A Gift of Wings, Too?

Was the podcast episode number changed
 for any future reason guys?-)

MU Podcast #23.19 Jim Bruton

I listened to the latest 'Mysterious Universe' podcast (the free part that is) featuring the author of the book, 'The In Between: A Trip of a Lifetime' yesterday, and Jim Bruton's NDE from a plane crash reminded me of Richard Bach's NDE from a plane crash, which I wrote about in these recent posts -
Life with my Guardian Angel?

Jonathan Livingston Seagull Came to Richard Bach From Out of the Blue?

Fiction Prediction, "Flight Shame"and 'A Gift of Wings'?

The bizarre thing is, that after I finished reading ' A Gift of Wings' last October, I found an old hang-gliding brochure which I was given the day I threw my wedding ring in the ocean from the Cape Byron lookout back around 2014.
They were taking people on tandem hang-gliding flights around Cape Byron that day and a young lady handed me this brochure on the walk back to the car.
I was seriously thinking about asking my brother for a lend of the money so I could go up for a flight with this guy doing the sky tours.
Love on the Rocks ... A Fool's Journey?

But when I looked at the guy flying around with a customer in the tandem bag, a thought entered my mind like, what if this guy lost control as he was coming into land and he crashed into the trees before landing on the beach, and I was left with a broken back, or a permanent head injury?
I wasn't scared of a quick death, but losing my legs, or laying in a hospital bed brain dead scared the crap out of me.
I decided to give it a miss that day and just go have lunch at the brewery with my brother and see a movie, as we had planned.
But I took the brochure home with me as a reminder to think it over and maybe come back another day.

So last November, after finally reading Richard Bach's book 'A Gift of Wings', which I had originally bought secondhand at a store down in Byron Bay, and then watching my DVD copy of 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull', I was all fired up and determined to take up the offer from 2014, and pay for a flight round Cape Byron to see what flying like a bird would be like.

So, I dug out the old brochure to make a booking but found out the hang-gliding website was no more.
I figured the company had gone out of business or changed names, so I did a search on my computer for hang gliding tour operators in Byron Bay, but stumbled across some rather chilling news-headlines from the end of October 2019 -
Lennox Head hang-gliding incident leaves instructor dead, passenger in critical condiction

One dead, another critical after
hang gliding accident at Lennox Head

Oddly enough, today when I keyed up the old news story link, in the current news story side bar was another aircraft fatality in New South Wales.

Richard Nicholls, 26, was involved in a
hang-gliding crash at Pat Morton Lookout

Unfortunately, after much searching, I found out the instructor who died was the bloke I was trying to hitch a ride with last year, and probably the same guy flying around as I threw my wedding ring into the ocean that day, too.
An Irish tourist named Richard (of all names) was seriously hurt as a result of a spur of the moment decision, like I was about to make back in 2014 and again last year, which has proved a very bad life choice for him.
I know that you can get killed or maimed for life doing almost anything in this lifetime, but I'm keeping my feet on the ground from now on, where I can, and without going on "joy-flights".

Flying is for the birds, I reckon ... from now on.

First time hang-glider holds on for dear life when pilot forgot to attach him