Art Scholl(1931-1985)

Art Scholl was an American aerobatic pilot, aerial cameraman, flight instructor and educator from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. During the 1980s, he worked as a stunt pilot in several films such as "To Be or Not to Be" (1983) and "Flashpoint". In 1985, he was killed in an aviation accident while taking part in the shooting of the aviation-themed film "Top Gun" (1986).As a young man, Scholl earned a degree in aeronautics from the California State University, San Jose, and a master's degree at California State University, Los Angeles. By the 1960s, he started working as a professor of aeronautics at San Bernardino Valley College. He remained there for nearly two decades, eventually serving as the head of the Department of Aeronautics.Scholl had a side career as a commercial aerobatic pilot. He regularly flew a pair of modified de Havilland Canada DHC-1 Chipmunk aircraft, renamed "Super Chipmunks". He performed for an estimated audience of 80 million people over 20 years of appearances in aerobatic shows.In the late 1970s, Scholl established his own aerobatics school and maintenance facility at Flabob Airport in Riverside, California. In 1978, he moved his school to a new facility at the Rialto Municipal Airport in Rialto, California. In the new location, he produced several highly successful air shows, attracting hundreds of thousands of spectators.Scholl died during the filming of "Top Gun" when his Pitts S-2 camera plane failed to recover from a spin and plunged into the Pacific Ocean. He had entered the spin intentionally in order to capture it on film using on-board cameras. Observers watched the plane continue to spin as it descended past the planned recovery altitude. . The plane impacted the ocean about 5 miles (8 km) off the coast, near Carlsbad, California. The exact cause of the crash was never determined. Neither the aircraft nor Scholl's body were ever recovered.