Freeport daredevil still skydiving after 30 years

Moe Viletto's toes curl forward as he steps to the edge and peers downward at the passing Matchbox cars.

There is no turning back.

In a matter of seconds, he will take the plunge. Zero to 60 miles per hour in three seconds. In 10 seconds, he'll hit 120 mph.

The roof of the skyscraper will get smaller as he falls.

He'll pull a cord and a parachute will open. It will break his fall and save his life.

Viletto will not close his eyes one time.

Why does he do this• Besides the rush of falling and the risk of his parachute pack remaining closed, why does he continue to float through the air and perform the sport of B.A.S.E.-jumping over and again?

"I do it for fun," he said. "The best jumps are the ones when I'm by myself. I know I could fall to my death, and no one would know. Or, I could obtain a minor injury that could be fatal. I like that, it intensifies the situation. That's why I don't even take a cell phone with me. It heightens my senses and makes me more aware of things.

"That's how I live."

B.A.S.E. stands for Building, Antenna, Span, Earth, Viletto said. He said his curious and dangerous hobby is now considered a sport. Competition is fierce, not just with other divers, but with the elements.

His landing pad could be a sidewalk, street, parking lot, pond or roof top . It depends on where he chooses to land that day.

Today, he is performing a stunt for business purposes. Tomorrow, he'll do it for pleasure.

"You're in the moment," he said. "When you're up there, you're not thinking about paying the bills or whether you have to put gas in your car. You get visuals. If you jump from a building, it's window, window, window, window. If you jump from a red-and-white smoke stack, it's red, white, red, white, red, white ... pink."

The 5-foot-6, 125-pound Viletto plays chutes, with no ladders. He is a professional stuntman and a skilled skydiver who has been sailing through the sky for 31 years.

When Viletto enters the Drop Zone, as he calls it, which coincidentally is the name of one of the many films he has been a part of, he feels free. He said he would rather be hanging out the door of a plane than driving a car.

"When I am on the edge of a building, I am only trying to kill myself," he said. "When I am in a car, everyone is trying to kill me. I don't feel in total control in my car."

Viletto said he has made over 3,500 sky-dives and has leaped from over 700 cliffs, buildings and other fixed objects. He has jumped from smoke stacks, mountain tops and the apex of ski lifts. He has dived into the massive 1,400-foot deep Cave of the Swallows in Aquismon, Mexico, nine times in fact.

"I made my first jump when I was 20," said Viletto, a self-taught B.A.S.E.-jumper and parachutist who first began leaping off tall objects as a small boy in Freeport. "I started out with a backpack with a garbage bag in it as my chute."

Viletto is performing stunts on movie sets, but its real life when he leans over the edge of a mountain or skyscraper.

Although some believe Viletto, 51, is out of the movie business, he strongly denies that notion. He has performed stunts in the big-screen productions of "Apollo 13" (1995), "Operation Dumbo Drop" (1994), "The Puppet Masters" (1994) and Hot Shots, Part Deaux" (1992).

Viletto also has played minor roles in films. He once portrayed a 12-year-old boy. Later, he was a curvaceous woman.

He also has been in commercials for Mead backpacks, Mountain Dew, Sony and Yamaha.

"There are fewer on-camera jobs for me out there, but I am still available," he said.

Viletto made $110,000 for one movie. He spent it in three months, sharing some with his family and putting much of it back into the sport.

"I was down to $4,000," he said. "That's all I needed."

Viletto also has made a significant impact on the sport itself. He designed the now popular Para-Pak, a backpack strictly for skydivers which includes a tent, fishing pole and other survival tools necessary for extended trips to exotic jumping spots.

"I want to be shot out of a cannon or become a human sling-shot and then open a parachute," Viletto said. "Those are my next goals."

Viletto was seen last Thursday evening during the 9th annual Freeport International Baseball Invitational at James Swartz Memorial Field in Freeport. He dropped some 3,000 feet from a plane and landed near center field as part of a contest and exhibition. He landed on a number and the person with a matching ticket won $500.

Viletto runs the Tailored For Survival parachute shop near the corner of 5th Street and Market in Freeport - the old liquor store. He lives a quiet life -- "People say I am the crazy guy," he said. But his exploits are as fascinating as they are unbelievable.

Moe is no Stooge. He is a trained professional who will do whatever it takes.

This is a man who has dressed in disguise and sneaked buildings to make jumps. Somehow, he made it past security, up hundreds of stairs to his point of descent. He often made his 500-foot leap back to the ground at 2 or 3 a.m.

"We dressed up like bums, and searched through a dumpster one time," he said. "We found some blueprints and figured out a way to get into the building. We crawled through a ventilation shaft to a stairway."

When he is done jumping for the day, Viletto returns to his Freeport shop, which doubles as his home. There he can view hundreds of framed photos on a large wall just inside the shop. He can re-live the moments - the less-than-a-minute journeys that took months to set up.

He gets back to his prized possessions, his nine sewing machines, including one that cost over $12,000.

Viletto recently moved back to Freeport after living 20-plus years in California. He wanted to be closer to his family.

A man with such a complex hobby lives just as simple and eccentric a life.

He operates his shop, building and repairing parachute and hang-gliding equipment. Although it may not seem like he would be busy due to the lack of a local mass following, he is. He sews, he stitches he molds the perfect chutes.

Only the best ones belong among the clouds. "It is a very equipment-intensive sport," he said.

"I don't own a computer, I never wanted one," Viletto said. "And my VCR is still blinking 12 o'clock. When I got out of school, I bought 30 pair of blue jeans and 30 T-shirts. I do laundry once every three months, four times a year. I sleep in a sleeping bag in the winter and on a piece of foam in the summer.

"I have used the same two forks and two spoons most of my life."

And, by the way, Viletto said he has never had insurance.

"Only when I did movies," he said. "Because I had to."

He doesn't celebrate holidays.

"Because that is what you're supposed to do," he said. "On Mother's Day, I don't tell my mother, 'Happy Mother's Day.' I tell her that every day."

As far as injuries go, Viletto has been fortunate. He has had fellow-divers fall to their deaths, but he keeps on. The pursuit of the perfect spot and conditions reduce the risk of disaster.

It took Viletto 500 to 700 tries to make 130 building jumps over a two-year span in Los Angeles.

"It took 22 years before I got hurt," he said. "I sprained my wrist. I was jumping off a bridge in a desert in Nothing, Ariz. Population four."

Viletto has had fewer injuries. His only other injury came when he was leaping from a 170-foot cliff and his chute came open early and hit a wall. He sprained his ankle.

Viletto's next jump could be his last. He realizes that as he pulls the cord. His chute pops open and he falls back to earth.

So, Moe, what is your favorite jump?

He thinks for a moment, does a panorama of his wall of photos.

"I love the last one I made. I was living and loving that moment."

Brutal honesty from a man who believes he can fly.

The Villeto file