Marine team designs and flies homemade, muscle-powered plane

(EXCERPT) By Linda McIntosh COMMUNITY NEWS WRITER

October 25, 2003

CAMP PENDLETON – Gunnery Sgt. Clark Howard had never piloted a plane.
He was afraid of heights.

But that did not stop him from entering a flying contest.

Last month, Howard and several comrades competed in Flugtag, a one-day
flying contest in Santa Monica that pitted 32 teams against each other
in homemade flying machines powered only by muscle.

The moments before takeoff were intense.

The Marine Team from Camp Pendleton did a prelaunch routine of
marching, push-ups, moon walk and monkey rolls.

Howard climbed into the cockpit of his 100-pound flying machine made
of chicken wire, papier-mâché and wood.

His three teammates sprinted and pushed the craft off the Santa Monica
Pier in front of 50,000 spectators.

"We kept running until we ran out of runway," Sgt. Manu...

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Otis Willie
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The American War Library
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