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Narrative: The WP-3D slammed into an updraft/downdraft/updraft triplet which wrenched the aircraft violently from 20 mph up, to 22 mph down, to 45 mph up again, all while the horizontal winds peak at 185 mph (298 km/hr). The force on the plane goes from 3 g’s downward to 6 g’s up (1 g = the force of gravity). Even items which were fastened down, such as a 200 pound life raft, are torn loose and sent careening around the cabin. One of the aircraft’s four engines suffered a flameout. Just then they enter the calm of Hugo’s eye, the pilots pull the plane out of its dive 880 feet above the raging ocean surface, a loss of 620 feet in just seconds. The aircraft remained grounded for the rest of the 1989 hurricane season.