Currently Owned by: Craig A. Freeman

STATUS: Destroyed August 2, 1988

LOCATION: Odessa, TX

William Foley requested an N-# that ended in "MM" on March 2, 1969, apparently at the request of its first "real" owner.

Schempp-Hirth sold it first to Motorless Flight Enterprises of Glastonbury, CT on April 3, 1969, and it was almost immediately - on May 26, 1969 - sold to Wylie "Moon" Mullen, Jr. MD, of Joliet, IL for $8,260. According to Burt Compton, Dr. Mullen may still be in the Chicago area; he flew in National contests ca. 1969-1970.

On April 1, 1970, Mullen sold it to Airleasco/Michael S. Greenwald of Joliet, IL.

There follows a curious series of "sales"; on February 20, 1972, two different documents were executed. One was a Bill of Sale from Michael S. Greenwald to a partnership of Eric and Neil Greenwald; the other was a re-registration that included all three (Michael as well as Eric and Neil - described as "minor children"). Finally, on March 26, 1972 a Bill of Sale transferred ownership from Neil and Eric Greenwald to Charles H. Whitmore of Plainwell, MI and Lachlan Ohman of Bryan, OH.

They flew it for about three years before selling it on February 1, 1975 to George F. Metts and Robert Eli of Georgetown, TX. It was George Metts that requested on April 11, 1975 a change in tail number to N158WT. But on September 11 of that same year, Robert Eli bought out Metts’ share and became sole owner. Again, almost immediately (December 19, 1975), Eli sold the plane to Albert G. Stirling of Friendswood, TX. (Stirling moved first to Brian, TX and then in 1981 to College Station, TX.)

Stirling flew it almost nine years in all, selling it on March 28, 1984 to Robert G. Olson of Houston, TX and Mark L. Duckworth of Waller, TX.

On April 20, 1989, Duckworth sold his share to Fred Blair of Houston, TX. Fred had an incident on August 2,1989 when he encountered some extremely severe turbulence on the leading edge of a squall line North of Lubbock, TX and the tail broke off, just in front of the horizontal stabilizer. He bailed out at about 6500 ft MSL and the ship landed across the road from him. (See NSTB Summary Report FTW89LA142.) He subsequently discussed the incident with Dick Johnson, who was exploring reported problems of high speed tail flutter; Fred allows that his situation was generated at low speed, but in extreme turbulence. (The ship was NOT one of the VTC variants, by the way.)