Part 77, page 137

Transcript

The scan is the source; the transcript is machine-generated from it.

[guess: Turning] Shot Beijing Weekend

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Is it a bird? Is it a plane?

The pensioner plunges

When the average man reaches the ripe old age of 71, he might expect a small party, perhaps a big cake or a slurpy bowl of longevity noodles.

But Sheridan Peterson is not what you might call your average man.

For Peterson's idea of a 71st birthday celebration was to throw himself out of a high-flying aeroplane.

He attempted his birthday freefall parachute jump at the Beijing Aero Sports School in Baishan, Changping County recently.

The result?

A few bruises, plus a fourth generation Californian became the oldest person to ever make a parachute jump in China, according to Zhang Angang, the school's head aero sports coach.

"I felt fine until the 'chute opened," Peterson said.

"I was stunned to see that the canopy had only a 28-foot circumference. I had been told that it was a 34-foot canopy.

"I felt certain that I would surely break my ankles: I mean I weigh over 200 pounds.

"Although it was the worst landing I've ever made — and I've made some bad ones — I only bruised my feet."

Peterson has made a total 262 freefalls. This particular jump was his first in, oh, about 30 years.

The last one was in Viet Nam in 1967.

Peterson first visited China in the fall of 1946 as a 19-year-old US Marine. For two days, he was stationed at Qingdao, the port city of China's eastern province of Shandong, better known as Tsingtao for the beer brewed there. He was in Shanghai for three days. What he saw in those five days left a lasting impression.

He returned 32 years later in 1978, as a tourist, right after the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976).

He saw people clad in drab blue and grey uniforms but appearing well fed, a big change from 1946.

His third sojourn was in 1987 as an instructor at the Civil Aviation Institute at Tianjin's international airport.

The following year, he taught a few months in Beijing at the College of Economic Management.

Two years ago, he returned for the fourth time.

"Each time I come back, China seems like an entirely different country. Things are changing at such a rapid pace especially in Beijing, the capital city," he said.

Of the past 32 years, Peterson has spent 30 of them in Asia and the Middle East as a training director for multinational corporations.

Peterson, a fourth generation Californian who grew up on a farm near Santa Rosa north of San Francisco, also took out two and a half years to write a book protesting US involvement in the Viet Nam War.

He made his first parachute jump with the US Forest Service at Missoula, Montana in 1952.

He made 30 jumps into wilderness areas throughout the Northwest and Pacific Coast.

In 1962, he organized the Boeing Aircraft Company's Sky Diving Club and was safety officer at the Issaqua Sky Port in Seattle. In 1965, while teaching at Clark Air Base in the Philippines, Peterson jumped with four members of the Clark Sky Diving Club to set a new record in Southeast Asia for the highest night delayed freefall.

Employed as a vocational training director for a construction conglomerate in Viet Nam, he was president of the Saigon Sport Parachute Club, "Nay Du," from 1965 to 1970. The club members jumped with Viet Nam's national skydiving team.

"Those were the best jumps I ever made," Peterson said. "We used the H-35 Stikorsky Helicopter. It was so great. Twenty of us could step out into space at the same time."

After his bruising, record-breaking parachute jump, perhaps Peterson will retire gracefully and take up gardening. And if he needs an adrenalin rush, there's always the odd game of bingo, right?

Yeah, right.

"I'd like to make a bungee jump at Shidu in Beijing's southwestmost suburb," Peterson said with a broad smile.

"No kidding."

by Xiao Chen

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DB Cooper-33733