So, it turns out that the motorcycle trip was not at ALL what I'd planned. What a surprise....
In any case, in some ways it was even better, but the damndest thing happened. My impatience got the better of me, and I didn't stop at all to take photos, even though I had the camera in a wonderful little backpack in the luggage carrier.
You see, I was either riding the bike, enjoying the scenery rushing past at near-light speed, or I was flying a kite, or wandering down the beach with a kite in my hand, or sitting at a restaurant, or setting up my tent, or doing my laundry, or......
So, the only photos I got were of the tall ships at Westport. Here.
And, later, after returning to Seattle, some delightful photos of fine young ladies playing volleyball on Labor Day.
The story? Well, it all starts in a fog really...
Monday, September 11, 2006
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Volleyball Labor Day
It's a hard thing to resist, photographing beautiful young girls. Sorry, know it's not appropriate to say that in some circles, but there you have it.
Here's a group of people who were playing at Golden Gardens one Labor Day, and whom I finally contacted through one of the players when I met him at Alki another day. He's not stupid...
Here's a group of people who were playing at Golden Gardens one Labor Day, and whom I finally contacted through one of the players when I met him at Alki another day. He's not stupid...
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Off Motorcycling
Going to be doing a bit of a ride in the next few days/week or so. Have decided that, given my incident of last weekend, and given that I'd already booked next week off, I'm going to jump on the old Goldwing and head down the Oregon coast.
I think I'm going to pack a tent, some camping gear, a few nice cameras, and maybe this laptop, plus a full selection of Prism kites, and then head for the beaches. Top that off with some suntan lotion, a few pairs of shorts and a bathing suit, and I think I'll be set for the week.
Will probably do a loop, heading inland in Southern Oregon and then coming up the two states inside the mountains, in the high desert country. That will give me an opportunity to stop off in the Horse Heaven Hills and photograph the Mustang II, talk to the farmer who might deliver it over to Seattle for me, and do some measuring and analysis.
Can't wait, and will try to make some postings enroute.
I think I'm going to pack a tent, some camping gear, a few nice cameras, and maybe this laptop, plus a full selection of Prism kites, and then head for the beaches. Top that off with some suntan lotion, a few pairs of shorts and a bathing suit, and I think I'll be set for the week.
Will probably do a loop, heading inland in Southern Oregon and then coming up the two states inside the mountains, in the high desert country. That will give me an opportunity to stop off in the Horse Heaven Hills and photograph the Mustang II, talk to the farmer who might deliver it over to Seattle for me, and do some measuring and analysis.
Can't wait, and will try to make some postings enroute.
It Had To Happen Some Day
Well, it finally happened. I bent some aluminum.
As always, with any accident/incident, there's a number of causes. Fortunately, it did NOT happen in the air, nor did it happen with an engine running, or the aircraft moving. It happened when my foot slipped, and I slammed to the ground while mounting/dismounting an aircraft on display at the Museum of Flight.
It was last Saturday, and I'd been there all day, working at the Aerobatics day. Getting off the right wing of the Zlin 242 I slipped, and slammed down full body weight on the right flap, tin canning it immediately.
Our sheet metal guys tell me that it's not damage that can't be repaired. And, there's some issues with re-rigging the flap, so on balance I got off pretty lucky. And of course, there's insurance, so I won't, fortunately, have to write a massive check. But I'm still mortified, and have replayed the incident over and over and over again in my mind.
Wish I could say that it hadn't happened, but it did, and that's that. And thank you to all the people who immediately asked me how I was, whether I'd been hurt myself. No, just my pride.
As always, with any accident/incident, there's a number of causes. Fortunately, it did NOT happen in the air, nor did it happen with an engine running, or the aircraft moving. It happened when my foot slipped, and I slammed to the ground while mounting/dismounting an aircraft on display at the Museum of Flight.
It was last Saturday, and I'd been there all day, working at the Aerobatics day. Getting off the right wing of the Zlin 242 I slipped, and slammed down full body weight on the right flap, tin canning it immediately.
Our sheet metal guys tell me that it's not damage that can't be repaired. And, there's some issues with re-rigging the flap, so on balance I got off pretty lucky. And of course, there's insurance, so I won't, fortunately, have to write a massive check. But I'm still mortified, and have replayed the incident over and over and over again in my mind.
Wish I could say that it hadn't happened, but it did, and that's that. And thank you to all the people who immediately asked me how I was, whether I'd been hurt myself. No, just my pride.
Monday, August 07, 2006
In The Pits
What a weekend, starting with hanging out with the Blue Angels for a morning breakfast Friday,
through working in our company booth, taking part in a flyby, and watching the hydroplane races and air shows from the top of the control tower, a place so secure you have to have about seventeen different levels of pass, plus a degree of chutzpah, just to get to.
I'm going to let the photos speak for themselves, as writing about this is not nearly as good as just seeing what it was.
Suffice to say that I'm not really happy with my photo skills, but some of them came out well, so that's progress.
through working in our company booth, taking part in a flyby, and watching the hydroplane races and air shows from the top of the control tower, a place so secure you have to have about seventeen different levels of pass, plus a degree of chutzpah, just to get to.
I'm going to let the photos speak for themselves, as writing about this is not nearly as good as just seeing what it was.
Suffice to say that I'm not really happy with my photo skills, but some of them came out well, so that's progress.
Speaking of Angels
Thanks to Karen Santa of Windermere Real Estate for arranging a pit pass for me Sunday at the hydroplane races. She's a sponsor of a boat, and graciously allowed me to do some photography that I otherwise would not have been able to get. And, in return, I took these photos of her.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
The Deep Blue Sky, Full Of Angels
OK, they're here, at Boeing Field, for the next four days. The US Navy Blue Angels, and what can be more exciting to a pilot than to be able to watch those guys from close up.
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Take A Deep Breath and Plunge In...
Through the immense generosity of a group of aviation friends, I have come to begin a new stage in my flying career, that of "aircraft builder".
With luck, persistence, and cash, lots of cash, I should at some time in the future have a hand in completing a kit-built Mustang II. The project is currently sitting abandoned in a barn in Eastern Washington, where we left it two years ago when I first saw it. At that time I took some cellphone photos of it, and as soon as I track down the hard drive they reside on I'll forward them on to this blog. However, here's a link to some photos I took of a Mustang II a few weeks ago at the Arlington EAA airshow. This is what my pile of airplane parts might look like after I put a lot of sweat and a lot of cash into the mixture, liberally dosed with a lot of time.
In the meantime, the plan is as follows:
Do the documentation with the current owner, releasing he and his heirs and successors from any and all liability pertaining to my further messing with the project.
(Addendum) Went to my local EAA meeting last night, found a resource, a gentleman who had a copy of a presentation given a few years ago by an aviation liability lawyer. My source also has copies of the contracts the lawyer drew up for him when he sold (that is, when my source sold) his own plane (sorry, collection of aircraft parts...)
(Addendum) Found the hard drive tucked away, and bought an external cover for it, powered it up, and found the cellphone photos from so many years ago. Here they are. Each needs some comments. The workmanship on the cowl is so poor that it's a full reject. So too will be some of the other cosmetic work, but the basic assembly workmanship is at least passable, at best good.
Haul the aircraft, the parts, the plans, and the dust, over from the dryland farm country to a storage area as yet to be determined. I hope that storage area is somewhere near my place of employment.
Start with a clean sheet or two of paper, an A&P or two, an afternoon or twenty, and review the work that has been completed so far. This analysis will lead me to one of two decisions, which are, of course, proceed or abandon.
If proceed, then I'll be making myself MUCH more active in my local EAA chapter, of which I'm already a member (just in case this project came to pass....).
And, I'll be scrambling for the cash of course....which is sparse to say the least....
But, over the horizon and out there somewhere, God willing and weather permitting, an airplane, a sweet little two seat semi-aerobatic ride, will be mine for the asking....and what's not to like about that?
With luck, persistence, and cash, lots of cash, I should at some time in the future have a hand in completing a kit-built Mustang II. The project is currently sitting abandoned in a barn in Eastern Washington, where we left it two years ago when I first saw it. At that time I took some cellphone photos of it, and as soon as I track down the hard drive they reside on I'll forward them on to this blog. However, here's a link to some photos I took of a Mustang II a few weeks ago at the Arlington EAA airshow. This is what my pile of airplane parts might look like after I put a lot of sweat and a lot of cash into the mixture, liberally dosed with a lot of time.
In the meantime, the plan is as follows:
Do the documentation with the current owner, releasing he and his heirs and successors from any and all liability pertaining to my further messing with the project.
(Addendum) Went to my local EAA meeting last night, found a resource, a gentleman who had a copy of a presentation given a few years ago by an aviation liability lawyer. My source also has copies of the contracts the lawyer drew up for him when he sold (that is, when my source sold) his own plane (sorry, collection of aircraft parts...)
(Addendum) Found the hard drive tucked away, and bought an external cover for it, powered it up, and found the cellphone photos from so many years ago. Here they are. Each needs some comments. The workmanship on the cowl is so poor that it's a full reject. So too will be some of the other cosmetic work, but the basic assembly workmanship is at least passable, at best good.
Haul the aircraft, the parts, the plans, and the dust, over from the dryland farm country to a storage area as yet to be determined. I hope that storage area is somewhere near my place of employment.
Start with a clean sheet or two of paper, an A&P or two, an afternoon or twenty, and review the work that has been completed so far. This analysis will lead me to one of two decisions, which are, of course, proceed or abandon.
If proceed, then I'll be making myself MUCH more active in my local EAA chapter, of which I'm already a member (just in case this project came to pass....).
And, I'll be scrambling for the cash of course....which is sparse to say the least....
But, over the horizon and out there somewhere, God willing and weather permitting, an airplane, a sweet little two seat semi-aerobatic ride, will be mine for the asking....and what's not to like about that?
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Way, Way Behind The Airplane
I am way, way behind the airplane. Which, as all pilots know, or are sometime to learn, is NOT where you want to be.
Since last I wrote, there’s been a significant number of aviation adventures. And misadventures too……
First, there was the EAA Northwest Fly-In, or more commonly, the Arlington Airshow.
My company takes part as a major sponsor, and we brought a lot of airplanes up for the show. That of course means that somebody has to fly them up, and I’m pretty much the kind of a guy that will drop anything to go flying, particularly if I don’t have to pull my own Visa card out at the end of the flight.
It was the fourth of July, and we had been griping a bit in the days prior to that, because none of us really wanted to have to take time away from our all-important holiday to do something as mundane as ferry brand new sophisticated airplanes up to a grassy field where there was nothing but aircraft idiots by the dozens……
When we finally got our flight together, there were seven of us. For me this was a first. It wasn’t like the formation flying ride I had bummed last summer, with the Red Baron biplane team.
This was ME flying the airplane in a very loose formation. So loose in fact that we had little if any visual contact, but still, we were all occupying the same airspace, and there was something special about firing up seven airplanes and taxiing to the runway for takeoff clearances…..
We’d agreed to monitor 123.45 (which yesterday I discovered is NOT intended for casual air-to-air conversations, but is instead a test frequency for avionics manufacturers…..who knew…?) so shortly after liftoff we were chatting back and forth….. a little bit of “where are ya?” and “didja see that….?” and so on. The high point was that it was, frankly, scud running, with a ceiling just barely legal, and conditions were somewhat less than my (previous) personal minimums. There was, of course, peer pressure, even though it was unstated……..and just as I was about to exercise my PIC right to turn around and run for the barn, a hole opened up over Lake Washington, and I could see that beyond the north end of the lake there was much improved conditions.
Now, we were flying two Diamond 20 C1 Eclipses, (VFR only, but with Garmin 430’s), three Diamond DA40’s with Garmin G1000 glass panels, a Diamond TwinStar (diesels, G1000, soon-to-be-certified for known icing, and a Columbia 400 (G1000 as well). So, there was a lot of avionics horsepower there, and it’s only a thirty minute flight from Boeing Field to Arlington….so there was little chance of anybody getting lost. Which is why when one of us said “hey K….., where ya at…?” and there was a long pause, then a “ummmmm, …….” we had to all bite our tongues to stop from laughing out loud, because if you can’t figure it out by looking out the window, you’ve got a half-million dollar computer screen in front of you with a little picture of an airplane over a moving map……
Anyway, we all got there safe and sound. And, set up our displays, and jumped back into the TwinStar and the Columbia to blast back to Boeing and get on with the fireworks and the partying later that night.
So, for the next five days, I had the distinct pleasure of being left seat in the Diamond TwinStar
as we commuted to work at Arlington each day, from Boeing Field. And I now feel a good deal more comfortable in that particular airplane than I have a right to expect. What a sweet ride she is….
The weather was lousy for the first two days, so the crowds did not materialize, and the show was disappointing, but the TwinStar was the star, that was for sure. There was always a pile of toothless pilots gathered round, chucking their chins and tilting their heads to one side and finally sidling up and asking “Is that them there damn diesels……”
That particular group of pilots have been, disparagingly and impolitely, nicknamed by one of our previous co-workers as “whistling gophers….” because they walk up to a brand new airplane, scratch their chins and their receding hairlines, then ask “how much does that there damned airplane go fer….?” and when we tell them they purse their lips and go “Weeeeeoooooooohhhhhhh………”
On the third evening, heading home, four on board, me on the stick, the PIC (for I have no multi-engine endorsement) suggested that this takeoff we might just level out at 20’ or so, and retract the gear, and fly it down the runway in ground effect…….
Just as I was about to pull back on the stick, since the available runway was coming to an end, the airshow temporary tower controller, who had been VERY interested in the TwinStar, came on the radio and said something like “So, I see the TwinStar doesn’t climb very well with four on board…….” and that was the moment that the airspeed had reached a good deal more than was necessary, and I pulled the stick back into my crotch and as we screamed up into the sky the tower came back on the radio and all he say was “Oh…..!” and that felt pretty good.
Anyway, Arlington is a blast, and there was some serious aerobatic behavior going on each day.
I spent some time with my camera pointed at the sky, but my long lens doesn’t have image stabilization, so I’m disappointed with the results, but still, it was fun.
On the last evening of the show we only had four pilots available to fly those wonderful airplanes back home, so we had to do two trips and commute back up one time. It seems that I’m developing a habit on the last evening of Arlington, which is that, even though I’ve flown AWO direct KBFI dozens of times, I seem to get lost heading home on the last flight of the weekend…..and I always find myself noodling around in the skies up above the Skagit Valley, which I what I consider to be a tiny bit of heaven. So, I celebrated another great Arlington by twisting a DiamondStar around the sky for a while, then headed home just at sundown and moonrise….for yes, it was very close to the full moon. A perfect weekend.
And since it’s bedtime, I’ll stop here, but there’s more coming, and it’s called…
It’s True, Blondes DO Have More Fun!
Since last I wrote, there’s been a significant number of aviation adventures. And misadventures too……
First, there was the EAA Northwest Fly-In, or more commonly, the Arlington Airshow.
My company takes part as a major sponsor, and we brought a lot of airplanes up for the show. That of course means that somebody has to fly them up, and I’m pretty much the kind of a guy that will drop anything to go flying, particularly if I don’t have to pull my own Visa card out at the end of the flight.
It was the fourth of July, and we had been griping a bit in the days prior to that, because none of us really wanted to have to take time away from our all-important holiday to do something as mundane as ferry brand new sophisticated airplanes up to a grassy field where there was nothing but aircraft idiots by the dozens……
When we finally got our flight together, there were seven of us. For me this was a first. It wasn’t like the formation flying ride I had bummed last summer, with the Red Baron biplane team.
This was ME flying the airplane in a very loose formation. So loose in fact that we had little if any visual contact, but still, we were all occupying the same airspace, and there was something special about firing up seven airplanes and taxiing to the runway for takeoff clearances…..We’d agreed to monitor 123.45 (which yesterday I discovered is NOT intended for casual air-to-air conversations, but is instead a test frequency for avionics manufacturers…..who knew…?) so shortly after liftoff we were chatting back and forth….. a little bit of “where are ya?” and “didja see that….?” and so on. The high point was that it was, frankly, scud running, with a ceiling just barely legal, and conditions were somewhat less than my (previous) personal minimums. There was, of course, peer pressure, even though it was unstated……..and just as I was about to exercise my PIC right to turn around and run for the barn, a hole opened up over Lake Washington, and I could see that beyond the north end of the lake there was much improved conditions.
Now, we were flying two Diamond 20 C1 Eclipses, (VFR only, but with Garmin 430’s), three Diamond DA40’s with Garmin G1000 glass panels, a Diamond TwinStar (diesels, G1000, soon-to-be-certified for known icing, and a Columbia 400 (G1000 as well). So, there was a lot of avionics horsepower there, and it’s only a thirty minute flight from Boeing Field to Arlington….so there was little chance of anybody getting lost. Which is why when one of us said “hey K….., where ya at…?” and there was a long pause, then a “ummmmm, …….” we had to all bite our tongues to stop from laughing out loud, because if you can’t figure it out by looking out the window, you’ve got a half-million dollar computer screen in front of you with a little picture of an airplane over a moving map……
Anyway, we all got there safe and sound. And, set up our displays, and jumped back into the TwinStar and the Columbia to blast back to Boeing and get on with the fireworks and the partying later that night.
So, for the next five days, I had the distinct pleasure of being left seat in the Diamond TwinStar
as we commuted to work at Arlington each day, from Boeing Field. And I now feel a good deal more comfortable in that particular airplane than I have a right to expect. What a sweet ride she is….The weather was lousy for the first two days, so the crowds did not materialize, and the show was disappointing, but the TwinStar was the star, that was for sure. There was always a pile of toothless pilots gathered round, chucking their chins and tilting their heads to one side and finally sidling up and asking “Is that them there damn diesels……”
That particular group of pilots have been, disparagingly and impolitely, nicknamed by one of our previous co-workers as “whistling gophers….” because they walk up to a brand new airplane, scratch their chins and their receding hairlines, then ask “how much does that there damned airplane go fer….?” and when we tell them they purse their lips and go “Weeeeeoooooooohhhhhhh………”
On the third evening, heading home, four on board, me on the stick, the PIC (for I have no multi-engine endorsement) suggested that this takeoff we might just level out at 20’ or so, and retract the gear, and fly it down the runway in ground effect…….
Just as I was about to pull back on the stick, since the available runway was coming to an end, the airshow temporary tower controller, who had been VERY interested in the TwinStar, came on the radio and said something like “So, I see the TwinStar doesn’t climb very well with four on board…….” and that was the moment that the airspeed had reached a good deal more than was necessary, and I pulled the stick back into my crotch and as we screamed up into the sky the tower came back on the radio and all he say was “Oh…..!” and that felt pretty good.
Anyway, Arlington is a blast, and there was some serious aerobatic behavior going on each day.
I spent some time with my camera pointed at the sky, but my long lens doesn’t have image stabilization, so I’m disappointed with the results, but still, it was fun.On the last evening of the show we only had four pilots available to fly those wonderful airplanes back home, so we had to do two trips and commute back up one time. It seems that I’m developing a habit on the last evening of Arlington, which is that, even though I’ve flown AWO direct KBFI dozens of times, I seem to get lost heading home on the last flight of the weekend…..and I always find myself noodling around in the skies up above the Skagit Valley, which I what I consider to be a tiny bit of heaven. So, I celebrated another great Arlington by twisting a DiamondStar around the sky for a while, then headed home just at sundown and moonrise….for yes, it was very close to the full moon. A perfect weekend.
And since it’s bedtime, I’ll stop here, but there’s more coming, and it’s called…
It’s True, Blondes DO Have More Fun!
Sunday, July 02, 2006
An Orcas Adventure
Had a lovely flight up to Orcas Island yesterday, with my friend Molly. We dropped into Decatur Shores to visit with Mark and Chris, but they had not yet arrived. Wandered up the path and introduced Molly to Ken and Diana. Diana was trapped in the treehouse, Ken using the ladder for work on the new deck, but Diana laid claim to the Rapunzel tactic......but she didn't actually let her hair down.
Orcas had a summer fair going on, and we were able to wander around there a bit. Had a camera with me, and noticed that I'd lost my lens cap. Backtracked looking for it, couldn't find it, cursed myself for losing it, and finally let go of it, figuring it was gone forever. It was of course at that moment that two young men wandered up to me holding the lens cap, making gestures to see if it fit.....when I asked them, they said they'd just found it a few minutes earlier, and had then been looking at all the people wandering around with cameras, looking for the missing cap. It was slightly miraculous. A lesson in letting go, as Molly pointed out.
There were some very interesting crafts going on at the fair, including some blacksmithing. It's quite the chore, that hammering on metal. No freaking wonder most of us like keeping our soft little hands on computer keyboards, or airplane controls.......
Had a lovely lunch, wandered around the drop-dead gorgeous Episcopal church on the point, and flew home. Got a text message from Mark just as I was flying overhead, over Decatur, inviting us down for tea, but we had to make it back to Boeing, more's the bad luck.
I'll be attending the Northwest EAA Fly-In at Arlington, WA, all next week, and should have piles of new photos and comments...can't wait.
What's So Special About This Guy?
Much as I hate to admit it, there's a certain panache about having your own 747 available, let alone swarms of police officers and security details, when you arrive at any airport. And, to hear the tower controllers on the radio say "Air Force One, cleared to land, the airport is yours......" is not something that I hear when I fly into Boeing Field.
So, there's been a visit to Seattle this morning, and here's some photos we took, from behind the windows of course, as there were MANY secret service types scowling at us as we shot these.....
But, what the heck, what else would we spend the tax dollars on? Education? Health Care? Nah....let's spend it on airplanes.....
that's MUCH more fun......
Anacortes Fly-In Saturday
I’ve been thinking what a special privilege it is to be so familiar with the airports around the
Yesterday I went in to work, and unexpectedly the front desk customer service person asked me if I’d grab an airplane and fly one of our flight instructors up to the
It’s nice to fly with an instructor when you’re not actually paying for instruction, as he feels free to comment on your flying, but you don’t have to listen…..you’re wise however if you do. So, Keith, who’s done some significant development work for NASA, gave me an intensive lesson on leaning the engine mixture, for proper fuel consumption.
Half an hour later, I dropped him off at Bayview Skagit, which is
Today, we flew three airplanes up to Anacortes 
which is the gateway to the 
most, and a barbeque, and maybe a smallish crowd….instead, it was about fifty or sixty planes of all descriptions, a few hundred people wandering around, and a beautiful sunshiney day.
You couldn’t have asked for more fun if you’re a pilot. There were taildraggers, weird birds from Eastern Bloc countries, 
amphibians, military helicopters, Cessnas, our three Diamonds, including the TwinStar which was the star of the show, and lots of other eye candy.
The organizer is the owner of the airplane I flew a few months ago which wound up on the cover of a flight training magazine, and he had been unaware of that, so it was fun to show him his airplane on a national magazine. There were women with diamonds the size of
The burgers were free, the pilots were bullshitting each other
, and the wives looked lovely, including those who were themselves accomplished pilots. And the kids were having a blast, playing air
planes and dogfighting.
I ran into an acquaintance late in the afternoon, who had dropped in looking for members of his Civil Air Patrol squadron, to pick him up at
Then it was a short hop home, arriving at Boeing just in time to hang out with the staff at the flight school, and give my new friend a ride on my motorcycle back to where he’d parked his car, at the northeast parking area. When we got there, my friend Ken was working on his Glastar, so we had a chat. Finally I tried to leave, but going out the airport gate there were two attractive young women walking towards a Piper Cub. One was my friend Mark’s wife Chris, who’s taking her private pilot checkride next week, and the other was Alison, who flies float planes for Kenmore Air out of
It Takes Two To Tango Charlie
N180TC, or November One Eight Zero Tango Charlie, holds a special place in my heart. It's the aircraft in which I earned my tailwheel endorsement, and that makes me a "real" pilot in the eyes of many, perhaps even including myself.
She's a lovely bird, a Cessna 180 Skywagon, which is basically the pickup truck of the airports. There's more Skywagons flying around with great stories to tell than you can shake a stick at, though she doesn't need a stick shaker to tell you that she's about to stall....
My friend Tom is a CFI, (Certified Flight Instructor) and he decided one day that I was competent enough to fly his airplane, and that I was even competent enough for him to endorse my logbook saying so. But the real story is how I got to that day.
My good friend Mark is the person who
got me flying. If you're interested, I've written a bit about him in a posting called "It All Started At A Forty Watt Radio Station in Saskatoon", but Mark is partners in a Skywagon with our friend Steve, and because of that, and because Mark and Steve are both my aviation mentors, I've spend tons of time in the right seat of their 180. Neither is a CFI, but the hundreds of hours I've spent haven't been wasted just looking out the window.I've been so fortunate. There's Rob too, who owns a 140A, is a CFI, and learned how to teach by teaching me some great tailwheel training, at his expense, for hours and hours.
Each pilot has shown me many things about their plane, so that the day that Tom agreed to help me get my endorsement, it was mostly just a matter of showing him that I knew where the rudders were located, that I could perform an emergency landing in a crosswind, and that I could do it with enough skill that we could re-use the plane each time.....Without these friends, I'd still be sitting somewhere hoping and praying that some day I'd be a pilot. It's what this great community of aviation is all about, friends helping friends, sharing their joy at the privilege of flight. I promise to do my utmost to continue the tradition.
Gee One Thousand
There's a terrific new piece of avionics out dominating the market these days. Garmin has taken over the general aviation cockpit, and transformed it into a spaceliner flight deck.
There's only one hitch of course......it's complex and takes a good deal of time and energy to learn. But the rewards are fantastic, I'm told, though it's just now that I'm beginning to buckle/knuckle down and apply myself to the task of actually learning it instead of just talking about it.
The company I'm lucky enough to work for has developed a course to bring pilots at lightning speed into the twenty-first century, and today I attended the first day of a two day ground school. Given that I'm just a low-time VFR pilot, I'm intimidated, even though, of the class of five, there's three of us working on our instrument ratings and two high-time pilots who fly turbine powered heavy iron.
Tomorrow is the real test, where we put into place what we learned today, which was basically a familiarization tour of the two screens.....it was functionally just learning button-pushing. But tomorrow? It's all about real-world IFR experience, how to use the fabulous capabilities of this toy to actually get somewhere when the weather's a challenge.
Can't wait. It turns out that I'll be one of the first people at our flight school and even one of the first people in the nation to take a full instrument rating on the G1000. It's going to be an accomplishment to be proud of, ranking right there with my tailwheel endorsement and what I hope to have some day which would be an aerobatics capability....
More of course to follow, but now, to bed....
Lights, Camera, Satisfaction
It never ceases to amaze me the reactions people have to the world of aviation.
Today I shepherded a film crew around the flight line where I work. We were entertaining many guests from around the world at the same time. Or, should I say, one of the Seattle "names" was entertaining his guests, and they had all arrived by executive jets, many parked on our ramp.
The film crew was doing work for that "name" company, doing a spoof on the highly popular TV show "24", wherein our intrepid hero finds himself piloting a business jet, with the need to subsequently abandon ship to save the world........
Meanwhile, I was surrounded by terrifically attractive intense women with a great company name doing creative work, while I was acting the part of an officious and sanctimonious twit...a part which, by the way, comes naturally to me...but a safety briefing is a safety briefing, and the world's a dangerous place, and the more so around spinning propellers and jet blast..
These film people were extraordinarily generous, and attentive, doing everything they could to put to rest any fears I might have had about the privacy of our other customers....it was just a ton of fun to be working on a bright sunny day surrounded by other people as passionate about their own work as I have become about mine.
OH, and the government saw fit yesterday to grant me clearance to pursue advanced flight training. This, because I'm an alien, and need to jump through a large number of hoops to assure the citizens of this country of which I'm a resident and guest that I'm not a threat.....
So, another banner day around light planes and beautiful women.....dang, I'm sure that this too shall pass, but bring it on Lord, and thank you.
Today I shepherded a film crew around the flight line where I work. We were entertaining many guests from around the world at the same time. Or, should I say, one of the Seattle "names" was entertaining his guests, and they had all arrived by executive jets, many parked on our ramp.
The film crew was doing work for that "name" company, doing a spoof on the highly popular TV show "24", wherein our intrepid hero finds himself piloting a business jet, with the need to subsequently abandon ship to save the world........Meanwhile, I was surrounded by terrifically attractive intense women with a great company name doing creative work, while I was acting the part of an officious and sanctimonious twit...a part which, by the way, comes naturally to me...but a safety briefing is a safety briefing, and the world's a dangerous place, and the more so around spinning propellers and jet blast..
These film people were extraordinarily generous, and attentive, doing everything they could to put to rest any fears I might have had about the privacy of our other customers....it was just a ton of fun to be working on a bright sunny day surrounded by other people as passionate about their own work as I have become about mine.
OH, and the government saw fit yesterday to grant me clearance to pursue advanced flight training. This, because I'm an alien, and need to jump through a large number of hoops to assure the citizens of this country of which I'm a resident and guest that I'm not a threat.....
So, another banner day around light planes and beautiful women.....dang, I'm sure that this too shall pass, but bring it on Lord, and thank you.
Follow Your Twin Stars
Was blessed twice in the past 24 hours.
Yesterday by appearing on the cover of a national flight training magazine, and today by having my first logbook entry flying a twin-engined aircraft.
For being on the cover of the magazine, I'd flown a Diamond 20 doing short field and soft field landings for a professional photographer doing the visuals for the article. It was on Wax Orchards, a private airstrip on Vashon, with flowering cherry trees lining the runway. A dream come true.
And today, I flew a Diamond TwinStar, the newest aircraft in our fleet. A total dream to fly...twin Mercedes diesel engines, Garmin G1000 glass panel avionics, and the sweetest ride you can imagine.
Had to ferry a Diamond 20 from Bremerton up to Arlington, and the aircraft salesperson allowed me left seat on the ride home in the TwinStar. We did advanced maneuvers, engine-out procedures, and I even greased it down on the runway at Boeing Field coming home. Got to descend at 80% power and 182 knots reporting Safeco Field on final approach, then drop out the gear and two notches of flaps and poof, I'm heading downhill at 88 knots and stable on short final......
Now, if that means nothing to you, I'm sorry, but it can, and if you'd like, I'll show you how.
Get in touch with your aviation soul!
Yesterday by appearing on the cover of a national flight training magazine, and today by having my first logbook entry flying a twin-engined aircraft.
For being on the cover of the magazine, I'd flown a Diamond 20 doing short field and soft field landings for a professional photographer doing the visuals for the article. It was on Wax Orchards, a private airstrip on Vashon, with flowering cherry trees lining the runway. A dream come true.
And today, I flew a Diamond TwinStar, the newest aircraft in our fleet. A total dream to fly...twin Mercedes diesel engines, Garmin G1000 glass panel avionics, and the sweetest ride you can imagine.Had to ferry a Diamond 20 from Bremerton up to Arlington, and the aircraft salesperson allowed me left seat on the ride home in the TwinStar. We did advanced maneuvers, engine-out procedures, and I even greased it down on the runway at Boeing Field coming home. Got to descend at 80% power and 182 knots reporting Safeco Field on final approach, then drop out the gear and two notches of flaps and poof, I'm heading downhill at 88 knots and stable on short final......
Now, if that means nothing to you, I'm sorry, but it can, and if you'd like, I'll show you how.
Get in touch with your aviation soul!
New Years Eighteen Months Later
Here's the first blog posting I made, New Years Day, 2005. It's on another blog, will figure out how to repost that here, but for the moment......
Morning all, and thanks for stopping by here.
Here's the list. You know the one I mean. The Resolutions.
1. Fly an airplane at every possible opportunity.
2. Be sure that somebody else is paying for that.....
3. Find a marketing job in the aviation community
4. Let somebody else pay for my instrument rating....
5. Lose those sneaky ten pounds that you've regained since August
6. Stay away from the dating websites.....no more kid in the candy store....
And here's the update.....
1. Flying about once or twice a week
2. Mostly somebody else is paying for it....
3. Got the marketing job eight days into the New Year, and only now am coming up for air to update this blog....
4. And, two weeks ago, got the go-ahead to complete my instrument rating as a benefit to my company, making me a more valuable employee....
5. Gained all the weight back, and more, now back down to neutral, and working hard on that......
6. Found a new girlfriend, lost her, am back to neutral there too.......
Four out of six is acceptable but not great, right?
Morning all, and thanks for stopping by here.
Here's the list. You know the one I mean. The Resolutions.
1. Fly an airplane at every possible opportunity.
2. Be sure that somebody else is paying for that.....
3. Find a marketing job in the aviation community
4. Let somebody else pay for my instrument rating....
5. Lose those sneaky ten pounds that you've regained since August
6. Stay away from the dating websites.....no more kid in the candy store....
And here's the update.....
1. Flying about once or twice a week
2. Mostly somebody else is paying for it....
3. Got the marketing job eight days into the New Year, and only now am coming up for air to update this blog....
4. And, two weeks ago, got the go-ahead to complete my instrument rating as a benefit to my company, making me a more valuable employee....
5. Gained all the weight back, and more, now back down to neutral, and working hard on that......
6. Found a new girlfriend, lost her, am back to neutral there too.......
Four out of six is acceptable but not great, right?
Saturday, January 01, 2005
Starting The Year Off Right
Morning all, and thanks for stopping by here.
Here's the list. You know the one I mean. The Resolutions.
1. Fly an airplane at every possible opportunity.
2. Be sure that somebody else is paying for that.....
3. Find a marketing job in the aviation community
4. Let somebody else pay for my instrument rating....
5. Lose those sneaky ten pounds that you've regained since August
6. Stay away from the dating websites.....no more kid in the candy store....
Here's the list. You know the one I mean. The Resolutions.
1. Fly an airplane at every possible opportunity.
2. Be sure that somebody else is paying for that.....
3. Find a marketing job in the aviation community
4. Let somebody else pay for my instrument rating....
5. Lose those sneaky ten pounds that you've regained since August
6. Stay away from the dating websites.....no more kid in the candy store....
Saturday, November 08, 2003
It All Started At A Forty Watt Radio Station in Saskatoon
"It All Started At A Forty Watt Radio Station in Saskatoon........."
My mother had a cousin, named E.... R......... Apparently ER put together a media empire of sorts, tv stations etc. etc; used to show up in Winnipeg in the 1950's driving a big geezly finned Cadillac of sorts, flashing diamonds and talking loudly. Had to love the guy. Whenever ER started a long rambling story, and in particular whenever he talked business or personal success, he started it with the now famous opening line in our family for any long and rambling story…..”It All Started At A Forty Watt Radio Station in Saskatoon”….
It's a funny thing about dreams, you gotta reach out and make them happen.
I have a fine friend named M..., who's one of those talented people you run across from time to time that make a difference in your life. M... owns a company here in Seattle, and he manufactures sport kites. He's the best in the world at what he does, and in the little world of kites, he's Michaelangelo, or more likely, Leonardo Da Vinci.
I met him because I was looking for sunshine.
As my second marriage was dissolving into catastrophe I would come home from work evenings and want sunshine. Our house was on the east slope of a hillside, and in shadow by that time of day. Nearby was the old Sand Point Naval Air Station, now a public park called Warren Magnusson Park. It's on Lake Washington. If you look down the lake on a summer evening, you can see the most beautiful volcano hanging in the sky, Mt. Rainier.
When they decommissioned the runways, they piled up the concrete onsite, and it became a hillside; the local kite community got together and removed all the scotch-broom, and now it's a lovely grassy slope with a view to die for, called Kite Hill.
Because it sticks out into the lake, it gets evening sun, and one day I wandered on up there and saw all the kite fliers. Now, when I had lived in Victoria, BC, I had flown kites, but somehow this time it kicked in as something I'd really like to do.
So I became a sport kite flier, and really began to enjoy it. Turns out, the kite I bought was a P...m kite, and it also turns out that that particular hilltop was the place where M... had filmed the videos that he used to include with his products. Kite fliers from all over the world would make pilgrimages to this place; it was astonishing.
Over time, I met M..., and we started talking business, and other kinds of things. He was just getting his private pilot's license, and I'd always been interested in aviation, like yourself, and had the standard profile of somebody who once upon a long time ago had accumulated a few hours, but then allowed life to get in the way.
A few years went by. My marriage dissolved, and one day M... asked me if I'd like to join him in a sweet old Stinson for a flight down to Portland. Duh! Like most pilots, when we were in the air, he handed me the controls. About twenty minutes later he took them back and said "you know, most times when I hand the controls to somebody, we spend five minutes porpoising and swerving all over the sky. You've held an altitude and a heading for twenty minutes. You should fly!"
"Nah" I said, "I'm too old, too poor, too much baggage, that dream is gone....." He turned his head, looked me square in the eyes, and said "YOU SHOULD FLY!" At that moment some little bell went off in my head that said "If not now, when? He's right, I've always wanted to be a pilot, and I do NOT want to be on my deathbed saying to myself 'dammit, I could have flown' "
Given that I have MANY challenges, it STILL took another three years. But, one day a few years ago only, a designated examiner from the FAA sat down at a crappy old typewriter, tapped out a few letters on a tiny piece of paper and handed it to me, and said "Congratulations Mr. W....., you're a pilot!"
And then I did a pre-flight, got back into the airplane that I'd flown up to Bellingham for the exam (since you can fly solo as a student, as long as your instructor has signed you off) and called the ground control for permission to taxi for takeoff..... "Good afternoon Bellingham Ground, Cessna Skyhawk November 5... Echo, GA Terminal with Information Charlie, Taxi for Southbound Departure."
"Five ...... Echo, Taxi to Runway One Six."
Now, by this time of day, it was sundown, and beyond; I'd have had to stay overnight if I'd failed my exam, because student pilots are not allowed to fly solo at night regardless. On the off chance that I DID fail the exam, M... was staying at his cabin on D..... , a private island in the San Juans just southwest of Bellingham. D......'s got a grass runway (with lights, activated by the pilot on the radio) and I'd dropped in there as a student once, and been in many times in the right seat with M....
It's a dangerous landing however, because there's a mountain at the other end, so you CANNOT execute a "go-around"; once you're on final approach over the meadow, you MUST get the plane onto the ground.
I'd planned this day for months, and I'd had a chance to look at an astronomical calendar, and I knew that it was going to be the night of a full moon."Bellingham Tower, Cessna Skyhawk November Five Five One Two Echo, ready at One Six, southbound departure.....!"
And then came the COOLEST radio call I've yet ever heard."Cessna 5512 Echo, cleared for takeoff Runway One Six, southbound departure approved. We understand congratulations are in order?"
Blow me away with a feather duster, the examiner had talked to the tower guys....."Uh, affirmative tower, and thanks. Cleared for takeoff, One Two Echo...!"
And off I went, my first takeoff as a private pilot, heart soaring, damned near singing into the microphones. Glanced over to my left, but no moonrise yet. Was heading to D......., to drop in on M...., and his aircraft partner S....., who was also waiting to see what had happened on the exam.
Pilot buddies. What a blessing. Got over D......, decided to overfly the runway crosswise, checking for deer, who graze it at sundown. Deer and airplanes on landing do NOT mix well. Clicked my microphone to turn on the runway lights. Nothing happened. Realized that I did NOT have the right frequency tuned in to activate them but worse, did NOT have the frequency committed to memory, and because it's a private runway, none of my charts or books were gonna help.
Damn, now I have to head back to Paine Field in Everett; just then, the runway lights came on. S...., hearing me overfly, and realizing my dilemma, had figured it out, and turned them on. So, my first landing as a private pilot was at night, onto a grass runway with deer grazing on it, and a mountain at the other end waiting to reach out and kill me. Possibly not the best exercise in good aviation judgement?
We shook hands, laughed, shot the shit for a while, and then it was time to go home. M... asked whether he could bum a ride home with me. Now, I'd been flying with lots of instructors, but my chief instructor was M.... He's not a certified flight instructor, but he's the best pilot of ALL the people I've flown with, and he had spent hundreds of hours with me in the cockpit of S.....'s Cessna 180; in fact, when I got my certificate I probably had a lot more experience than many do, including a fair amount of actual instrument flying conditions, which you don't do as a wet behind the ears private. That comes a lot later.
So, when M..... asked me for the ride home, S...... would take the 180 back to Paine, I said of course, and realized that THIS was ACTUALLY my final exam. I'd never been in the left seat of an airplane with him, never landed nor taken off with him, because the 180 is a taildragger and one needs a special endorsement to do the landings and takeoffs in it. By the way, I'm almost finished that endorsment now.
We back taxied down the runway toward the mountain, in the dark, carefully looking for deer in the taxi lights. We turned facing south, having completed the runup, which is the final moment you check to make sure all systems are go, and he said "OK, now, when you lift the nose off the runway tonight, everything is going to be pitch black; there's no lights out over the water as a visual reference, you CAN'T tell the difference between the ground and the sky, and you just need to fly on instruments like I've taught you.....use the attitude indicator to keep the wings level and the nose pitched up slightly, use the rate of climb indicator to establish that you have a positive rate of climb, and make sure that your airspeed is Vy (which is a known quantity, the best rate of climb); if you do that, then everything is going to be just fine.
Now, you'd think there'd be a bit of heart pounding going on, but there wasn't. It was just, OK, I've flown this puppy many times, I've flown with M.... many times, it's just a takeoff, nothing's any different except I can't SEE squat, off we go!
As we lifted off I had everything squared away just the way it was supposed to be. I'd dialed in the radios to contact Whidbey Naval Airstation, whose airspace I would be intruding upon about two minutes after liftoff, and everything was tickety-boo. So I allowed myself the opportunity to glance over to the left, toward the Cascade Mountains, fully expecting to see a gorgeous full moon, as it was a perfectly clear night.
Instead, there was deep yellow sliver of a moon out on the horizon, just sneaking over the tops of the mountains."Now THAT's a lunar eclipse" I said, and I was right, it was true, I'd had NO idea that it was going to happen, but sure enough, my first night takeoff as a pilot, and my first takeoff with my best friend where I was pilot in command? A VERY GOOD omen! At least, that's how I chose to take it, because the other choice was not too promising..
Now that night four years earlier with M...., coming home from Portland, it had been just before Christmas, and there'd been ground fog in all the valleys, and shining UP through the ground fog were all the Christmas lights of all the houses. Magic glow. And, looking around in the crystal sky, there were all the twinkling anti-collision lights of all the planes in the sky, as if we were swimming in some magic fishbowl.
But coming home from Bellingham, with ME doing the flying, and a full moon slowly revealing itself from a lunar eclipse over the forty minutes in flight? I will NEVER forget that night, and if I NEVER fly again, I will always have those moments.
And if YOU want to fly, then DO IT! Don't listen to the little voices saying you can't, you can't afford it, you're too old, you're too whatever. Just get into your car one day, drive out to the airport, and walk into the flight school. Tell them Jeremy sent you.
And tell them it all started at a forty watt radio station in Saskatoon.
© J....... W......, 2005
My mother had a cousin, named E.... R......... Apparently ER put together a media empire of sorts, tv stations etc. etc; used to show up in Winnipeg in the 1950's driving a big geezly finned Cadillac of sorts, flashing diamonds and talking loudly. Had to love the guy. Whenever ER started a long rambling story, and in particular whenever he talked business or personal success, he started it with the now famous opening line in our family for any long and rambling story…..”It All Started At A Forty Watt Radio Station in Saskatoon”….
It's a funny thing about dreams, you gotta reach out and make them happen.
I have a fine friend named M..., who's one of those talented people you run across from time to time that make a difference in your life. M... owns a company here in Seattle, and he manufactures sport kites. He's the best in the world at what he does, and in the little world of kites, he's Michaelangelo, or more likely, Leonardo Da Vinci.
I met him because I was looking for sunshine.
As my second marriage was dissolving into catastrophe I would come home from work evenings and want sunshine. Our house was on the east slope of a hillside, and in shadow by that time of day. Nearby was the old Sand Point Naval Air Station, now a public park called Warren Magnusson Park. It's on Lake Washington. If you look down the lake on a summer evening, you can see the most beautiful volcano hanging in the sky, Mt. Rainier.
When they decommissioned the runways, they piled up the concrete onsite, and it became a hillside; the local kite community got together and removed all the scotch-broom, and now it's a lovely grassy slope with a view to die for, called Kite Hill.
Because it sticks out into the lake, it gets evening sun, and one day I wandered on up there and saw all the kite fliers. Now, when I had lived in Victoria, BC, I had flown kites, but somehow this time it kicked in as something I'd really like to do.
So I became a sport kite flier, and really began to enjoy it. Turns out, the kite I bought was a P...m kite, and it also turns out that that particular hilltop was the place where M... had filmed the videos that he used to include with his products. Kite fliers from all over the world would make pilgrimages to this place; it was astonishing.
Over time, I met M..., and we started talking business, and other kinds of things. He was just getting his private pilot's license, and I'd always been interested in aviation, like yourself, and had the standard profile of somebody who once upon a long time ago had accumulated a few hours, but then allowed life to get in the way.
A few years went by. My marriage dissolved, and one day M... asked me if I'd like to join him in a sweet old Stinson for a flight down to Portland. Duh! Like most pilots, when we were in the air, he handed me the controls. About twenty minutes later he took them back and said "you know, most times when I hand the controls to somebody, we spend five minutes porpoising and swerving all over the sky. You've held an altitude and a heading for twenty minutes. You should fly!"
"Nah" I said, "I'm too old, too poor, too much baggage, that dream is gone....." He turned his head, looked me square in the eyes, and said "YOU SHOULD FLY!" At that moment some little bell went off in my head that said "If not now, when? He's right, I've always wanted to be a pilot, and I do NOT want to be on my deathbed saying to myself 'dammit, I could have flown' "
Given that I have MANY challenges, it STILL took another three years. But, one day a few years ago only, a designated examiner from the FAA sat down at a crappy old typewriter, tapped out a few letters on a tiny piece of paper and handed it to me, and said "Congratulations Mr. W....., you're a pilot!"
And then I did a pre-flight, got back into the airplane that I'd flown up to Bellingham for the exam (since you can fly solo as a student, as long as your instructor has signed you off) and called the ground control for permission to taxi for takeoff..... "Good afternoon Bellingham Ground, Cessna Skyhawk November 5... Echo, GA Terminal with Information Charlie, Taxi for Southbound Departure."
"Five ...... Echo, Taxi to Runway One Six."
Now, by this time of day, it was sundown, and beyond; I'd have had to stay overnight if I'd failed my exam, because student pilots are not allowed to fly solo at night regardless. On the off chance that I DID fail the exam, M... was staying at his cabin on D..... , a private island in the San Juans just southwest of Bellingham. D......'s got a grass runway (with lights, activated by the pilot on the radio) and I'd dropped in there as a student once, and been in many times in the right seat with M....
It's a dangerous landing however, because there's a mountain at the other end, so you CANNOT execute a "go-around"; once you're on final approach over the meadow, you MUST get the plane onto the ground.
I'd planned this day for months, and I'd had a chance to look at an astronomical calendar, and I knew that it was going to be the night of a full moon."Bellingham Tower, Cessna Skyhawk November Five Five One Two Echo, ready at One Six, southbound departure.....!"
And then came the COOLEST radio call I've yet ever heard."Cessna 5512 Echo, cleared for takeoff Runway One Six, southbound departure approved. We understand congratulations are in order?"
Blow me away with a feather duster, the examiner had talked to the tower guys....."Uh, affirmative tower, and thanks. Cleared for takeoff, One Two Echo...!"
And off I went, my first takeoff as a private pilot, heart soaring, damned near singing into the microphones. Glanced over to my left, but no moonrise yet. Was heading to D......., to drop in on M...., and his aircraft partner S....., who was also waiting to see what had happened on the exam.
Pilot buddies. What a blessing. Got over D......, decided to overfly the runway crosswise, checking for deer, who graze it at sundown. Deer and airplanes on landing do NOT mix well. Clicked my microphone to turn on the runway lights. Nothing happened. Realized that I did NOT have the right frequency tuned in to activate them but worse, did NOT have the frequency committed to memory, and because it's a private runway, none of my charts or books were gonna help.
Damn, now I have to head back to Paine Field in Everett; just then, the runway lights came on. S...., hearing me overfly, and realizing my dilemma, had figured it out, and turned them on. So, my first landing as a private pilot was at night, onto a grass runway with deer grazing on it, and a mountain at the other end waiting to reach out and kill me. Possibly not the best exercise in good aviation judgement?
We shook hands, laughed, shot the shit for a while, and then it was time to go home. M... asked whether he could bum a ride home with me. Now, I'd been flying with lots of instructors, but my chief instructor was M.... He's not a certified flight instructor, but he's the best pilot of ALL the people I've flown with, and he had spent hundreds of hours with me in the cockpit of S.....'s Cessna 180; in fact, when I got my certificate I probably had a lot more experience than many do, including a fair amount of actual instrument flying conditions, which you don't do as a wet behind the ears private. That comes a lot later.
So, when M..... asked me for the ride home, S...... would take the 180 back to Paine, I said of course, and realized that THIS was ACTUALLY my final exam. I'd never been in the left seat of an airplane with him, never landed nor taken off with him, because the 180 is a taildragger and one needs a special endorsement to do the landings and takeoffs in it. By the way, I'm almost finished that endorsment now.
We back taxied down the runway toward the mountain, in the dark, carefully looking for deer in the taxi lights. We turned facing south, having completed the runup, which is the final moment you check to make sure all systems are go, and he said "OK, now, when you lift the nose off the runway tonight, everything is going to be pitch black; there's no lights out over the water as a visual reference, you CAN'T tell the difference between the ground and the sky, and you just need to fly on instruments like I've taught you.....use the attitude indicator to keep the wings level and the nose pitched up slightly, use the rate of climb indicator to establish that you have a positive rate of climb, and make sure that your airspeed is Vy (which is a known quantity, the best rate of climb); if you do that, then everything is going to be just fine.
Now, you'd think there'd be a bit of heart pounding going on, but there wasn't. It was just, OK, I've flown this puppy many times, I've flown with M.... many times, it's just a takeoff, nothing's any different except I can't SEE squat, off we go!
As we lifted off I had everything squared away just the way it was supposed to be. I'd dialed in the radios to contact Whidbey Naval Airstation, whose airspace I would be intruding upon about two minutes after liftoff, and everything was tickety-boo. So I allowed myself the opportunity to glance over to the left, toward the Cascade Mountains, fully expecting to see a gorgeous full moon, as it was a perfectly clear night.
Instead, there was deep yellow sliver of a moon out on the horizon, just sneaking over the tops of the mountains."Now THAT's a lunar eclipse" I said, and I was right, it was true, I'd had NO idea that it was going to happen, but sure enough, my first night takeoff as a pilot, and my first takeoff with my best friend where I was pilot in command? A VERY GOOD omen! At least, that's how I chose to take it, because the other choice was not too promising..
Now that night four years earlier with M...., coming home from Portland, it had been just before Christmas, and there'd been ground fog in all the valleys, and shining UP through the ground fog were all the Christmas lights of all the houses. Magic glow. And, looking around in the crystal sky, there were all the twinkling anti-collision lights of all the planes in the sky, as if we were swimming in some magic fishbowl.
But coming home from Bellingham, with ME doing the flying, and a full moon slowly revealing itself from a lunar eclipse over the forty minutes in flight? I will NEVER forget that night, and if I NEVER fly again, I will always have those moments.
And if YOU want to fly, then DO IT! Don't listen to the little voices saying you can't, you can't afford it, you're too old, you're too whatever. Just get into your car one day, drive out to the airport, and walk into the flight school. Tell them Jeremy sent you.
And tell them it all started at a forty watt radio station in Saskatoon.
© J....... W......, 2005
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