80
Screaming Lord Salba shot
and slid over every inch of cement
below eleven o'clock.
TOP: Structural perspective of a skate
dream, five stories below ground zero
RIGHT PAGE: Master pipe-fitter.
Steve Alba, reaches for the edge of the sky.
INSET: Card carrying Badlands resident.
Tim Galvin, wheels back towards the
entrance after gaining some
backside height
heard the story of how the fantastic
discovery had been made.
Fernando first read of the pipes in August
of '83, in a government-owned newspaper
that praised the illustrious Mexican leaders
for their wisdom and foresight in deciding
to build the pipes. He had met Dan while
in Phoenix on a search for front mags to
grace his way bad Chevy. Moped had
helped him lower the cruise machine and
install the green dingle balls which hung
from the ceiling. In return, Moped had gain-
ed the nickname "Low-ped" and insight as
to the whereabouts of the giant pipes.
Moped convinced his friends to brave
bands of bantitos and Federales and com-
mence an excursion to the land of tequila
and tamales.
They now drove along a dirt road to the
main highway, with images of the great
subterranean pipeline, six stories under-
ground, dancing in their heads. From pipe
level, looking up, all that could be seen was
a round, blue patch of sky which an occa-
sional bird flew across, and the tall, rickety
wooden staircase that descended from
ground level.
The hero of the day remained Tim Galvin,
the man with the foot tough enough to send
a football flying out of the fifty foot hole in
the ground.
Sounds of reverberating shouts and the
feeling of going with a twenty-four-foot high
flow dominated the subconscious dreams
of all the riders for the next week.
A few days later, the voice of Steve Alba
greeted Fernando on the telephone. "We're
coming back this weekend," said Salb.
"Can't stay away." Sure enough, the very
next weekend Salba, Rob Roskopp and
Keith Meek arrived to rip and tear, along with
a photo and video crew from Santa Cruz to
record it all for the benefit of mankind.
As before, Screaming Lord Salba shot
and slid over every inch of cement below
eleven o'clock. He pasted stickers on the
upper seam that was so high it hurt one's
neck just looking at it. Salba thrust long
frontside slides from too far up there and
twisted gnarly ones in an unbroken chain.
Keith Meek cruised the cavern in a cool
but aggressive surf style, punching in
backsides at considerable altitudes.
Robskopf dug the whole scene, weaving
the length of the pipe like a seamstress
gone mad. He reached downright insane
heights.
Great clouds of dust arose as the riders
rose higher, reducing visibility and creating
the dreaded dust booger. The question of:
"Is this shit bad for us?" presented itself,
but Fernando convinced most everyone that
the dust was harmless because it came
from a sacred source.
It finally had a chance to settle when the
crew once more departed, and soon.
enough, they would return. For that magic
moment, pipe, dust and skaters waited to
be buried forever. Under the Mexican plains
of the Sonoran desert.