Hooker Jams Poles In Ceiling at Airport

[Bubba PV]

This often happens? The photo is priceless. Bubba

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/s ... 23,00.html

Steve Hooker pole-axedArticle from: Font size: Decrease Increase Email article: Email Print article: Print Submit comment: Submit comment By Mike Hurst

March 02, 2009 12:00am

WE apologise for the delay to your journey today . . . but some vaulting poles got jammed into the ceiling and stopped the escalators.

That was the unlikely scenario confronting commuters at Sydney Airport yesterday, and the red-faced owner of the sticks in question was Olympic gold medallist Steve Hooker.

Having been slugged $240 for excess baggage and then been made by airport officials to carry the 5.20m-long fibreglass poles themselves, Australia's top vaulters faltered under the unwieldy load.

This was no way to treat any Olympian, much less Hooker, a top bloke and the first Australian male athlete to win gold for 40 years.

Hooker blogged live with The Daily Telegraph last Friday. Read his responses here.

Hooker's training partner, Paul "Budgie" Burgess, world ranked No. 2 in 2006, was carrying a set of poles owned by Hooker on his shoulder but they tilted as he tried to avoid a glass sign on the ceiling above the escalator.

"It was pretty shocking when it happened because it all happened really quickly," Hooker told Confidential yesterday.

"There was a bit of a glass ledge and Budgie avoided that with the poles and he was trying to do the right thing by turning around to tell me to avoid the glass and that's when his poles went into the wall.

"He was actually trying to do a really good thing, but it didn't work out that well for him.

"And then all of a sudden the poles were just into the wall and then wedged into the step on the escalator and then it was all out of control - they all started to go up into the roof and the poles in the bag started to bend."

Fortunately, some quick-thinking commuter pressed the emergency stop button - otherwise the six poles, each valued at $800, would eventually have shattered.

Hooker said the poles were eventually freed 45 minutes later when a technician came and reversed the escalator.

The athletes meanwhile had missed their flight to Melbourne where they will compete in the Melbourne Track Classic on Thursday night.

The whole insulting episode brought Hooker down with a thud after he starred in Saturday night's Sydney Track Classic, winning the pole vault with a leap of 5.95m - which would have won every gold medal in Olympic history.

Hooker said Burgess was OK, if a little shaken up. "Budgie's all right. He was a bit shocked initially. It was pretty full-on," Hooker said.

[rainbowgirl28]

LOL!!!

That's they they wouldn't let us carry poles on the escalator when we were at the Hilton/Grand Sierra in Reno. When I saw this headline I knew an escalator was involved!

[rainbowgirl28]

[Bubba PV]

So much for special treatment for a national hero - he had to pay $240 for excess baggage for the poles on Qantas, the airline of Oz? Bubba

[smokinvaulter1]

I believe anthony Curran did this also. Thats funny though

[rainbowgirl28]

So much for special treatment for a national hero - he had to pay $240 for excess baggage for the poles on Qantas, the airline of Oz? Bubba

Yeah and Hooker is like the Michael Phelps of Australia. It's not like they wouldn't have known who he was.

[Bubba PV]

In 1977 I was traveling to Mexico City with Billy Olsen and Frank Estes and paid the baggage guy $20 extra to make sure my poles got on the plane safely. When I arrived at baggage claim I found he cut them in half to make sure they would fit. To make things worse, I borrowed one of Billy's poles and broke it on my first jump. Bubba

[KirkB]

Bubba, REALLY!!!?

I'd heard that story before, but I thought it was just an Urban Legend!!!

I mean, how could anybody be that stupid?

Did you get your $20 back? Guess not, eh?

Is that the whole story, or did you complain, get compensated, or what? I just don't want to perpetuate this story without the full facts!

Kirk

[Bubba PV]

It's true. I can't blame the guy as he did what I asked. Unfortunately he wasn't in Mexico City when I landed. They also lost my gym bag with my spikes in it. One of only two nh's in my career. I tried to explain but they "no habla englis".

Other highlights – we had a long jump contest off the 10m platform in the Olympic diving pool. The goal was to make it in the shallow end. Only Billy made it.

At night we pooled our Spanish together enough to get invited into some parties. Every time I went to Mexico City as an athlete we were treated like kings by everyone. One time I spent a couple of days with a major sports reporther and he gave me incredible tours. I remember a beautiful and hospitable city and feel very blessed to have gotten to go 6 times. Bubba

[ashcraftpv]

does that sign say "Way out" ?

The only cool poles at airport story I have is almost hitting LL Cool J in the head with our poles at the baggage claim in LAX....

[rainbowgirl28]

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/s ... 23,00.html

Why Steve Hooker picture is one for the vault

By Tom Smithies and Mike Hurst
March 03, 2009 12:00am

OLYMPIC gold medallist Steve Hooker might have seen his equipment go through the roof of Sydney Airport but at least the champion pole vaulter won't have to worry about the damage.

As The Daily Telegraph revealed yesterday, Hooker watched in amazement on Sunday as his vaulting poles, longer than 5m, got jammed between the escalators and the roof.

They were carried by Hooker's training partner Paul Burgess and would have snapped but for the quick thinking of another passenger who hit the stop button on the escalator.

Hooker blogged live with The Daily Telegraph last Friday. Read his responses here.

It left a sizeable hole in the ceiling of the domestic terminal but Sydney Airport have confirmed they will sort the repairs out - which leaves Hooker free to concentrate on attacking the world record in his hometown of Melbourne at the World Athletics Tour meet at Olympic Park on Thursday night.

Unbelievably, getting the poles around is an occupational hazard for the man with the second highest jump in the world - and something he has had to learn to live with.

He often has to pay excess baggage fees on the poles, though rarely out of his new base of Perth, and carry them on the plane himself - hence Sunday's mishap.

He said: "It happens everywhere in the world. I'm not a prima donna. The poles have to go on the plane so we do whatever it takes to make sure they do get on the plane."

The Olympian keeps a set in Europe, a set in America and a set in Australia to avoid the issue arising too often, and it's said that he now knows exactly which models of plane can and can't accommodate the 15kg bag of poles.

Remarkably, Hooker has yet to add a major sponsor since the Olympics, though his management company have a string of deals in the pipeline and hope to start making announcements within weeks.

To help things along, The Daily Telegraph approached both Virgin Blue and Qantas yesterday to see if Hooker's valuable cargo could not be accommodated within some sort of travel deal but neither company was able to respond by last night.

[powerplant42]

So would they really have snapped, or what? Did the get wedged into some sort of girder or something like that?

Oh and Bubba... I think that's the best vaulter's nightmare story I've ever heard!!!