Flight over Pelican Point

Alone in his boat, the burly driver was grinning like a schoolboy. On a trial run, his speedometer had climbed past 260 m.p.h. as he shot his new jet-powered, aluminum-hulled Tempo-Alcoa over the startling blue surface of Nevada's Pyramid Lake. Driver Les Staudacher knew that the sleek water monster he had designed was ready for an official try at the world record of 260.35 m.p.h. held by Britain's Donald Campbell and his Bluebird.

Heading back to his pits, Staudacher sighted a photographer on shore, decided exuberantly to give him a good shot at the boat's bellowing speed. He opened up his J35 engine, the same model that drives the Air Force's F89 fighter, and Tempo-Alcoa zoomed up to 180 m.p.h. Then he cut the engine. Two miles ahead, a small peninsula called Pelican Point jutted out into the water. The distance seemed safe enough. The boat had earlier slowed from 260 m.p.h. to a stop in less than a mile. But now a sudden breeze stirred sharp ruffles on Pyramid Lake. The chop broke the normal suction grabbing at the hull, turned the water into a fast-running surface. Tempo-Alcoa did not slow, instead seemed to take off at a speed that made the rudder all but useless. Says Staudacher: "It was like skidding on ice. When I saw that rocky shore coming, I believed this was the end of my life."

Staudacher crashed into Pelican Point at 150 m.p.h. The boat missed a shelf of rocks by 18 in., rose majestically and hurtled some 150 ft. through the air, came down on a bank of loam and sand that was about the only spot on the peninsula not covered by rocks, skidded nearly into the water on the far side of Pelican Point before stopping.

When Staudacher found that he was still alive and unhurt, he climbed lightly out of the cockpit. The sight was nearly too much for old friend and fellow speed-man, Guy Lombardo, orchestra leader, onetime hydroplane driver and half owner of Tempo-Alcoa. "I expected to see crumpled metal and a crumpled body," says Lombardo. Sprinting toward the wreck, down Pelican Point, Lombardo fell heavily on the rocky shore, cut his leg so painfully that he had to be driven back to Reno. Behind the wheel: nerveless Les Staudacher.

At week's end Staudacher, 47, had his badly damaged, 31 1/2-ft. boat up for repairs at his woodworking shop back in Kawkawlin. Mich., where he earns a good living by turning out church furniture, enjoys a reputation as the nation's finest builder of wooden-hulled, unlimited hydroplanes. As soon as repairs are complete and the water is right (probably next spring), Staudacher will give Tempo-Alcoa an all-out try at Campbell's record, feels sure she will break it. Says he wryly: "She runs much better on water than she does on land."

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