Chute

A groundswell of support grew Tuesday online and at office water coolers across America for a JetBlue flight attendant who pulled off one of the most dramatic "take this job and shove it" acts in recent memory. In fact, the new phrase for quitting a job in dramatic fashion just might be "sliding the chute. " After reportedly trying to deal with an unruly passenger on a parked aircraft Monday, JetBlue Airways Corp. flight attendant Steven Slater used the plane's intercom system to curse out the passenger.

If you've ever wondered why airlines dim lights upon landing, why it's important to put your oxygen mask on or what it's like to jump onto an inflatable emergency slide, British Airways has just the ticket. It's the BA Flight Safety Awareness Course ( www.ebaft.com/fsa/fsa.htm ), a modified version of the training that flight crews get after they're hired and then once a year thereafter. It's a fascinating way to spend a day in London. You get to slide down that emergency chute.

A San Diego woman making a nighttime jump over Perris was killed in the first minute of the new year when her parachute failed to open. Gloria Radford, 32, plunged to earth just a minute after midnight near the Perris Valley Airport and Parachuting Center, a spokesman for the Riverside County coroner said. Radford, her husband and 20 other jumpers were trying to form an aerial star at midnight to mark the beginning of the new year, said Deputy Coroner Rick Bogan.

As take-this-job-and-shove-it moments go, Steven Slater's was epic. After allegedly tussling with a passenger aboard a JetBlue flight that had just landed at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, the veteran flight attendant finally had enough. He commandeered the public address system, according to news accounts, hurled a few profanities, grabbed a beer (or beers), deployed the emergency chute and slid into infamy. That Slater was almost instantly considered a folk hero for his dramatic flame-out shouldn't be surprising.

A 20-year-old woman survived a half-mile fall on her first parachute jump when the chute opened only partially, police in this British Columbia town said Monday. Heather Jones of North Vancouver was listed in stable condition at Vancouver General Hospital with multiple injuries, a day after her chute failed to open completely. She landed in a farmer's field near this Fraser Valley town about 35 miles east of Vancouver. Jones had just finished training for her first jump, police said.

Rescuers on Wednesday removed the body of an apparent jogger who wandered off the Baden-Powell trail in the Angeles National Forest and fell about 2,000 feet down an ice chute. "It looks like he was jogging because he was dressed in sweats and a T- shirt," said Lt. Terry Lewis of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. The man, who was about 30, carried no identification, Lewis said. He said the body looked as though it had hit several big rocks on the way down the chute.

Aided by crampons and an ice ax, Norma Rodarte of Monterey Park climbs a snow chute up to Trail Crest on her way to summit Mt. Whitney. "We were hiking the main Whitney Trail although it became a bit of a mountaineers route," John Rodarte says of the June 25 ascent.

I can't believe I conquered Skyline (8,000 feet of gain in 12 miles from the desert floor in Palm Springs to the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway station). There was a great deal of snow and, in parts, ice on the trail. I lost my footing several times crossing one chute. I was scared, big-time scared. But I'm ready to do it again. Rob Madrigal Rialto

As David Chute's article "Is 'Secret' 'Truman's' Precursor?" (June 8) reflects, "The Truman Show" blends elements that have appeared in other works concerned with a life observed ("The Secret Cinema" and MTV's "The Real World") or constructed and manipulated (a "Twilight Zone" episode and "The Prisoner"). To Chute's list could be added the PBS documentary series "An American Family," "The Conversation" and "Total Recall," among others. As timely as "Truman's" themes may be, the idea that our lives are actually a figment of someone's imagination appears in literature as early as 1871.

A Marine skydiver was reported in satisfactory condition after a parachuting accident at the opening football game for the University of Nevada-Reno and California State University, Fullerton. Staff Sgt. Richard Scriven, 28, stationed at the Pickle Meadows mountain warfare training camp near Bridgeport, Calif., lost control of his chute and hit the ground at the football stadium in Reno at an estimated 15- to-30 m.p.h.

Warning: In the event of excessive cabin pressure, your flight attendant may go completely ape. Unfortunately, that's what happened when an "air rage" incident sent Steven Slater sliding down a jet's emergency evacuation chute Monday — and might eventually send him to jail. A 20-year veteran flight attendant with JetBlue who sat on a committee dedicated to upholding the airline's in-flight values, Slater had such a bad day at the aerial office that he's become something of an international celebrity.

A groundswell of support grew Tuesday online and at office water coolers across America for a JetBlue flight attendant who pulled off one of the most dramatic "take this job and shove it" acts in recent memory. In fact, the new phrase for quitting a job in dramatic fashion just might be "sliding the chute. " After reportedly trying to deal with an unruly passenger on a parked aircraft Monday, JetBlue Airways Corp. flight attendant Steven Slater used the plane's intercom system to curse out the passenger.

The School on Heart's Content Road A Novel Carolyn Chute Atlantic Monthly Press: 384 pp., $24 So much begins with poverty. Here in the land of literature, we forget that sometimes. Carolyn Chute, beginning with her first novel 23 years ago, "The Beans of Egypt, Maine," and now, with "The School on Heart's Content Road," the first in a projected five-novel series, pushes it in our faces. Chute is not in the mincing-words business. She is not in the marketing business.

A tangled, torn parachute found buried last month was not the one used by plane hijacker D.B. Cooper when he bailed out of an airliner over the Pacific Northwest, the FBI said in Seattle. Investigators reached that conclusion after speaking with parachute experts, including Earl Cossey, who packed the chutes provided to Cooper that rainy November night in 1971.

Everybody out: I'm wondering why planes detained on the tarmac don't use those emergency chutes to get everyone off and into the airport. It beats sitting in a seat for 11 hours. Why wouldn't they do that? -- ERIN SCARLETT Oceanside, Calif. Answer: The mental picture of newly freed hostages, uh, I mean passengers, zipping down an emergency slide may bring a smile to your face, but such an exit is no laughing matter.

A flying instructor and his student were killed Monday when a small plane equipped with a safety parachute crashed northeast of Gen. William J. Fox Airfield in Lancaster. The two men, who authorities did not identify pending notification of relatives, were practicing takeoffs and landings just before their Cirrus SR20 aircraft went down at 1:42 p.m. in what Los Angeles County Sheriff's Lt. William Hindman called "open desert" near Avenue F and 40th Street West.

OFFICIALS with the U.S. Forest Service are warning Mt. Whitney hikers about glissading down ice chutes after an El Cerrito man died attempting the risky maneuver this month. Friends describe Stephen Tom, 45, as a cautious climber, but he was killed when he and another hiker slid down a chute to save time descending a 13,777-foot crest and arduous switchbacks.

Summer and salad are synonymous in my kitchen because salad is my staple warm weather food. I adore salads of every description, but throughout the years, one has emerged as a favorite. Making my Mediterranean Vegetable Salad is a yearly ritual, one I recently repeated on my first weekend at the beach. A Sunday lunch of barbecued chicken just did not seem complete without it, and even the teen-agers ate it approvingly.

Their performance wasn't perfect, but the Indianapolis Colts still are. Relying more on Peyton Manning and less on a sporadically vulnerable defense, the Colts kept their record unblemished with a 45-37 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday in Paul Brown Stadium. It was a masterful showing by Manning, who directed five touchdown drives on the Colts' first five possessions, rekindling memories of his record-setting passing torrent of 2004.