Wrong-Way Corrigan

April 12, 2012 10:06 PM

"I'm Douglas Corrigan," the man told a group of startled Irish airport workers who gathered around him when he landed his modified Curtiss Robin at Baldonnel Airport, in Dublin, on July 18, 1938. "Just got in from New York. Where am I? I intended to fly to California."
posted by ocherdraco (20 comments total)

PIR, gnorW yaW.
posted by pjern at 10:14 PM on April 12, 2012 [2 favorites]

I learned of this historic figure via a cartoon version on the Bullwinkle show, Peter 'WrongWay' Peachfuzz (who, for the purpose of the cartoon plotting, went the wrong way constantly, and whose name was based on the Business Manager for Jay Ward Productions, Peter Peich).

But that Obit was from 1995. Otherwise he would've been 105 today. Which is a LONG way off.
posted by oneswellfoop at 10:28 PM on April 12, 2012 [2 favorites]

Yes, the obit is from 1995. I didn't post it as an obit post, but because the obit is a great story.
posted by ocherdraco at 10:28 PM on April 12, 2012 [3 favorites]

Thanks for this. I always think of the little mouse pilot from Richard Scarry's "What Do People Do All Day" when I hear about Wrong-Way Corrigan.
posted by not_on_display at 10:57 PM on April 12, 2012 [1 favorite]

You know, I'm not surprised that it was all a cockamamie stunt-- and the Irish knew it too. "Is that your story, eh?" But they were easy-going enough, and Corrigan was charming enough, that they didn't care.

I wonder how this sort of thing would fly nowadays. Get it? Get it? But seriously... yeah. I think a modern-day version of Corrigan would be screwed.
posted by suburbanbeatnik at 11:00 PM on April 12, 2012

What a wonderful story.

After Corrigan looked over the plane, he decided not to do anything about the gas leak, since it would have taken him more than a week's work to remove the tank and make the repairs. He was eager to get going on his dream flight [...]

Why waste a week fixing your leaky gas tank when you can fly across the Atlantic with a leaky gas tank. Balls of steel, right there.
posted by no regrets, coyote at 11:09 PM on April 12, 2012 [6 favorites]

Corrigan Brothers - Wrongway Corrigan.
"He who has a Tates is lost".
posted by unliteral at 11:32 PM on April 12, 2012

I once took off from Heathrow intending to get to Dulles but ended up in Ireland. In my case it was with a few hundred others on a United flight that had an electrical short behind the stoves. Two days in a freezing cold Shannon airport thinking that while it sucked, it sucked less than the Atlantic would have. Dinner on the first night was in a rubbish hotel pub but the highlight was two locals saying "What's yer hurry?"
posted by srboisvert at 11:33 PM on April 12, 2012 [1 favorite]

Boy, he really pulled a boner.
posted by Snyder at 12:01 AM on April 13, 2012

I wonder how this sort of thing would fly nowadays. Get it? Get it? But seriously... yeah. I think a modern-day version of Corrigan would be screwed.

Well, not exactly "modern", but how about 18 year old Mathias Rust?

Mathias Rust (born July 1968 in Wedel, Schleswig-Holstein, West Germany) is a German aviator known for his illegal landing on May 28, 1987 near Red Square in Moscow. An amateur pilot, he flew from Finland to Moscow, being tracked several times by Soviet air defence and interceptors. The Soviet fighters never received permission to shoot him down, and several times he was mistaken for a friendly aircraft. He landed on Vasilevski Spusk next to Red Square near the Kremlin in the capital of the Soviet Union.

Rust's intentions, as he stated, were to create an "imaginary bridge" to the East, and he has claimed that his flight was intended to reduce tension and suspicion between the two Cold War sides.[1] Rust's flight through a supposedly impregnable air-defense system had great effect on the Soviet military and led to the firing of many senior officers, including Defence Minister Marshal of the Soviet Union Sergei Sokolov and the head of the Soviet Air Defense, former World War II fighter ace pilot Chief Marshal Alexander Koldunov. The incident aided Mikhail Gorbachev in the implementation of his reforms (by removing numerous military officials opposed to him), and reduced the prestige of the Soviet military among the population, thus helping bring an end to the Cold War.[1]

posted by jamjam at 12:20 AM on April 13, 2012 [15 favorites]

I just flew in from Finland and boy is your arms race tired.
posted by pracowity at 1:46 AM on April 13, 2012 [19 favorites]

In 1988 he was lured back into the limelight by an offer to display his plane at an air show...He was so enthusiastic that the show's organizers became alarmed. Although Mr. Corrigan had not flown since 1972, the organizers found it prudent to station guards on the plane's wings during his appearance at the exhibition and even discussed anchoring the tail of the plane by rope to a police car.

If that's how they treat you at the age of 80, you've lived well.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 2:20 AM on April 13, 2012 [21 favorites]

Ha, my grandmother (who was born in Ireland) used to say "wrong way, Corrigan" to me as a child whenever I was told to turn left but turned right because I didn't know the difference yet (also whenever I looked like I was heading toward something I shouldn't play with, like my grandfather's decorative axes). I still say it to people when they make a wrong turn. No one ever has any idea what I'm talking about.
posted by solotoro at 4:51 AM on April 13, 2012 [6 favorites]

I knew of the saying but I never knew this was a real guy. Awesome.
posted by DU at 6:09 AM on April 13, 2012

In 1988 he was lured back into the limelight by an offer to display his plane at an air show...He was so enthusiastic that the show's organizers became alarmed.

When I first read about this guy when I was a kid, I had never seen what he looked like, but for some reason, I imagined a 'placeholder' image for him: Burgess Meredith, grinning, giving some nameless government bureaucrat the finger.

I never knew about the air show, though. My first reaction to their efforts to prevent him from stealing his own plane was rebellious indignation and a desire to formulate a perhaps reckless and unwise plan to distract the guards and give him a chance to get back in his old plane and in the air again one last time, and damn the consequences.

Would've made a good 80s movie, though.
posted by chambers at 6:22 AM on April 13, 2012

I drove to the wrong airport once. That's sort of like this, right? Let me tell you, I did not drive straight into the heart of my wife.
posted by Naberius at 6:44 AM on April 13, 2012 [1 favorite]

I knew of the saying but I never knew this was a real guy. Awesome.

I knew it was a real guy, but I always thought he was just a horrible, horrible navigator. I had no idea he was brazenly flouting the authorities. Cool.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:49 AM on April 13, 2012

no regrets, coyote: "What a wonderful story.

After Corrigan looked over the plane, he decided not to do anything about the gas leak, since it would have taken him more than a week's work to remove the tank and make the repairs. He was eager to get going on his dream flight [...]

Why waste a week fixing your leaky gas tank when you can fly across the Atlantic with a leaky gas tank. Balls of steel, right there."

Or brains of shit.
posted by symbioid at 9:55 AM on April 13, 2012

It's pretty well established that brains and balls cannot operate concurrently.
posted by polyhedron at 3:55 PM on April 13, 2012

Is it really up to me to remind everyone of his small-screen namesake Wrongway Feldman?

I guess it is.
posted by bryon at 10:26 PM on April 13, 2012