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twogeeseinatrenchcoat · 3 months

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Spaceship Short Stories

Yeah why not. Title is self-explanatory. I'll be bringing back my aborted plan for a spaceship story in favour of this because I want to. Also, I will be changing and retconning past work in this as I go. Don't expect anything to stay the same.

Intro.

This is the official logbook of the Vchern'ixt, or Merchant and Delivery Ship 382. (382-MDS). We are, as our work tag suggests, an interplanetary merchant ship. This logbook will almost certainly be used by the crew, and knowing my crew, will not be taken seriously. I can only hope it will provide actual information, and I will hopefully find the time to add actual updates between the crew entries.

Entry 1: 218-4-7 (Kaylie - Pilot)

First week on the ship! Not much happened this week, few deliveries, some unnecessarily (but fun) dangerous asteroid-dodging. I think everyone else is still getting used to a human in board, they're fairly cautious around me. To be honest, I would be as well! I think their previous pilot was a lot more cautious than me. They've been watching me, though. Curious but cautious. I've tried to make some friends, be nice to people, but it's kinda hard when everyone half expects you to explode at any moment.

Truly, the worst part is that they don't have coffee here. I'll make sure to fix that with the first paycheck I get, Captain said that "you can spend your own money on your comforts. I'll spend the ship's money on the ship." So they're no help. Anyways, paycheck is in two days, and we dock for supplies at Kerroi-825B in... Whenever our orbits get close, so I'll be able to get my coffee then! For now, I'll live with the mimicry that Grömerg makes.

Entry 2: 218-4-10 (Grömerg - Medic, Chef)

My coffee is not bad, is it? I do not know if the taste is as it should be, though it smells like the sample you gave me. I'm sorry if it is [untranslatable]

Translator suggestions: Subpar, worse than typical, less than.

Entry 3: 218-4-12 (Kaylie)

It's not! I just prefer real coffee over synthetic, not a problem with you at all!

Update: finally got my coffee machine! And I remembered to buy coffee beans this time! It didn't take as long as I thought to find the "Human Items" section of Kerroirå Market (Fun fact: that's "Kerroi Market Market in Tychfing), and I was able to grab my coffee making items (coffee ingredients?) In time to not be left behind by the crew! Yay!

In other news, I was able to pick up a roll of duct tape and a knife for our beloved cleaning robot. Now I just have to fit Stabby with a camera to record everyone else's reactions to him. He is now one with the hivemind of Stabbies. Oh, and I grabbed the stuff I was actually supposed to. The boring stuff. It was heavy, but some people helped me load the boxes into the ship!

Entry 4: Galactic Year 218, Standard Lunar Cycle (SLC) 4, Standard Solar Cycle (SSC) 14 [218-4-14] (Ky'tchas - Secretary, Accountant)

Kaylie, what is your new creation for? It has caused several minor injuries, and I don't understand the purpose of the "laugh track." Or the confetti. Why do these only occur when it stabs someone? Are they incentive for violence?

Additionally, I will include the "boring stuff," or our pickup for the next delivery. We have picked up:

14 Planetary Leap Drives, 10 Warp Cores, 2 Wormhole Accessors, 24 Guard-8.6 Androids, 48 Holo-Screen 18.5s, and 36 Extragravitory Flight Suits.

These are important things to record. Kaylie, as the one who ordered some of the parts, you should be the one to relay them to me. As it is, you should have placed the order through me in the first place, since it is my job to place orders and file them.

You're new, so I assume you haven't heard anyone explicitly state this, though the captain should have during your viewing and explanation of the ship. Either way, I expect any further orders to be placed though me.

Entry 5: 218-4-18 (Grömerg)

Kaylie? Is it alright if I make a request of you? Please, I beg, slow down when flying. The food almost did not survive our last warp-jump.

IN PROGRESS

#space australia #science fiction #humans are space australians #humans are space weirdos #stabby the roomba #Sergeant Stabby #Spaceship log #Feat. Confused aliens #coffee #Humans need coffee to live #Kaylie slow down please #Humans are reckless #Just like as a species

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epfloutthere · 6 years

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Preparing for Colombia

Jean-André is in Marseille, Marisa is in Zurich. We just have one week left before going to Cali in Colombia.

How do we feel ? A bit stressed but so much excited ! This is a strange mix of feelings, just exactly like before jumping into the water from a cliff : you really want to do it but something is holding you back. Surely the fear that we’ll miss our friends, the fear of leaving our comfort zone to go to the unknown. A lot of questions in our heads, how will it be ?? How nice will be the people around us ? How will be the university and our offices ? Do we have a sufficient knowledge to work on cyanide remediation in a river ? Will we succeed in constructing the Showerloop in a real bathroom ? Can we visit Colombia during the weekends ? Where to go ? How will we meet our new friends ?

All that we know for now is the plan of our two projects :

The first one concerns a cyanide contamination in a stream in Mondomo, a town 70km from Cali. One of the traditional Colombian activities is making starch from manioc. But manioc contains cyanide. There is no problem when you eat it because it’s cooked and the cyanide evaporates, but in the extraction process of starch, all the cyanide goes into the effluents, and is released into streams. So we need to evaluate how contaminated the stream is and find the most appropriate solution to treat it, taking into account technical aspects but also, economical, sociological and cultural aspects. This is our Master’s Internship and we had the chance to be funded by the “Ingénieurs du Monde” association of EPFL, that promotes exchanges and cooperation in the Global South Countries.

View of Mondomo © DaNiEl.O [1]

The second one is the “Showerloop 4 Dev” project, more personal. This year, we built in the Student Krativity and Innovation Laboratory (SKIL) at EPFL a cyclic shower that reuses and treats water in real time to use only 10 liters per shower. This is an Open Source technology invented by Jason Selvarajan that we wanted to implement in Colombia and therefore, we applied to the Development Impact Grants of the Cooperation and Development Center (CODEV) at EPFL. The CODEV center works on the link between the Global South and the Global North, researching how innovation and technologies can lead to a better human development by responding to today’s global issues and UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. We had the honor to earn from this grant the funding of 3 showers for the Sports Center of the Universidad del Valle.

Jason Selvarajan's Showerloop © Jason Selvarajan

So much challenges we will face. But for now, the biggest challenge is : pack our bags. We have to take all the stuff we need for one year of adventure. What do we have to take ? We had different ways to do it :

Jean-André:

“Not a lot of clothes ! Not a lot of clothes!” I was saying to myself. Do you know this feeling when you go 10 days in a place, thinking that you didn’t take a lot of clothes, and finally your luggage is more than 23kg and you have to wear 6 shirts and 3 jackets to be able to register it and go to the plane ? I wanted to avoid it. I preferred to take a few things, like 5 shirts, 3 pants, and if I need some things, I would buy it there. But one thing that I’m sure of is that I want to go climbing and hiking in Colombia. I took a large backpack, my hiking shoes, my climbing shoes, my harness and all the camping stuff : a tent, sleeping bags, air mattresses, cooking stove, pots and pans, utensils, flashlight, lantern, small solar panels and appropriate cold weather gear for snow capped peaks. I know I surely forgot things, but then we will improvise. I spent this final week before the flight studying papers on cyanide & manioc, and refreshing my Spanish : watching movies and series in Spanish like Amando a Pablo, Casa de Papel or Narcos, listening to and translating some Latin songs like Calle 13, and reading Spanish authors like Isabel Allende or Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Marisa:

As for me, I wanted to take the minimum of clothes possible, just as Jean-André. However, I’m really bad at this, and I felt like I wouldn’t succeed in selecting only the most important things. Since Colombia has a great variety of landscapes going from beautiful beaches to stunning views over snowy mountains and rainforests, I took clothes for each of these situations; short as well as long pants with some shirts, swimwear but also a thicker jacket if I go hiking in colder areas. Since I really like hiking, I took my hiking shoes, a backpack and also a sleeping bag in case I have the opportunity to camp. A Swiss army knife had also a place in my bag : you never know when you can use it. Apart from that, I just accomplished a scuba diving course in Thailand and discovered that I love this activity and the underwater world. I heard that there are some nice spots to go diving in Colombia as well, therefore I took my logbook with me which is a small book where you can write down all the dives you accomplished. I spent the last few days with family and friends and prepared the internship by reading papers about cyanide treatment and the Showerloop. But now it’s finally time to go to the airport. At that moment I still couldn’t realize that we were really going to Colombia.

But now it is, here it is... We are each in our respective airports, ready to take the plane after a big hug to our parents. Still asking to ourselves what are we going to discover in Colombia…

Departure from the airport

[1] http://ec.geoview.info/vista_del_pueblo_desde_las_montanas,19776917p

#MasterInternshipCali #EPFLOutThere

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illbefinealonereads · 4 years

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Blog tour! I present to you some info and an excerpt from She’s Faking It by Kristin Rockaway.

She’s Faking It Kristin Rockaway FICTION/Romance/Contemporary Trade Paperback | Graydon House Books On Sale: 6/30/2020 978152580464 $15.99 $19.99 CAN

You can’t put a filter on reality. Bree Bozeman isn’t exactly pursuing the life of her dreams. Then again, she isn’t too sure what those dreams are. After dropping out of college, she’s living a pretty chill life in the surf community of Pacific Beach, San Diego…if “chill” means delivering food as a GrubGetter, and if it means “uneventful”. But when Bree starts a new Instagram account — @breebythesea — one of her posts gets a signal boost from none other than wildly popular self-help guru Demi DiPalma, owner of a lifestyle brand empire. Suddenly, Bree just might be a rising star in the world of Instagram influencing. Is this the direction her life has been lacking? It’s not a career choice she’d ever seriously considered, but maybe it’s a sign from the universe. After all, Demi’s the real deal… right? Everything is lining up for Bree: life goals, career, and even a blossoming romance with the chiseled guy next door, surf star Trey Cantu. But things are about to go sideways fast, and even the perfect filter’s not gonna fix it. Instagram might be free, but when your life looks flawless on camera, what’s the cost?

BUY LINKS:

Harlequin Amazon Apple Books Barnes & Noble Books-A-Million Google Play IndieBound Kobo

Kristin Rockaway is a native New Yorker with an insatiable case of wanderlust. After working in the IT industry for far too many years, she traded the city for the surf and chased her dreams out to Southern California, where she spends her days happily writing stories instead of software. When she's not writing, she enjoys spending time with her husband and son, and planning her next big vacation.

SOCIAL LINKS:

http://kristinrockaway.com/ Facebook: /KristinRockaway Twitter: @KristinRockaway Instagram: @KristinRockway

Excerpt

From Chapter Two

“Don’t these books make your purse really heavy? There’s gotta be some app where you can store all this information.”

“Studies show you’re more likely to remember things you’ve written by hand, with physical pen and paper.” She reached across my lap and opened the glove compartment, removing a notebook with an antiqued photograph of a vintage luxury car printed on the cover. “For example, this is my auto maintenance log. Maybe if you’d kept one of these, like I told you to, we wouldn’t be in this predicament right now.”

I loved Natasha, I really did. She was responsible and generous, and without her I’d likely be far worse off than I already was, which was a horrifying thought to consider. But at times like this, I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake the shit out of her.

“A maintenance log wouldn’t have helped me.”

“Yes, it would have. Organization is about more than decluttering your home. It’s about decluttering your mind. Making lists, keeping records—these are all ways to help you get your life in order. If you’d had a maintenance log, this problem wouldn’t have caught you off guard in the middle of your delivery shift. You’d have seen it coming, and—”

“I saw it coming.”

“What?”

“This didn’t catch me off guard. The check engine light came on two weeks ago.” Or maybe it was three.

“Then why didn’t you take it to the mechanic?” She blinked, genuinely confused. Everything was so cut-and dried with her. When a car needed to be serviced, of course you called the mechanic.

That is, if you could afford to pay the repair bill.

Fortunately, she put two and two together without making me say it out loud. “Oh,” she murmured, then bit her lip. I could almost hear the squeak and clank of wheels turning in her head as she tried to piece together the solution to this problem. No doubt it included me setting up a journal or logbook of some sort, though we both knew that would be pointless. The last time she’d tried to set me up with a weekly budget planner, I gave up on day two, when I realized I could GrubGetter around the clock for the rest of my life and still never make enough money to get current on the payments for my student loans. You know, for that degree I’d never finished.

But Natasha was a determined problem solver. It said so in her business bio: “Natasha DeAngelis, Certified Professional Organizer®, is a determined problem solver with a passion for sorting, purging, arranging, and containerizing.” My life was a perpetual mess, and though she couldn’t seem to be able to clean it up, that didn’t stop her from trying. Over and over and over again.

“I’ll pay for the repairs,” she said.

“No.” I shook my head, fending off the very big part of me that wanted to say yes. “I can’t take any money from you.”

“It’s fine,” she said. “Business is booming. I’ve got so much work right now that I’ve actually had to turn clients away. And ever since Al introduced that new accelerated orthodontic treatment, his office has been raking it in. We can afford to help you.”

“I know.” Obviously, my sister and her family weren’t hurting for cash. Aside from her wildly successful organizing business, her husband, Al, ran his own orthodontics practice. They owned a four-bedroom house, leased luxury cars, and took triannual vacations to warm, sunny places like Maui and Tulum. They had a smart fridge in their kitchen that was undoubtedly worth more than my nonfunctioning car.

But my sister wasn’t a safety net, and I needed to stop treating her like one. She’d already done so much for me. More than any big sister should ever have to do.

“I just can’t,” I said.

“Well, do you really have any other choice?” There was an edge to Natasha’s voice now. “If you don’t have a car, how are you going to work?”

“I’ll figure something out.” The words didn’t sound very convincing, even to my own ears. For the past four years, all I’d done was deliver food. I had no other marketable skills, no references, no degree.

I was a massive failure.

Tears pooled in my eyes. Natasha sighed again.

“Look,” she said, “maybe it’s time to admit you need to come up with a solid plan for your life. You’ve been in a downward spiral ever since Rob left.”

She had a point. I’d never been particularly stable, but things got a whole lot worse seven months earlier, when my live-in ex-boyfriend, Rob, had abruptly announced he was ending our three-year relationship, quitting his job, and embarking on an immersive ayahuasca retreat in the depths of the Peruvian Amazon.

“I’ve lost my way,” he’d said, his eyes bloodshot from too many hits on his vape pen. “The Divine Mother Shakti at the Temple of Eternal Light can help me find myself again.”

“What?” I’d been incredulous. “Where is this coming from?”

He’d unearthed a book from beneath a pile of dirty clothes on our bed and handed it to me—Psychedelic Healers: An Exploratory Journey of the Soul, by Shakti Rebecca Rubinstein.

“What is this?”

“It’s the book that changed my life,” he’d said. “I’m ready for deep growth. New energy.”

Then he’d moved his belongings to a storage unit off the side of the I-8, and left me to pay the full cost of our monthly rent and utilities on my paltry GrubGetter income.

I told myself this situation was only temporary, that Rob would return as soon as he realized that hallucinating in the rainforest wasn’t going to lead him to some higher consciousness. But I hadn’t heard from him since he took off on that direct flight from LAX to Lima. At this point, it was probably safe to assume he was never coming back.

Which was probably for the best. It’s not exactly like Rob was Prince Charming or anything. But being with him was better than being alone. At least I’d had someone to split the bills with.

“Honestly,” she continued, “I can’t stand to see you so miserable anymore. Happiness is a choice, Bree. Choose happy.”

Of all Natasha’s pithy sayings, “Choose happy” was the one I hated most. It was printed on the back of her business cards in faux brush lettering, silently accusing each potential client of being complicit in their own misery. If they paid her to clean out their closets, though, they could apparently experience unparalleled joy.

“That’s bullshit, and you know it.”

She scowled. “It is not.”

“It is, actually. Shitty things happen all the time and we have no choice in the matter. I didn’t choose to be too broke to fix my car. I work really hard, but this job doesn’t pay well. And I didn’t choose for Rob to abandon me to go find himself in the Amazon, either. He made that choice for us.”

I almost mentioned the shittiest thing that had ever happened to Natasha or to me, a thing neither of us had chosen. But I stopped myself before the words rolled off my lips. This evening was bad enough without rehashing the details of our mother’s death.

“Sometimes things happen to us that are beyond our control,” Natasha said, her voice infuriatingly calm. “But we can control how we react to it. Focus on what you can control. And it does no good to dwell on the past, either. Don’t look back, Bree—”

“Because that’s not where you’re going. Yes, I know. You’ve said that before.” About a thousand times.

She took a deep breath, most likely to prepare for a lengthy lecture on why it’s important to stay positive and productive in the face of adversity, but then a large tow truck lumbered onto the cul-de-sac and she got out of the car to flag him down.

Grateful for the interruption, I ditched the casserole on her dashboard and walked over to where the driver had double-parked alongside my car.

“What’s the problem?” he asked, hopping down from the cab.

“It won’t start,” I said, to which Natasha quickly followed up with, “The check engine light came on several weeks ago, but the car has not been serviced yet.”

He grunted and popped the hood, one thick filthy hand stroking his braided beard as he surveyed the engine. Another grunt, then he asked for the keys and tried to start it, only to hear the same sad click and whine as before.

“It’s not the battery.” He leaned his head out of the open door. “When was the last time you changed your timing belt?”

“Uh… I don’t know.”

Natasha shook her head and mouthed, Maintenance log! in my direction but I pretended not to see.

The driver got out and slammed the hood shut. “Well, this thing is hosed.”

“Hosed?” My heart thrummed in my chest. “What does that mean? It can’t be fixed?”

He shrugged, clearly indifferent to my crisis-in-progress. “Can’t say for sure. Your mechanic can take a closer look and let you know. Where do you want me to tow it?”

I pulled out my phone to look up the address of the mechanic near my apartment down in Pacific Beach. But Natasha answered before I could google it up.

“Just take it to Encinitas Auto Repair,” she said. “It’s on Second and F.”

“You got it,” he said, then retreated to his truck to fiddle with some chains.

Natasha avoided my gaze. Instead, she focused on calling a guy named Jerry, who presumably worked at this repair shop, and told him to expect “a really old Civic that’s in rough shape,” making sure to specify, “It’s not mine, it’s my sister’s.”

I knew she was going to pay for the repairs. It made me feel icky, taking yet another handout from my big sister. But ultimately, she was right. What other choice did I have?

The two of us stayed quiet while the driver finished hooking up my car. After he’d towed it away down the cul-desac and out of sight, Natasha turned to me. “Do you want to come over? Izzy’s got piano lessons in fifteen minutes, you can hear how good she is now.”

Even though I did miss my niece, there was nothing I wanted to do more than go home, tear off these smelly clothes, and cry in solitude. “I’ll take a rain check. Thanks again for coming to get me.”

“Of course.” She started poking at her phone screen. A moment later, she said, “Your Lyft will be here in four minutes. His name is Neil. He drives a black Sentra.” A quick kiss on my cheek and she was hustling back to her SUV.

As I watched Natasha drive away, I wished—not for the first time—that I could be more like her: competent, organized, confident enough in my choices to believe I could choose to be happy. Sometimes I felt like she had twenty years on me, instead of only six. So maybe instead of complaining, I should’ve started taking her advice.

#she's faking it #kristin rockaway #blog tour #excerpt

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alliance-recruitment-agency-blog · 5 years

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Aviation Headhunters - Your Trading Education Is The Key To Success

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kristablogs · 4 years

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Flying over mountains isn’t as scary (or hard) as you might think

“I shopped the Strip at Mahoney Creek only to see its windsocks voting in opposite directions.” (Julie Boatman/)

This story originally featured in the May 2020 issue of Flying Magazine.

My relationship with the mountains began on hikes with my family, camping trips up into the farthest corners of Glacier National Park that could be reached with a 7-year-old (me) and a toddling 4-year-old (my little brother) in close formation. We took what we could carry in our little packs—supplemented heavily with the resources my parents stuffed into their own.

Fast-forward to my early flight-instructing years in Colorado, where one of my greatest joys was introducing pilots to the high country—famously high-altitude airports like Leadville, Telluride and Aspen. The “real” backcountry beckoned, though, and about 15 years ago, I took a condensed, one-on-one mountain flying course with well-known backcountry instructor Lori MacNichol, through McCall Mountain Canyon Flying Seminars. The flights I made there cemented my love for the high country and, more so than that, provided me with a skill set that could be applied to much of my everyday flying.

Indeed, these lessons that the mountains bring to us know no gender, age or aviation background. So, when Christina Tindle from WomanWise Aviation Adventures dropped me a note on Twitter, asking my interest in joining them for an upcoming seminar in Cascade, Idaho, I was intrigued by two things: how flying with like-minded pilots would enhance my experience (or detract from it) and how much I would recall from my previous time flying into the Idaho wilderness.

A psychologist and counselor by occupation—and backcountry pilot—Tindle launched a series of seminars in 2011 with a fly-in to Smiley Creek, Idaho. In 2019, she conducted four events in Idaho and Colorado, focusing on backcountry flying but also touching on other areas of flight based on the requests of participants, including upset and recovery training, aerobatics, floatplane flying, and primary tailwheel instruction.

“These lessons the mountains bring to us know no gender, age or aviation background. ” (Julie Boatman/)

Setting goals

I knew this aviation seminar would be different when Tindle sent me a pre-event registration packet that included an overview with the quote, “If the shoe fits, you’ll dance a lot longer.” While the questionnaire accompanying the notes asked me to list standard items such as my flight time and recency of experience—and relative comfort flying in the backcountry—it also asked an open-ended question, “What do you want from your experience at WWAA?”

You could respond with a simple answer, or you could dive in more philosophically. Given that the registration form also noted that we would be formulating Life Flight plans, the intention with the question was clearly broader than simply probing our need to improve our confined-airstrip-landing skills.

Because I would be a speaker at the seminar, giving a presentation on coping with life’s “go-arounds” (often mistakenly referred to as “failures”), I left my answer generic, knowing I’d address the very topic I wanted to work on—extrapolating the confidence I’ve often gained from flying into my life on the ground—in my talk with the group.

A careful study of the terrain and airport information before you fly is critical—but takes on even more significance in the mountains. (Julie Boatman/)

Preparation and planning

Weather in Cascade in the third week of September can offer up anything from summer-like temps and density-altitude concerns to drizzly clouds and mountain-obscuring ceilings—or even a blizzard. I scheduled two days of instruction according to the forecast, knowing I could add an aerobatic flight or some tailwheel practice as the actual conditions allowed.

To balance the flying time, Tindle scheduled briefings from the instructor corps in the afternoons and evenings. For example, in one evening, Bob Del Valle of Hallo Flight Training (based in Priest River, Idaho) covered key concepts, such as engine failure after takeoff and accelerated stalls, as well as decision-making skills tuned to the environment in which we’d fly.

I spent my first day of flying with Fred Williams, an instructor who splits his time between Cascade and Reno, Nevada. He offered up his Kitfox with large-format tires for our flying—an airplane I’d flown only briefly with a friend in the more urbane environs of airpark-rich Florida.

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Highlights from the “Lessons From The Mountains” appearing in May 2020 FLYING. #instaaviation #avgeek #avgeeks #explore #aviation #flying #pilots #airplanes #goflying #aviationlovers #flyingmagazine #flyingmag #pilotsofinstagram #mountainflying #backcountry #backcountryflying #idahoflying #flyidaho #kitfox

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We briefed the flights in detail before launching, with a careful look at the airport diagrams and sectional charts, as well as the beta put together on each approach by a long list of experienced (and mostly successful) mountain pilots before us. Williams quizzed me on general concepts such as performance and high-country macro- and microweather to determine my background and review any areas I needed to address. Because my previous time flying in the true backcountry had been more than a decade ago (and different from flying at high-elevation yet improved airports in the Mountain West such as Santa Fe, New Mexico, or Steamboat Springs, Colorado), there was much ground to cover.

Understanding performance is paramount to mountain ops—whether it involves a new-to-you airplane, as was the Kitfox for me, or an old friend like the Cessna 182, which I would fly on day two. I looked forward to flying a made-for-the-mountains machine like Williams’ Kitfox, which has a 115 hp turbocharged Rotax 914 UL engine up front coupled with a Garmin G3X Touch integrated flight deck in the panel, about $150,000 as equipped. As a special light-sport aircraft, the Kitfox in this configuration keeps training costs reasonable while, at the same time, offering some of the latest technology and safety features.

We knew wind would likely become a factor after lunch—very common when flying in the mountains, regardless of the season—so we planned to keep a watchful eye on the wind vector shown on the G3X as we crossed passes on our way out and back.

“A Canyon Turn takes advantage of the fact that reducing airspeed decreases the radius of your turn.” (Julie Boatman/)

The practice area

Once briefed, we launched into blue and headed east to the practice area, in the valley hosting the Landmark, Idaho, airstrip (0U0). Before reaching the airport vicinity, Williams had me practice canyon turns in the broad valley, slowing down bit by bit to tighten them up. A canyon turn takes advantage of the fact that reducing your airspeed decreases the radius of your turn. If you execute a turn using a 30-degree bank at a near-cruise, density-altitude-adjusted groundspeed of 120 knots, the radius of your turn is 2,215 feet. At a speed near VA for many single-engine airplanes—say, 90 knots—you take up a lot less real estate, at 1,246 feet. If you can safely reduce your speed to 60 knots, that figure drops to 553 feet, and you can just about execute a 180-degree turn in 1,100 feet laterally. Use of flaps can help maintain a slower speed—making a huge difference when you contemplate a course reversal below canyon walls.

But those take practice to execute well. In Del Valle’s briefing, he had gone over the increased stall speed inherent with a turn of increased bank. With a bank angle of zero, let’s say your airplane has a stall speed (VS) of 60 knots. At 30 degrees of bank, that speed increases 10 percent to 66 knots; at 45 degrees of bank, it’s up to 72 knots. Because the Kitfox’s VS was much lower than 60 knots—try 49 mph with no flaps—we had a lot of room to play with, but still the smaller the bank, the less the chance we’d run into accelerated-stall territory. A good canyon turn is a balance of these aspects.

Surveying the strip—what some pilots call “shopping,” a term I first heard from MacNichol 15 years ago and in common usage among Idaho pilots—takes practice, too. Flying an extra traffic pattern gives you time to ferret out the details. Sometimes, you have to do this a lot higher than a standard traffic-pattern altitude, and you might not have sight of the strip during the approach until you’re on short final.

At Landmark, we had a relatively wide-open valley in which to maneuver as we gauged the status of its 4,000-foot-long, 100-foot-wide surface. As we worked through the day, flying to Indian Creek (S81) and Thomas Creek (2U8), we would need progressively more-inventive ways to survey the landing site before making our approach. On day two in the 182, we would do the same with instructor Stacey Burdell, scoping the scene at Stanley (2U7), Smiley Creek (U87), Idaho City (U98) and Garden Valley (U88), consecutively.

Checking the actual weather against the forecast also proved most important, especially because of the winds at ridge-top level contradicting those at the surface—or even at the ends of the same runway. With Williams on day one, I shopped the strip at Mahoney Creek (0U3) only to see its windsocks voting in opposite directions. As much as I wanted to land there and tag another new strip in my logbook, we left it for another day. We bounced around enough on the way back to Cascade (U70) to validate my choice.

Most visitors to the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness float or hike in, but flying yourself offers an unmatched perspective. (Julie Boatman/)

A stabilized approach

If you have this image of a backcountry pilot making crazy maneuvers to “make it” to a landing, dispel them from your mind right now. If you have any sense, you won’t accept anything less than a stabilized approach—and you’ll bail out early if you can’t maintain your airspeed and sight picture.

That said, the stabilized approach to a backcountry strip looks a little different than the one you might use in normal ops. This stems directly from the fact many mountain strips are one-way-in runways and have a “point of no return,” after which you must make the landing. A super-low-speed, power-off, short-field approach doesn’t offer the same margins for adjustment at the last minute that the backcountry approach does.

We practiced at Landmark—which has no point of no return because of its position in the valley—setting up a steep, low-power descent at a moderate rate, with full flaps in the Kitfox (think 30 degrees if you were flying a Cessna 172) and a speed at 1.2 to 1.3 times VSO, which correlates to about 55 mph indicated in the Kitfox. This configuration offers the ability to use more or less power if needed and modify the descent rate to avoid landing short—or long.

The key is to lock this in well before you reach your predetermined go-around point. If you don’t have the configuration in place and stable, you need to execute the go-around before that point of no return, or you risk everything. One of the approaches on day two was not well-stabilized, at Garden City, and it drove home the necessity of staying diligent about this practice—and being locked and loaded to go around if you’re too high and too fast at the key position, rather than forcing the approach.

Instructors Fred Williams and Danielle Maniere have fun in the Kitfox. (Julie Boatman/)

Life lessons

There’s an aspect of facing and conquering the unknown that carries over into the rest of your experience. The mountains are personal to me, and returning to them at a perfect time in my life, when I needed a shot of self-confidence, made all the difference in the world.

As weather drew in on day three, we bagged the airport activities for a hike into a nearby hot springs as the snow fell around us. The camaraderie was real as we navigated slippery rocks, and it would continue on in the aviation friendships I made that week. Our Plan B was just fine—and executing it reiterated the joy of taking advantage of life’s sharp turns. A disappointment became an opportunity to enjoy the natural beauty of a place we could access through general aviation. That’s another lesson that feels particularly poignant now as we face uncertainties ahead in life.

On the last evening of the seminar, the group encapsulated our plans for the coming days, weeks and months into concrete goals. Mine was simple: to keep flying. To keep exploring new places only an airplane can reach. To tap into that well of confidence-building stuff that only learning to fly has provided me. And that too is something every pilot can take away.

An approach into Garden Valley. (Julie Boatman/)

Mountain skills you can use every day

Pay attention to micrometeorology—and understand how fast the weather can change. In both the mountains and the lowlands, the environment immediately surrounding an airport can funnel winds and generate up- and downdrafts worthy of note, along with localized clouds and reduced visibility.

A stabilized approach is a safe approach. While you might use a different technique for your approach to a “normal” runway, setting a configuration and rate of descent to have in place by the time you’re at 500 feet agl—or higher—will stack the deck in your favor for a better landing.

Practice and plan for a go-around every time. In the backcountry, your go-around decision point might not be over the runway, or even on short final. Committing to a go-around plan, and knowing when you’ll trigger it, is vital. This holds true with every single landing you attempt.

The go/no-go decision continues throughout the flight. While you may consider the flight launched once you’re airborne, you’re always in a position to return to the place you just left, divert, or come up with some alternative to the plan you had in mind. This mental flexibility may very well save your life someday.

Take the right equipment. Save room (and weight) for a well-stocked flight bag—one that holds an extra layer of clothing, a hat, a first-aid kit, food and water, and other emergency supplies. Landing out, even in the flatlands, can leave you far from assistance.

Required reading

Two books guided my research, and a host of content online supports the topics they cover.

If there’s a primary textbook for flying in the high country, Mountain, Canyon, and Backcountry Flying by Amy L. Hoover and R.K. “Dick” Williams is it. Hoover has been flying the Idaho backcountry since 1989 and started teaching mountain flying in 1992 while working as a backcountry air-taxi pilot. She’s an original co-founder of McCall Mountain Canyon Flying Seminars. For the book she teamed up with pilot legend and author Dick Williams, who started training pilots in the backcountry in 1985. It’s available through Aviation Supplies and Academics.

For those who want their mountain flying in concise form, seek out a copy of Mountain Flying by Sparky Imeson, published in 1987 by Airguide Publications. Imeson, who ironically died in a March 2009 accident involving his Cessna 180 in the mountains, founded Imeson Aviation in 1968 at the Jackson Hole Airport in Wyoming. His wisdom—and the website, mountainflying.com—lives on, disseminating his vast knowledge of the techniques and decision-making critical to flying safely in the backcountry.

More aviation adventures

Tindle plans more WomanWise Aviation Adventures for 2020, though at press time they remain in flux because of general travel concerns in the spring, which we all hope to have dissipate by summer. Tindle said in March, “[I’m planning] September 6 to 10 in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, for high-mountain flying, aerobatics and spin [training], and soaring, which is new. [Then it’s] October 25 to 29 in Moab, Utah, for backcountry flying, aerobatics and spin [training], and ballooning—also new.”

Check womanwiseaviationadventures.com for more details.

Also, look to Fred Williams’ Adventure Flying LLC for the wide range of flight training he provides in Cascade, Idaho, and Reno, Nevada, both in the Kitfox or in the aircraft you bring (contact Williams for details via advflying.com). Bob Del Valle offers instruction in Sandpoint, Idaho, as well as around Montana and Washington (halloflighttraining.com). Sam Davis offers instruction in aerobatics, as well as upset prevention and recovery, in the Heber City, Utah, area through Pilot Makers Advanced Flight Academy (pilotmakers.com).

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scootoaster · 4 years

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Flying over mountains isn’t as scary (or hard) as you might think

“I shopped the Strip at Mahoney Creek only to see its windsocks voting in opposite directions.” (Julie Boatman/)

This story originally featured in the May 2020 issue of Flying Magazine.

“These lessons the mountains bring to us know no gender, age or aviation background. ” (Julie Boatman/)

Setting goals

A careful study of the terrain and airport information before you fly is critical—but takes on even more significance in the mountains. (Julie Boatman/)

Preparation and planning

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A post shared by Flying Magazine (@flyingmagazine) on May 6, 2020 at 10:28am PDT

“A Canyon Turn takes advantage of the fact that reducing airspeed decreases the radius of your turn.” (Julie Boatman/)

The practice area

Most visitors to the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness float or hike in, but flying yourself offers an unmatched perspective. (Julie Boatman/)

A stabilized approach

Instructors Fred Williams and Danielle Maniere have fun in the Kitfox. (Julie Boatman/)

Life lessons

An approach into Garden Valley. (Julie Boatman/)

Mountain skills you can use every day

Required reading

Two books guided my research, and a host of content online supports the topics they cover.

More aviation adventures

Check womanwiseaviationadventures.com for more details.

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sailorsandseadogs · 5 years

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Living in a Sailboat Tree House - Stuck on Dry Dock (March 14 -April 13, 2019)

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Cabedelo, Brazil, South America

For the past several weeks, we have been stuck on dry dock in the shipyard at Marina Jacaré Village here in Cabedelo, Brazil. It feels so strange to be on the boat, but not in the water. Living on dry dock is like living in a tree house. It’s not easy. It’s not convenient. But like everything else we have experienced so far, it’s another adventure.

During the past month, I took a two-week break and headed to our land home in Gulf Shores, Alabama, U.S.A. to work a little and visit with family and friends. I had not been home since before we set sail on this journey seven months ago.

Meanwhile, in Brazil, Maik continued to work on at least eight major projects during this past month—all while living in our sailboat tree house. Most of these projects are still ongoing. Here is a recap of our last month in Cabedelo, Brazil and Alabama, USA.

Thursday, 14 March 2019

We continue to be completely inspired by the other sailors we meet and their stories. We have been in Cabedelo for so long we have seen many sailors come and go. I’ve said this many times, but it’s important to say it again—with sailors, it’s never goodbye. We always know that there is a chance we will see our sailing friends again somewhere in the world at some point. This will make even more sense if you read all of this logbook entry, as well as previous entries.

In my last blog, I mentioned our friends, Robin and Philemon, who recently sailed down to Patagonia on the southern tip of South America. They sailed around Cape Horn and then sailed for 40 straight days up to Cabedelo. They have a very cool steel ship, Bekwaipa. This is a French word that Robin learned from his grandmother. Loosely translated, it means “the opposite of not stable.”

We were walking by their boat on the pontoon while they were working outside on boat projects and invited us onboard for a tour. This is not a bright, shiny, or fancy boat. The green and white steel structure is covered in rust and in some parts of the cabin there are no walls, only open insulation. But this is a STABLE boat, so the name fits! Their inside layout is similar to Seefalke. It has the appearance of being messy and cluttered, but it’s very organized for them. They have creative rigs everywhere, including a long board with their depth sounder attached to the end. They simply hang this off the back stern when they need to test the depth of the water. It’s simple and unsophisticated, but it works.

They have surfboards on board and look like typical vagabond surfer dudes. They are so cool and are living a cool, free lifestyle. They are making plans to head back home for a month and then return here to sail to the Azores next.

That evening we ate dinner at our favorite outdoor meat-stick truck and eventually drew a crowd. We were joined by Robin and Philemon, Sophie and Tobias, and Felix and Emeline. Everyone but Maik drank Caipirinhas (the official Brazilian cocktail) and talked for hours about the addiction of sailing and the sailing lifestyle. There is a unique and instant connection with other sailors who love this lifestyle.

Friday, 15 March 2019

Christoph surprised us at breakfast with our finished cockpit boards. They had all been sanded and oiled and look brand new!

Again, we worked all day in marina. This is a very open and social area for the sailors here. The washrooms and showers are here, as well as a small diner with a limited menu, and a laundry service operated by a sweet Brazilian woman, Annabella. Most important, there are tables for working, hammocks for relaxing, and a cool breeze that makes its way through the open-air breezeway. A few tents overhead provide shade and protection from the rain.

There is a library full of books that you can read while in the lobby, or you can “leave one and take one.” Books are available in just about every language. This is also where the office of the Harbor Master is located as well as access to the marina maintenance crew.

But most important, this is where all the sailors hang out to get relief from the heat and of course, to talk with other sailors. There is always upbeat music playing, which we have trained ourselves to tune out while working.

There are a couple of stray cats and one kitten that has been adopted by all the sailors and marina crew. These cats drive Cap’n Jack and Scout crazy. We generally bring the Seadogs with us into the lobby every day while we work so that they also can get a break from the extreme heat.

We met another cool sailing couple, Mer and Dan. Mer is French, and Dan is British. They have been in Brazil for three months and head toward French Guiana next. They are young, not sure their exact age, but I would guess mid-to-late 20s. They have an apartment in London that they rent out for what they call a “ridiculously obscene price” and use the money they make from the rental to support their cruising kitty. They have no other source of income, so they always stay at anchor, never eat out (only cook on the boat), and do 100% of their boat maintenance themselves. I still find it fascinating that if you want to sail the world, you can find a way financially.

At dinner that evening, Maik and I talked about how on land our international relationship seems completely crazy. How ridiculous it seems to have a relationship with one person who lives in the US and the other who lives in Germany. People have asked us for the past six years how we manage this, and it isn’t easy. I wouldn’t recommend this kind of long-distance relationship, although we found a way to make it work all these years. But at sea, it’s completely normal and common for relationships to exist without borders. And no one we meet in these many ports seems at all surprised when we tell them I am from America and Maik is from Germany. In fact, it’s rare to find couples cruising together who are from the same country.

Tuesday, 19 March 2019

We had a lazy bag made by Christoph that we were set to install on this day. It was Maik’s turn to strap on the bosun chair and make the climb up the main mast to the top of the crow’s nest to install the rigging.

A lazy bag is a device designed to wrap itself around the main sail with lines attached to the mast spreader, creating a bag to capture the main sail when the halyard is released. The sail drops right into the bag. In addition to looking really nice and clean and organized, this is a safety feature when we are at sea. We no longer will have to fight the sail that may be flapping in heavy conditions when we try to bring it down, nor will we have to hand tie it on the foredeck. The sail will simply drop into the bag, the sail will be contained, and then we zip up the bag when conditions allow.

Wednesday, 20 March 2019

We said goodbye, for now, to Robin and Philemon, who headed to Europe by plane for a month. They were so sweet and baked us homemade bread before they left.

That afternoon, I interviewed Emeline for one of the international pumping magazines for which I often contribute articles. She is a female engineer who sails six months of the year, and then works on an offshore rig the other six months of the year. She is among the 1% of female engineers for her company. She is at sea even when she and Felix are not sailing the world in their little monohull, Sea You. It’s a fascinating story that I will post for you once it’s published.

I spent the rest of the week making a list of supplies to find while in Alabama and preparing for my trip to our land home.

BACK IN THE GOOD OLE USA (March 24 – April 8, 2019)

I had not been back in Alabama since Thanksgiving, and I had not been to our apartment in Gulf Shores since I left with the pups to fly to Germany on July 30, 2018. Seven months is a long time to be away from home.

I had an early flight from Recife, which meant I needed to leave the marina at 04:30 with our taxi driver/friend Marco to make the 2-hour drive to the airport.

It felt strange being on an airplane. The 8-hour flight was ok, but I had a 14-hour layover in Orlando. It was an overnight layover, so I decided to take a cheap hotel near the airport and sleep during the layover. This made the 1.5-hour flight to Pensacola the next day manageable and helped me quickly shake any jet lag.

My dear friend, Michele, picked me up from the airport. I planned to stay two nights with her and Doug while we had renters in our apartment in Gulf Shores. Maik had given me a long list of boat supplies to find while in the states that we couldn’t get in Brazil. Michele and I went on the hunt at WalMart and Lowe’s. Oh, how I have missed these great American super stores!

We filled her car with supplies and headed back to her house for a barbecue with more friends — Steve, Catherine, Jenny, Fritz, and of course, Doug (Michele’s boyfriend). We had a blast catching up! It’s so great to see my American friends again!

I made it to Gulf Shores on Monday morning and struggled a bit to settle in. It didn’t feel like home without Maik and the pups, but I immediately got busy on several projects after visiting with more friends—Trisha, Krista, and Tom.

One of my main tasks for the trip was to try to sell enough things in my offsite storage unit to move to a smaller, cheaper storage unit. I was able to easily sell tons of old furniture items on Facebook Marketplace and brought a few things back to the apartment to use there. During the two weeks stateside, I was able to accomplish moving from a 10 x 10 storage unit to a 5 x 10 unit, cutting my footprint and the monthly payment in half. I was able to use the money gained from the furniture sales for all the boat supplies I needed to purchase.

Meanwhile, I also sold my car to my friend Trisha—my cool VW Beetle Convertible. I love this car, but it’s just sitting there all these months, so now I can save money on the payments and insurance. It was a huge expense each month, so this is a relief to be free of that. We still have our old beat-up Jimmy truck that we can drive while in Gulf Shores, and this is all we really need. We barely need one car right now, and we definitely don’t need two!

I struggled to find a good rhythm at home—especially at first. I was enjoying the long, hot showers and the unlimited supply of ICE, but I found it hard to concentrate on real work. I thought I would love being in the civilized world so much that maybe I wouldn’t want to return to Brazil, but this only made me want to get back to the boat more. I continued to realize that some of the creature comforts I always thought I couldn’t live without are just not that important to me anymore.

As the famous sailor, Robin Lee Graham, once said, “At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much.”

My amazing son, Bo, came to visit me for the weekend. It was fantastic to have some very high-quality one-on-one time with him. I miss my kids so much and this is the hardest part of being at sea!

Bo and I spent the weekend talking, catching up, and watching all the Oscar-nominated movies. This is our tradition. We do it every year and come up with our own opinions of who should have won the Academy Awards. We highly recommend BlackkKlansman and Green Book. They were our favorites over the weekend, but we also liked The Wife and The Favourite.

We also spent some time over the weekend cheering on our Auburn Tigers with our neighbors, Tom and Krista! Our team made it to the NCAA Final Four Basketball Tournament for the first time in history, but lost in the first round. It was cool to share the experience with other loyal Auburn fans and friends! War Eagle!!!!

During my second week home I got to spend a lovely dinner with friends/neighbors, Lynn and Mike, and then got a visit from my sis-in-law, Pam, and my niece, Allie, who drove all the way from Decatur to visit me for a couple days. We went to the beach and had a fabulous time together. We also went to Mobile and had dinner with my other sis-in-law, Dana, and my niece, Ashton, and nephew, Wells, at their restaurant, The Dumbwaiter.

It was fabulous seeing family, but I was devastated to not be able to spend any time with my parents or with my precious daughter, Shelby.

Time in Gulf Shores was productive and went by so fast. I loaded up three huge suitcases full of supplies for the boat, then headed back to Pensacola for another fun evening with Michele and Doug, and our friend, Shirley.

After an early flight out of Pensacola, I had another long layover in Orlando. This time it was 10.5 hours and during the day rather than overnight. I stayed at the airport and caught up on all the work I didn’t get done during my hometown visit.

BACK IN BRAZIL (April 9 – 14, 2019)

While I was in the U.S., Maik had moved Seefalke onto dry dock in the Marina Jacaré Village shipyard and had been extremely busy with repairs and upgrades.

As Marco drove me into the marina, I didn’t even recognize Seefalke. Her bright orange paint had been almost completely stripped from her hull and there were little bits of orange paint peelings all over the dirt ground in the shipyard.

Maik and the pups had gotten used to living on dry dock since the day after I left for the U.S., and I learned quickly what it’s like to live in a sailboat on dry land.

We have access to electricity and water, but we can’t use the head at all. There is a bathroom in the marina lobby, which is just a short walk from the shipyard, but it’s a major project to get in and out of the boat.

We have a swimming ladder attached to the back of the stern, but it’s not long enough to reach the ground while Seefalke is sitting on dry land. We have another traditional ladder leaned against Seefalke’s stern. We climb a few steps on the regular ladder, then switch to the swimming ladder to climb the rest of the way to the top. On the way down, we use the swimming ladder then can switch to the regular ladder. We also have a huge oil can we can step onto on the way down. This system works, but it is especially inconvenient when I need to go to the potty in the middle of the night. But this is our situation at the moment.

As I mentioned earlier, living on dry dock is like living in a tree house!

Then, there is the issue of getting the Seadogs on and off the boat. Seefalke’s deck is about 3 meters (10 feet) off the ground. It would not be safe to try and carry Cap’n Jack and Scout up and down the ladder.

Maik used his engineering and seamanship skills to engineer a puppy crane for them. We strap them in their extraordinarily safe life vests, which have two handles on the top. Safety straps with D-rings connect the life vest handles to a line that is rigged with a block to the mizzen boom. Then we can simply lower them or raise them safely and securely with the well-designed puppy crane. They don’t seem to mind. Their tails are wagging the whole way. We posted a very cool video of this system for our Patrons. You can join our crew on Patreon for as little as $2 per month to get extra features like this.

ONGOING REPAIR AND UPGRADE PROJECTS

Paint Job

The paint job project is ongoing. At this point, we have scraped all the paint, sanded, and began the priming stages. Removing the paint is not as easy as it sounds as our ship had four decades of paint layers. Heavy rain delayed the project several days and continues to extend it. Seefalke still needs several layers of primer, with sanding in between each layer, and then the bright orange paint.

Maik considered painting Seefalke a different color as he has never really loved the bright orange facade, but I wouldn’t let him. Her orange color is part of her character and personality. She was meant to be ORANGE!

After all that is finished, we will apply the coppercoat antifouling on Seefalke’s bottom and then give that coating a harsh sanding before putting her back in the water.

Fuel Leak

Sometimes, when you fix one thing on a sailboat, you uncover many other problems and issues. After Seefalke’s paint was scraped, we discovered a leak in the main diesel tank that is in the keel of the boat. There was a crack in the structure of the boat that we later learned was caused by the boat being placed on the support timber in the wrong place when we moved her out of the water. We have now emptied the tank and flushed it with water many times. The crack has been welded, but the next crucial task will be welding the tank from the inside. Again, more detail is available on Patreon.

Solar Panels

One of our other ongoing projects is installing our new solar panels, which have been ordered.

As you may remember we realized during our Atlantic Crossing that we have not quite reached energetic self-sufficiency yet. One of the old solar panels is down, and the other one is covered by the sails most of the time, while the wind generator remains behind our expectations.

We have decided to significantly upgrade our solar inventory from 90 W to 690 W. We will use the existing massive mast of the wind generator and will install a similar mast on the other side. On the beam between them we will install a 280 W solar panel and the support will also serve as davits for our dinghy.

In addition to the big solar panel on the stern we will install two smaller solar panels of 160 W each on each side of the sea fence. Those will get adjustable mounts to direct them toward the sun, if conditions allow.

The davits are a great side effect of the structure as we desperately need more space on the stern deck. Being able to move the dinghy to the davits will clear the stern deck almost entirely. Also, it will be much easier to deploy the dinghy, when needed. It was impossible to get the necessary blocks here in Brazil, so I bought them in the U.S. at West Marine in Orange Beach and brought them back with me, along with three huge suitcases full of other supplies we couldn’t find in Brazil.

New anchor & chain

You may remember that we had to leave our anchor and chain at the bottom of the sea in Fernado de Noronha during our Atlantic Crossing. This week, we received the new anchor and chain and will install it as soon as the painting is completed. We marked the 50-meter chain with white paint every 5 meters and orange paint every 10 meters (two sections for 20 meters, three sections for 30 meters, etc.) so that we will know the depth of the anchor as we raise it and lower it with the windlass.

For continuous detailed updates on these and other ongoing projects, join our crew on Patreon!

Meanwhile, we said goodbye, for now, to our German friends, Dieter and Claudia, who are headed to French Guiana. But on the same day, we said hello again to Robin and Philemon, who returned from their month-long break with family in Europe. It’s so hard to believe we have been sitting here this long!

We also said hello again to another French sailor we met in Cape Verde. He left Cape Verde about two weeks before we did and made his way to Brazil. He then went to El Salvador and then attempted a solo voyage to Cape Town, South Africa. But he didn’t make it. Somewhere along the way, the headwind and massive waves were impossible for him to maneuver. Somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic, he made the decision to turn around and return to Brazil. He was at sea for 36 straight days and never made it to his destination. This is one sailor we definitely didn’t expect to see again so soon.

Meanwhile, we continue with our routine of working in the lobby every day and working on all these boat projects. This week, we will take a break from work and boat projects to explore Brazil a little. We really haven’t had the opportunity to do that yet. Maik heads to Germany next week to spend time with his daughter for Easter. Hopefully, when he returns, we will be closer to our next adventure—a cruise along the Amazon Delta. We are so ready to get back to sea. But for now, we will live in our dry dock tree house for at least another few weeks . . .

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mrcoreymonroe · 6 years

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A Precautionary Landing Leads To Big Surprise For Pilot

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Flying is great. By using the flying club Comanche, I could combine a Friday morning business meeting in Philadelphia with a weekend duck hunting trip to Swanton, Vermont, on the Canadian border, something that would have been essentially impossible using the airlines. So, on a rainy September morning, after a checking the Westchester County Airport (HPN) weather (marginal VFR), I filed VFR to Philly. A 7:30 a.m. departure would get me there in good time to make an 11 a.m. advertising presentation. Then, after a client lunch, I would be back in the air headed to Vermont by 3 p.m.

As soon as I crossed the Hudson River into New Jersey, the ceiling started to drop until it hit 300 feet with less than a mile of rainy visibility. I was losing my VOR navigation signals (this was before GPS) and was starting to get that “this is not going well” feeling.

I was just about to reverse course and return to HPN when a 1,500-foot freshly mowed field suddenly appeared right in front of me. So, rather than risk hitting one of the many 900-foot TV towers I had just flown past at 300 feet, I decided to land. The landing was tricky since the man on the tractor mowing the field was not quite finished. He could not hear me due to the noise created by the gang of a dozen mowers he was pulling. He also did not see me from under his rain hood as he was focused on the cutting pattern he was creating. I had to keep circling the field until I could set up a short final to clear the 10-foot wall on the downwind end just as the mower was making his turn inside the wall at the upwind end of the field. Of course, I knew I would surprise him as I touched down and he turned to face a 6-foot spinning prop attached to a fast-moving airplane coming right at him. Fortunately, in addition to landing into a pretty brisk wind, I was landing slightly uphill on wet grass, and so we both stopped a good 50 or 60 yards apart!

I thought that was the end of the drama and when I saw him get on his handheld radio. Now, there were no cell phones back then either, but why did he have a radio? Dismissing that oddity, I thought “Great! He is already calling for help. Maybe he thinks I’m out of gas.”

A security car arrived in minutes, and an armed guard got out and immediately asked, “How long have you been flying?” I looked at my watch and said, “Oh, only about 45 minutes, and then I ran into this bad weather.”

“No! I mean how much time have you logged as a pilot? There is an airport 2 miles from here, and you just landed in a state prison yard! This is the New Jersey Neuro-Psychiatric Institute,” he exclaimed. “Sorry, I am just trying to get to a business meeting in Philly,” I replied as I pulled my advertising portfolio case out of the cockpit.

“I need to look in the duffle bag you have in the backseat—and is that a gun case you have strapped in next to it?” he said, looking in the backseat with one hand on his sidearm.

“Yes, well, you see, after the meeting, I am flying to Vermont to go duck hunting and, yes, that is a 12-gauge shotgun, and the ammo and camo rain gear is for the hunt,” I explained as I opened the duffle.

“If you could just call me a cab, I can get to my meeting in Philly, and then I’ll come back this afternoon and fly this plane out of your yard—I’m sure the weather will have improved by then.”

The officer did call me a cab after recording all my ID info and taking lots of photos. He also insisted that I call the New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) to report my transgression and get permission to fly a plane out of a state prison yard. He thought for sure they would make me take the wings off and truck it to the nearby airport.

After an expensive, one-hour cab ride to Philly, I had just enough time before my meeting to call NJDOT. Of course, they already knew all about my prison yard landing and, after confirming my limited private time (less than 150 hours), they insisted that I hire a commercial pilot to fly the Comanche two miles to the nearby airport. In fact, the officer I spoke to had already lined up a commercial pilot (also his brother-in-law) to meet me at the prison later in the day—but much better than taking the wings off and trucking it over.

So, after a client lunch during which I listened to lots of advice about the virtues of Amtrak vs. small plane travel and ribbing about my piloting skills, I got one of the more sympathetic clients to give me a ride back to the prison yard.

After watching the commercial pilot fly the Comanche off the grass and over the trees, we drove the two miles to the Princeton airport (of course, it was clearly marked on my sectional chart that I must have been too busy to look at—what with watching for TV towers and trying to take advantage of my “good luck” spotting a freshly cut field to land in). I paid the commercial pilot his $200 fee, topped off the tanks and was in the air heading for Vermont within the hour.

I spent most of the flight to Swanton reliving my morning flight and comparing it to the safety and comfort of Amtrak. Should I take the train next time? “Start working on an instrument rating” was my answer!

I also spent some time trying to decide whether to enter the unscheduled stop in the Comanche’s logbook as A precautionary weather-related landing at the New Jersey Neuro-Psychiatric Institute for all the other club members to read or not. That’s the way it appears in my pilot’s logbook, but in the end, I decided to enter “HPN to Princeton, NJ, Airport to Swanton, VT, Airport” in the Comanche’s log book.

In the weeks that followed, I thought a lot about VFR flight planning and the importance of penciling alternate routes and possible emergency stopping places along the route on sectional charts. As I continued to fly VFR in marginal weather, I was able to make much better decisions and make them sooner about when to reverse/alter course or land safely, albeit not at my originally intended destination. I never did pursue an instrument rating.

Instead, I continued to fly with carefully marked sectional charts even as GPS and satellite weather streamed to an iPad became more prevalent. During all those years, I diverted to an alternate airport any number of times, but luckily I never had to set it down on a freshly mowed field again, and certainly not one within the walls of a state prison.

Have you had a close call or a cool aviation experience that left a lasting impression? We’d love to share your story in the magazine! We’re looking for stories that are between 1,100 and 1,500 words long that tell a great story. If you’re interested, you can always write us a note outlining your experience and we’ll get back to you right away. The pay is small potatoes, $101, but if your story is chosen, you’ll get to work with our great illustrator Gabriel Campanario and have him bring your memory to life.

Email us (sorry, no phone calls or snail mail) at [email protected] and put Lessons Learned Submission in the subject line.

Did you miss our last installment of Lessons Learned? Check out the archive now!

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epic-flight-academy · 6 years

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Peruvian Pilot Program

Hernan Sotil, Epic Professional Pilot, Boeing 737-500 First Officer, LC Perú

Have you ever dreamed of becoming an airline pilot? Epic Flight Academy’s Peruvian Pilot Program is designed to provide students seeking employment under the Directorate General of Civil Aviation of Perú with structured flight training taking them from zero experience to a successful career as an airline pilot. The course is designed to support students who speak English as a second language and wish to pursue a career as a professional pilot. In the aviation industry, the ability to read, write, and speak English proficiently is required for most employees and all pilots. Our flight school students have unlimited access to English tutoring to develop Aviation English skills during Ground School training.

Epic is proud to have helped more than 5,300 international students from 88 countries prepare for jobs in aviation. Epic has successfully provided an unparalleled pilot program for Peruvian students to reach their dream airline job at LATAM Perú and LC Perú, such as Hernan Sotil. With the demand for airline pilots at an all-time high and pilot salaries soaring, aspiring aviators are seeking the most cost and time-effective ways to fulfill their flight training and airline pilot career dreams.

Transferable, Top Quality FAA Pilot Programs Our flight school’s flight training courses are the leading United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved Professional Pilot courses. World-renowned for structure and rigorous training standards, licenses and certificates issued by the FAA are recognized globally by all Civil Aviation Authorities (CAA), including the Directorate General of Civil Aviation of Peru. FAA approved flight courses are the key to worldwide pilot career opportunities, as they require English Proficiency and successful completion results in an ICAO Level 4 English language endorsement, which is a required skill set for students intending to fly routes between countries with different native languages, opening up a world of possibility.

Virtual Online Flight Academy Epic Flight Academy provides important resources for its international flight students. Our Online Virtual Flight Academy lets you connect with your FAA Flight Instructor and classmates before you arrive here in New Smyrna Beach, Florida. The online, interactive pilot training course helps you develop aviation skills and build a knowledge base of aviation terms and concepts so you will have an advantage when you begin attending Epic’s Ground School. With training videos on Cessna 172s, aircraft systems, aircraft performance, FAA regulations, and the New Smyrna Beach Airport, students can start their training from home. Try our Demo Online Course.

Aviation Skill Development (ASD) and Private Pilot Ground School The ASD is a unique course only offered at Epic Flight Academy. During this phase of flight training, ground school students will build on the information they gained from the Virtual Flight Academy and also start simulator training. The purpose of ASD is to familiarize students with the Cessna 172 and the New Smyrna Beach Airport. ASD increases students’ safety and awareness.

Multi-Engine Professional Pilot Program

Total Tuition: $39,503.60

Program Duration: 6 to 8 months

Flight Time: 141 hours

Time Building: $79.88 per flight hour (Pilot-in-Command)

Peruvian Pilot Program Course Requirements

18 years of age

High school education or equivalent

Read, write, speak the English language

Valid international passport

Full-time student 5 days per week

Private Pilot: This course covers Visual Flight Rules (VFR) flight training in conjunction with the ASD and Ground School. Students will learn basic aerodynamics, FAA regulations, aircraft weight & balance, and aircraft performance. At successful completion, student will be able to command a single aircraft solo in VFR conditions. Learn more about our Private Pilot Course.

Epic Online Virtual Academy – 60 Hours ASD & Private Pilot Ground School – 60 Hours Simulator – Cessna 172 w/ Instructor – 7 Hours Flight – Cessna 172 w/ Instructor – 40 Hours Solo Flight – Cessna 172 – 10 Hours One-on-One Instruction – 20 Hours Pre & Post Briefing – 6 Hours Tuition $14,252.50

Instrument Pilot: This course covers flight training Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) with procedures specific to instrument flying, additional instruction in meteorology, and more intensive training in flight solely by reference to instruments. At successful completion, student will be able to command a single aircraft solo in IFR conditions. Learn more about our Instrument Pilot Course.

Instrument Pilot Ground School – 40 Hours Simulator – Cessna 172 w/ Instructor – 14 Hours Flight – Cessna 172 w/ Instructor – 24 Hours One-on-One Instruction – 20 Hours Pre & Post Briefing – 5 Hours Tuition $9,785.00

Multi-Engine Commercial: This course covers IFR flight training in a multi-engine aircraft to commercial pilot standards At successful completion, student will be able to command a multi-engine aircraft in IFR conditions. Learn more about our Commercial Pilot Course.

Commercial Pilot Ground School – 35 Hours Simulator – Multi Piper PA-44 w/ Instructor – 3 Hours Time Building – Cessna 172 – 32.5 Hours Flight – Cessna 172 w/ Instructor – 3 Hours Flight – Multi Piper PA-44 w/ Instructor – 30 Hours One-on-One Instruction – 7 Hours Pre & Post Briefing – 3 Hours Tuition $15,916.10

Non-Tuition Fees: Application Fee: $625 includes Epic Virtual Academy, I-20, I-901 SEVIS FAA Written Test: $125 FAA Flight Test: $600 Housing (based on availability): $650 per month/shared room

Peru Airline Career Requirements

Depending on the airline, additional time building flight hours may be required. Generally, Peruvian airlines require a total of 200 hours, so our students typically need an additional *60 hours to time building if they finish their commercial training within the estimated 140 hours. Below are links for hiring requirements for top choice airlines in Perú. Note: These requirements are subject to change at the discretion of the airline. Refer to the airline directly for the latest information.

*Pilot-In-Command Time Building: 60 Hours – $4,792.80

View Pilot Hiring Requirements for:

ATSA – Charter & Cargo

Avianca Perú

LATAM Perú

LC Perú

Peruvian Airlines

Star Perú

Viva Air Perú

DGAC Peruvian Pilot Conversion Process

Once Peruvian students complete their FAA pilot training at Epic, they will need to follow the steps below to officially convert their licenses to DGAC (Direccion General de Aeronautica Civil).

Before returning to Perú, students must take their logbook to the Consulate General of Peru in Miami to get the documents legalized for Perú.

After returning to Perú, students must go to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to get their paperwork stamped. The stamped paperwork must be taken to the DGAC (Direccion General de Aeronautica Civil), which is part of the Ministry of Transportation. Students will notify the DGAC that they intend to validate their hours and convert from FAA to DGAC.

Take 4 Peruvian examinations: ICAO English Exam, Commercial Written Exam, Medical exam (available at TEZZA or Air Force Hospital), and the Phraseology Exam

Students will then return to the DGAC where they will be present a temporary license with which students will select a flight school to validate their training

The DGAC requires a minimum of 5 hours for validation, which includes the checkride time. Depending on the school, students will likely complete a 2-hour ground school and 1-hour simulator lesson before working towards the 5 validation hours.

After successful completion of the minimum hours and checkride, students should have their official documentation available for pickup at the DGAC within a week.

Meet Your Peruvian Pilot Program Admissions Representative!

Evelyn Orama

Hello, my name is Evelyn Orama, and I’m from the city of Tingo María, Perú. I worked at Epic Flight Academy in the city of New Smyrna Beach, Florida, USA, for more than three years. I still work as a counselor and guide for students from several countries in the Admission process in the same Academy from the city of Lima, Perú where I currently reside. Actually, I am very passionate about the world of aviation since I grew up in a family linked in this environment and which led me to obtain my Bachelor of Science in Aeronautics degree. In addition, I speak Spanish and English fluently. Therefore, do not hesitate to ask me all the questions you may have so that together we can make sure that you are fully prepared for a successful career in aviation. I am eager to help you make your dreams come true, beginning with your private pilot’s license and leading up to your commercial pilot’s license.

Contact me when you’re ready to learn more about becoming an airline pilot!

Relocation & Transportation Assistance We understand that selecting and applying to a flight school, and arranging travel and housing, if necessary, can be very stressful, but our pilot training facility assists students in arranging each detail so that the transition is simple and easy. Visit our Student Life section for more information on our student amenities, transportation, events, and activities.

#aviation #peru #flying #goals #success

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esprit-de-corps-magazine · 6 years

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THE TIFFY & THE SPIT: Both Allied Aircraft Made Their Mark During The War As Did The Canadians Flying Them

(Volume 24-12)

By Ken Wright & Anne Gafiuk

In newsreels, newspapers and magazines during the Second World War, the headliner and star was the Spitfire. Lagging behind in coverage, but just as important, was the Typhoon. The exciting ‘Spit’ shot down enemy aircraft. The Typhoon, or Tiffy as it was fondly known to its pilots and to the Canadian and British Armies, provided the men on the ground with aerial support. They just had to ‘whistle for a Tiffy.’ The Spitfire was the beauty, the Typhoon the beast, yet both served the Allies worthily.

Of the 3,317 Second World War Typhoons built, only one still exists today, although there are now a few undergoing restorations. Of the 22,000 Spitfires produced, 35 are still flying, bringing the masses out to air shows, promoting WWII’s sweetheart, keeping her front and centre in the public eye.

There are not many pilots of both aircraft left who are able to recall their contributions to the Allied war effort. Flying Officer Gordon Hill says, “It is the end of an era.”

Four fighter pilots who flew with the Royal Canadian Air Force candidly discuss their experiences, the characteristics of the Hawker Typhoon and the Supermarine Spitfire, and the roles each of the aircraft played during the Second World War.

Flight Lieutenant Jack Hilton, C.D., 98 years old, of No. 438 Squadron (Typhoons) says:

I flew about 100 operations. Our squadron’s nose art was Walt Disney’s Wild Cat. We were flying low level about 100 to 200 feet off the ground to attack our targets including tanks, convoys, and trains. The Typhoon did the job. There were two squadrons with rockets that had RP3 25-pound warheads, four under each wing. They could blow a tank apart. In the beginning, the rockets were very hard to control. The Battle of Falaise Gap in August 1944 was a good example. While the German army was retreating, we were attacking troop carriers, with 30 to 40 men in them. There were so many targets that when you fired at them, you were going to hit something!

Although the rocket-firing Typhoon is commonly regarded as the aircraft that was predominant in the destruction of the trapped German army, it was, in truth, extremely valuable as a platform for strafing and a great morale booster for the Allied troops, but not for its lethal rocket firing capability as detailed in many books on the battle.

The destruction of the trapped German forces in the Falaise Pocket in August 1944 was due to land-based forces. Historians vary in their estimates of German losses. Between 80,000 and 100,000 troops caught in the encirclement of which 10,000 to 15,000 were killed, 40,000 to 50,000 taken prisoner, and 20,000 to 50,000 managed to escape. In the northern sector alone, German material losses included 344 tanks, self-propelled guns and other light armoured vehicles as well as 2,447 soft-skinned vehicles and 252 guns abandoned or destroyed.

According to a subsequent British analysis, RAF Typhoon rockets had not caused as much destruction as first thought or claimed. It has been assessed that only about 100 armoured fighting vehicles were knocked out during the whole campaign, in stark contrast to the Allies’ loss of a total of 1,726 aircraft. The Tiffy’s real contribution, at least as far as the Falaise Gap was concerned, was the sense of panic their attacks caused — the German crews quickly abandoned their vehicles and took cover in the fields at the onset of a strike.

Hilton continues:

People don’t know much about the Typhoon and have asked me about its idiosyncrasies. The Typhoon had a terrible attrition rate because of its specialist role. It carried bombs and it was fast, but it had a poor turning radius. The Typhoon is one of the most difficult aircraft for a pilot to fly.

It killed a lot of pilots at the beginning. The tail fell off, the engine quit, and when this happened, the Typhoon was going nowhere but down. The Typhoon had such a high wing loading that you had no room for safety and turns. You had to turn when you were in a fight and when we tangled with the Messerschmitts; we would dive down and outrun them in the dive. The deadly flaw with the Typhoon was that when we got to low level at high speed, we could not turn. We did not have the radius to get inside them to shoot at them. In addition, carbon monoxide seeped into the cockpit, which if undetected, could be fatal.

So the only thing we had going for us was to go straight at the target, faster than the enemy could go, and then get the hell out of there. The turn is the secret in fighting the German fighters. If I pulled tight turns at 150, the darned thing would spin on me and I would dive straight into the ground. I had no safety margin. It was one of these questionable things. Speed was the only thing you had. One of our guys tried to stay in a fight and didn’t come back. There is no second chance. Get in and get out. You don’t go back for a second look. I never went back for a second look. Those who did never came home.

We always went out in two groups of two. We were very tired with an average of 2 hours a trip from start to finish. Sometimes I did two operations a day. My logbook showed that at one point, I flew 28 operations in 30 days. Imagine the pressure on the pilots to take off and land. During the D-Day invasion, we were right up to our ears. Flying 150 feet over the water, the spray of the water was hitting our airplane. It was a desperate situation.

Flight Lieutenant Harry J. Hardy, DFC, 95 years old, of No. 440 Squadron (Typhoons), recalls:

During the Battle of Normandy (D-Day to August 25, 1944), 151 Typhoon pilots were killed, including 51 Canadians. Casualties were replaced as available from the Operational Training Unit (OTU) in the UK. We were always under-strength after D-Day to VE-Day. As the pilots were being killed, we could not replace them fast enough. There were also pilots on leave, on special duty, in hospital (sick bay).

Hilton continues:

You are shot at going in and shot at going out. So often when we did the dive-bombing, you didn’t see what you hit or even if you got what you were aiming for. We’d go in at 500 or 550 mph — that’s fast for a prop airplane.

A Spitfire and Hurricane could turn tightly. The Spitfire has a low wing loading and thin wings, great for turning. I never flew the Spitfire, but the Tiffy was a great air to ground attack aircraft.

As an experiment, one of our fellows took one of our Typhoons up to 30,000 feet and he put it into a spin. It took him to 5,000 feet before he got out of it! The tail was too small. The weight was too heavy. We had cannons in the wings, armour underneath, and armour all around us. It had a big engine: Napier Sabre 24-cylinder with 2,100 horsepower (hp) on the MK 1A and a 2,200hp engine in the MK 1B. The MK 1 was armed with twelve 0.303 machine guns and the MK 2 had Hispano cannons in the wings plus up to two 1,000-pound bombs or 8 rocket projectiles.

Flight Lieutenant Robert [Bob] Spooner, DFC, 95 years old, served with No. 438 Squadron (Typhoons) added:

I flew the Typhoon for seven months. You really recognize it because of the big air scoop. With its 24-cylinder, 2200hp engine, it needed a lot of cooling. It is a one-person airplane. I was in an all-Canadian wing. We had three squadrons on that wing and we all had identification numbers. Our squadron was F3.

I was given specific targets and I always hoped I didn’t hurt any innocent people and I don’t know whether I did or not. At one time, we were given a target and we were in the attacking dive when my squadron got a message to call off the attack. Seems we were about to bomb our own troops. Pulling out of the dive with a 1,000-pound bomb attached under each wing was not easy. When you are in the dive, you gain speed really fast and there was a chance you could pull the wings off by pulling back too fast.

The Typhoon was a good aircraft but a real tank of a plane to fly because it was very heavy. It was supposed to replace the Hurricane, built by Hawker, but it didn’t fill the role, which was as a mid-to-high-altitude interceptor. Its performance fell off quickly above 20,000 feet and the Napier Sabre engine continued to prove unreliable.

Our job was to go low level armed with our four 20mm cannons and two 1,000-pound bombs or rockets. A devastating package, but it was hungry on fuel. It would go about 150 miles out and 150 back before the tanks were empty.

Flight Lieutenant Harry Hardy of No. 440 Squadron explains:

The Typhoon was well armoured and could take a lot of punishment. I went through four Typhoons. Had any been a Spitfire, I would have been dead. I had a chance to fly 14 different types of aircraft during fighter pilot training and later through Ferry Flight. The Spitfire was intuitive. You just had to think and then it would do what you wanted. It was good in a tight turn and it was cosy. The engine was at my feet and the firewall separating the engine kept me warm.

I had a 20-hour conversion to learn about what a Typhoon could do. We were not allowed to tail spin. We could not get out of it. I never did a loop. I did do rolls. The first dive was from 8,000 to 4,000 feet when I dropped the bomb. The second dive was from 11,000 to 6,000 feet, because we were expecting ground fire. The windscreen is not as important for a Spitfire because the enemy planes would be on their tail. With the Typhoon, we had 1½-inch to 2-inch thick armoured plated glass as our job was to strafe low down. Most of the enemy ordnance sent at us was from the ground in front of the aircraft.

Typhoons were sometimes victims of friendly fire as its profile was similar to a Focke-Wulf 190. For recognition, we had yellow stripes [painted under the wings] to distinguish us from the Focke-Wulf. The black and white stripes painted under the wings were for the [D-Day] invasion —they were put on the night before so our own troops would not shoot us down.

Flying Officer Gordon Hill, 94 years old, of No. 416 Squadron (Spitfires) added:

I had about 1,000 hours flying and over 200 trips. We flew 50 feet above the ground or lower when we were engaging air to ground. We were up to 25,000 feet when we were air to air, up to the end of 1944, then the Germans and British came down to more sensible levels of 10,000 to 12,000 feet.

This saved fuel and time. On our approaches, we stalled at 78 mph to drop to the ground. It was easy for us to land. We flew the easiest aircraft. One hand did the job. When it came to ground targets, we flew in groups of six up to a maximum of 12. I was often number 3. Occasionally, we were in a group of just two. We flew 1¼ hours, maximum 1½ hours.

We saw Messerschmitt Me 109s and Focke-Wulf 190s, but never saw a German bomber until the end of the war. By September 1944, though, the Germans had Me 262 jets and another aircraft, the Arado 234 which, in my opinion, were better than the Me 262s.

Most of our casualties were due to air-ground attack from below. We had four machine guns, two cannons and a gun camera. On the Spitfire F. Mk XVI, acquired December 18, 1944, the armament went from 0.3 to 0.5. It made all the difference in the world and I became a better marksman.

Spitfires were the envy of most people in the air — the darling of the sky. It was extremely manoeuvrable with a weight of about 7,000 pounds. Once I got to England, I flew nothing but Spitfires: Mk I, II, V, IX, XVI and XIV, in order of the types I flew. My favourite was the Mk XVI (Sweet Sixteen). The Brits were flying the Mk XIV before the Canadians flew them.

As a Spitfire pilot, we were different than Typhoon pilots. The Spitfire’s primary role was engaging other aircraft. Typhoons were more for air to ground attack. As the war progressed towards the end of 1944, the air war was virtually over. The Luftwaffe was having enormous problems. They were suffering from an acute shortage of fuel, trained pilots and machines, and were hardly able to put up a fight anymore. This situation necessitated changing the role of the Spitfire from aerial combat to attacking ground targets. Periodically, we still encountered German fighter planes.

In September 1944, when the German Me 262 jets came out, they could outrun our Spitfires, but by then it was too little too late.

Every single Spitfire had a limited amount of fuel of 90 gallons, except for the modified versions. This worked out to be about 1.5 hours’ flying time. If we were carrying auxiliary tanks, the rule was to use them first. We had a 45-gallon (plywood tank) and 90 gallon (steel). The steel tank was a blasted nuisance! When we were climbing through cloud in a tight formation, the aircraft tended to move slightly.

The fuel would then start rolling/sloshing in the tank, causing the aircraft to move even more, creating a degree of instability. Auxiliary tanks had to be dropped if engaged in an air-to-air fight, but we had to slow down to 180 mph to get rid of the tank, otherwise it would not fall off.

After June 16, 1944, 416 Squadron went to France and stayed there. Auxiliary tanks were used less and less as we were nearer to the front lines and our fuel supplies. The Allies were well fuelled so we had no restrictions on the number of sorties we could do that I can recall. We did, however, have to always watch our fuel gauge at the end of each flight as four gallons was needed to come in to land.

The Spitfire’s fuel tank was situated directly in front of the pilot, between the engine and the cockpit. If, during aerial combat, the fuel tank holed and the escaping fuel was to catch fire, the flames were blown back towards the cockpit. By opening the canopy to escape the inferno, the forward motion of the aircraft dragged the fire into the cockpit even more.

Hill recalls:

When I got a new version of the Spitfire, I would take it up for tests to see how it performed. The Mark XVI had a sharp tail and cropped wings. It had a four-bladed prop and the turn rate was excellent. The Mk XIV had a round tail and a five-bladed prop.

Typhoon pilots had more plane to manage and had more weight to handle. Is it comparing apples to oranges? Sort of. Different men were flying different aircraft. Sometimes it came down to the pilot.

The Hawker Typhoon had established an excellent reputation for low-level attacks and lowering enemy morale at the mere sound of its distinctive whining sound. Playing a key role in the Normandy campaign, the Supreme Allied Commander, U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, later singled out the contributions the Typhoon made to the Allied victory.

The Supermarine Spitfire also earned an enviable place in the history of aviation alongside the Messerschmitt Bf 109, Focke-Wulf 190 and the North American P-51 Mustang, but the Spitfire remains the most recognisable aircraft of the Second World War.

NOTE: The writers thank Harry Hardy, Gordon Hill, Jack Hilton and the family of Bob Spooner for permission to use their stories and photographs. Jack Hilton wrote the book The Saga of a Canadian Typhoon Pilot in 2015 and it is available through Amazon.

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type2diabetestreatments-blog · 7 years

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Living with Diabetes in... the United Arab Emirates

New Post has been published on http://type2diabetestreatment.net/diabetes-mellitus/living-with-diabetes-in-the-united-arab-emirates/

Living with Diabetes in... the United Arab Emirates

Welcome again to our ongoing series about living with diabetes around the globe. We're very excited to bring you this special account of life in the United Arab Emirates by Aisha AlQaissieh, a 25-year-old native of Abu Dhabi, the capitol of the country, where she works at her family's business. Aisha was diagnosed with type 1 at age 12 and struggled with her diabetes for a few years before becoming a patient at the UAE's Sheikh Khalifa Medical City Diabetes Center, where she has found the support and guidance she needed in her diabetes management.

The United Arab Emirates has recently become a hotspot in the diabetes epidemic, with 20% of the 8 million citizens now having diabetes! In contrast, most countries have diabetes rates of about 5% of the population. Experts believe the economic success of some Middle Eastern countries have led to an increase in fast food and less exercise, which has negatively affected public health.

Despite the huge burden of diabetes on her country, Aisha has seen advancements made in diabetes care in the UAE. She has written a lovely post expressing her gratitude to the UAE's healthcare system and the folks who work at the Diabetes Center. It's certainly not something you hear very often from patients — certainly not in this country.

A Guest Post by Aisha AlQaissieh

Thirteen years ago, after suffering weight loss and awkward moments while constantly excusing myself to the restroom, I was laying down paralyzed with abdominal pain and watching other kids playing around and the elders fancy-dressed for Eid, one of the two most holy celebrations for Muslims. It's pretty much like a three-day Halloween for the kids with new outfits instead of costumes.

Eid is very special to me and I didn't want to spend it at the hospital. Despite the pain, I told my mother that I could wait till the morning. "Just please don't take me to the hospital tonight," I begged.

A while after I vomited, and my parents rushed me to the hospital. I was almost unconscious, and I can barely recall what happened. I went back to sleep and then woke up to my parents, brothers and sisters by my side, and it was at that moment when I was introduced to diabetes.

My father struggled to explain diabetes. The words made my mother cry and saddened my father, but they put me at ease.

"Daughter, God has given you a gift. A type of gift that is only given to the people God loves. You see my little girl: Diabetes is called a friendly disease because it becomes your friend if you take care of it and your worst enemy if you neglect it. And as you go through some changes, we are all by your side, as long as you always take control, because in the end my dear, if you don't take care of yourself all that people can do is pity you. Don't fall for the mercy of others when you have the choice. As our Prophet Mohammed (S.A.A.W) taught us, know that Allah loves you and gave you diabetes as a test. You shall always be grateful it isn't anything else, always be grateful that Allah is always beside you even when you just prick your finger, and show your gratitude by taking care of yourself."

For the past 13 years, I have recited those words almost every day. Those words opened my eyes to diabetes. Today, I don't consider myself the weak person on the hospital bed, and my parents are not agonized about me being a diabetic. I've got an elder brother who looks up to me, and two sisters and a younger brother that consider Diabetes a 'norm.'

The moment that changed our lives wasn't me becoming diabetic; in fact, it was the words my father used in reaction to the situation.

Interestingly enough, a few years after my father shared, "I wasn't much aware of Juvenile Diabetes at that time; your mother and I only thought of Type 1 Diabetes to be hereditary. We still believed that it was a misdiagnosis, but that day we insisted to set you on a solid track. Just in case."

It was during my week stay in the hospital that I learned how to deal with diabetes and was prepared for a new life. On the other hand, my parents were focused on finding every information possible about Type 1 diabetes and were prepared to welcome me to a "modified" life.

For years I have struggled adapting with diabetes, and the main reason was me misunderstanding the extra attention I got. I sometimes forgot my father's advice on being grateful and I started to act like a spoiled child. I was proud of being "different" but believed that I was too special to worry about managing blood sugar levels.

Four years after being diagnosed, my parents took me abroad for diabetes treatment, because they believed that treatment abroad was somewhat more advanced, and because there wasn't an actual Diabetes Center in our country when I was first diagnosed. According to my father's research, Germany had advanced treatment that was convenient in terms of location, since it was almost 7 hours away by plane, rather than the United States, which is an almost 14-hour flight.

My parents took me to a German doctor in Munich where I spent a week. Impressed by the doctor, my parents decided to start shipping my insulin from Munich and stayed in touch with the doctor when I was back home. For about two years, I sent my logbooks to Germany and got a reply on the results and what to do next. Even though I maintained my BG levels, not being able to interact with the doctor or meeting another diabetic in Abu Dhabi made me feel something was not yet complete.

It wasn't complete until late 2005, when we found out that the General Authority for Health Services in Abu Dhabi officially opened the Diabetes Centre on November 14 (World Diabetes Day) that year. This was different than the other Diabetic Clinics at the time because it was under the Health Authority supervision and was the first specialized center for Diabetes in Abu Dhabi. Hoping for a diabetic community and a sense of belonging, I made an appointment right away.

My mother accompanied me the first time, just to make sure that they were at least somewhat knowledgeable about diabetes. The doctor explained that The Health Authority in the Emirates provides diabetics with their necessary treatment and care with no charge at all. He explained that the United Arab Emirates doesn't put a price on health, therefore anything additional was also provided!

The healthcare system in the Emirates offers free treatment and medication for locals, for diabetes or any condition. For expats, they have insurance that covers most treatments, or requires them to pay just a tiny amount. My health card is also the insurance card which I could use in the country, or outside the country as well. If I traveled abroad for treatment, my country will cover the payments.

The Diabetes Center encourages the patients to visit at least once a month, since the doctor, consultant, dietitian, and all medical staff are highly involved with the patients. I tend to visit the Center every other week, even when I do not have an appointment. But usually my appointments are almost every month.

The care in the Center is outstanding. None of the medical staff would ever treat a diabetic as just a another numbered patient. Instead they let us feel as if they genuinely care about us, in terms of diabetes and also life. The person I see most is a consultant nurse that follows up with everything. I visit the endocrinologist every 2 to 3 months for followups, but the nurses are those who are mostly involved with diabetics. They also arrange appointments with the pediatrician, dietitian, eye doctor, blood works, health educators, psychiatrists, and other medical staffs that a diabetic could need, which are all available at the Clinic.

As we left the Clinic that first time, I remember thinking how grateful I am for being a diabetic in the Emirates, yet I seemed very ungrateful. Why didn't it occur to me that my country would have the best healthcare? The Emirates always strives to offer the best standards for everything. As I sat in the car looking out the window and seeing all this greenery, skyscrapers, all those facilities, even the sky, I asked my mother, "Is it possible to call the Emirates my 'Diabetic Parent'? I know the Emirates has offered us much more than healthcare, but to me as a diabetic, my country is providing me with what you and father have provided for me all those years." I wasn't sure what my mother's smile meant, but she looked at me and said, "As long as you honor that name" and she explained how this was a new start with special motivation.

One of the main ongoing programs is 'The Insulin Pump Program' which started in 2005. A group of fellow diabetics and I decided to go on the pump in 2006. The insulin pumps were already provided by the Diabetic Clinic, however in order to be eligible, we must first be well educated about everything in relation to the pump. The program has the doctors, psychologists and dietitians highly involved in the first phase mainly, and then monthly followups. Also, the nurses (along with everyone in the program) are certified Insulin Pump Trainers and are available 24/7 for any type of support.

Today, the Diabetic Center has the largest insulin pump program in the Middle East.

The capitol, Abu Dhabi, now has many institutions that offer information and treatment for diabetics. Along with the Diabetic Center, the Ministry of Health focused on the importance of growing the Diabetes Health Care facilities by opening the Imperial College London Diabetes Center as a specialized clinic for diabetics in Abu Dhabi 2006. Not to mention the annual budget the UAE spends on treating Diabetes which ranges between US$100-200 million. This assures that the country has not only provided the UAE Nationals with free healthcare, but it has succeeded in obtaining the latest information/technology and providing the optimal care for diabetics.

However, the society is still facing some sort of barrier against making the best use of the information and treatment. I hope that one day diabetes will be more acceptable than it is today. I truly believe that the diabetes care in the Emirates is optimal, and what touches me with pride is that the Emirates still strives for the best and latest. I just hope that society would make the best use of what the country is offering and allow the 'care' to be mutually beneficial.

Diabetes is unfortunately something that still worries people in the Emirates as much as around the world. When you research on the Internet for the word "diabetic," you receive horrific images and advices on how to "avoid diabetes." People in the Emirates relate it to Type 2 diabetes, since elders are mostly diagnosed with it and elders are very important in our society along with family bonds. As a diabetic, I constantly get pity and sympathy from people. This comes from a lack of effort in learning about diabetes, as well as sincere concerns; people tend to react to diabetes as something challenging and difficult to live with.

I may have not portrayed the lives of every diabetic in the Emirates, but facts are the country has put so much effort and money to care for diabetics and strives to have the latest updates, medications, information and everything related to diabetes.

I decided to follow in my country's footsteps and contribute to diabetes awareness. My efforts can never measure up to what the Emirates has done for diabetics, but this is my humble way of thanking my "Diabetic Parent." I shall forever be in debt to my country, my family and the Diabetic Clinic for guiding me to reach a point where I consider diabetes such bliss, and offer my well-maintained health as a token of appreciation.

Thank you, Aisha, for sharing this very unique perspective!

Disclaimer: Content created by the Diabetes Mine team. For more details click here.

Disclaimer

This content is created for Diabetes Mine, a consumer health blog focused on the diabetes community. The content is not medically reviewed and doesn't adhere to Healthline's editorial guidelines. For more information about Healthline's partnership with Diabetes Mine, please click here.

Type 2 Diabetes Treatment Type 2 Diabetes Diet Diabetes Destroyer Reviews Original Article

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jacewilliams1 · 4 years

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The Return of a Rusty Pilot, Just in Time for a Global Pandemic

After years of accumulated rust in my logbook, a friend and senior mentor at work, who is also CFII, was admiring the Boeing 737 poster hanging in my office one day when he mentioned he knew of a 182 fractional ownership opportunity. “You know what? I have a 182 poster behind that 737!” I said as I took down the poster and opened the frame to reveal the circa early 2000s Skylane cockpit facing Sporty’s Pilot Shop. The admiration continued for a few more minutes, and a lightbulb clicked. Fast forward six months, and I had reinstated my third class medical and was a new partner of vintage Skylane ready to start my first lesson in 13 years.

For the next three months I re-learned the basics that were buried way way back in my subconscious, and I got familiar with a few new things, like the constant-speed prop and electronic flight bags. I also took my instructor’s inaugural instrument ground school, newly prepared for a handful of local VFR pilots. On March 16, after just over 21 hours of instruction, I received my first-ever BFR, complete with a high performance endorsement.

A reminder of the dream…

And on March 17, our tiny airport closed its terminal’s doors. The world was in chaos, and through the rest of March and April, flying took a backseat to surviving the pandemic. But part of that survival was keeping our young children (ages 3 and 1) occupied, and our solution was frequent trips to the hangar and biking among the hangars and along the taxiways. As talk of opening things back up increased, we decided this would be a great time to put the bird to good use by taking the kids to see their grandparents in Kansas. We decided to introduce the kids to flying gradually. So one Saturday in April, I installed the car seats in the back, and we taxied around Los Alamos Airport (LAM) for 15 minutes.

I started flying again the first week in May. After standing in the hangar for 20 minutes, gazing at the wind sock and psyching myself up to tackle the “8G12KT” crosswind, I completed my first solo in over a decade. Three days later, with car seats installed again, I took our family sightseeing over Taos and Lake Abiquiu. A week later, a slightly longer cross country flight with a 45-minute stopover. The next week, another family flight, and a 2.5 hr solo cross country. I racked up 13 hours in May, which was almost 15% of all my hours up to that point. We were almost ready for Kansas. There was just one thing left I needed to do.

When my instructor was ready to teach again, we scheduled a ground school (wearing masks) to brush up on a few things, and a few days later, a short dual lesson (also wearing masks) to solidify that discussion with action.

For my first-ever long cross country, family in tow, during a global pandemic, our mission was to trek to Kansas for a week. In the days leading up to our departure date, I watched the weather like a hawk. We wanted to leave early in the morning, but if schedules and weather worked out better for the afternoon, so be it. Friday morning, I preflighted the plane and installed the car seats. That afternoon was looking iffy, but we might have a two-hour window around noon. As the morning passed, the clouds over the mountains in our flight path grew to cumulonimbus. We were packed and ready, but as the outlook grew worse, I made the no-go decision. We’d try again first thing Saturday morning. And good thing too, because that afternoon and evening, the radar suggested storms would have been chasing us for our entire flight, and the possibility of finding ourselves in a bad situation was very real.

We woke up at 4:30 Saturday morning. I weighed our luggage one last time, we got the kids up and ready, and I headed to the airport to load up and do one more preflight. Everything looked good. After a short run up, we lined up with the runway. I’d never flown this heavy (still well below max gross limit). I knew that ground roll would be longer than I was used to, and everything was fine, but the experience was nonetheless surprising. Wheels were up by 6:40 am.

The weather was perfect, and we had a generous tailwind on our route to Liberal, Kansas. The 3-year old slept quite a bit, but the 1-year old cried for about half of the first leg. Communications with air traffic controllers had become more fluid, and I was comfortable with flight following handoffs as we crossed into Texas, then Oklahoma, and into Kansas. Liberal’s AWOS winds were reported to be down the runway at 14G25KT, and short-final was bumpy. We found the (fantastic) FBO, gassed up, got a clean windshield, and relaxed for about an hour before loading up again for the next leg to Wichita. Remembering my instructor’s discussion on density altitudes below which leaning isn’t required, I took off nearly full rich. This was my first time taking off in this airplane below 5000 ft. MSL. Even fully loaded, with the winds as strong as they were, we were in the air quicker than I expected. After leaving the pattern and a quick call to Kansas City Center for flight following, we were on our way.

The second leg was just as smooth, and the calm afforded me the opportunity to rehearse Class C communications in my head a few times. I was a little nervous as we approached 30 miles out from ICT, and as a result as we got closer, I forgot to switch from Approach to Tower. I got a gentle reminder from the controller. Lucky for us that, again, winds were right down the runway (19L). Another smooth landing, and a short taxi to the FBO. Part one of the mission accomplished!

The Wooten flight crew, ready for an adventure. (Photo credit: Julia Kennedy)

Although our goal was to stay a week, our earlier experience reminded us of the importance of being flexible. To make sure we were home by a deadline, it became clear that we’d have to cut our trip short by a couple of days to avoid what looked like three solid days of thunderstorms between us and home base, spanning our intended departure dates. While an early morning departure would have been ideal, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to spend a little time with the great-grandparents the next morning. So our goal was to depart by noon.

The FBO had the plane topped off and ready to go when I arrived. Another installation of the car seats, preflight, and we were ready to go. We were wheels-up shortly after noon, headed to Dalhart, Texas. This ride was long, bumpy, and hot. The sky was clear but slightly hazy, and those generous tailwinds from our eastbound trip turned into a 12-kt headwind. After a one hour break and fuel up at another friendly FBO, we headed out for the final leg.

And it is during this leg that I applied every bit of piloting skill I had ever learned. Just south of Las Vegas, we seemed to enter a golden haze, with smoke blowing in from the wildfires blazing across Arizona for the past several days. I didn’t notice anything mentioned in the weather briefing, but the hazy smoke most certainly obscured mountains and the ground below, reducing visibility to less than 5 miles. Add to that, the crosswind gusts at home base exceeded 30 kts, which meant the possibility of diverting.

I notified ATC of my intent to descend to maintain visual contact with Interstate 25 and turned southbound to stay clear of the mountains that I knew were there but could not see. And I diligently exercised the instrument scan I’d learned in IFR ground school just a few months earlier. After flying at about 3000 ft. AGL for 15 minutes while maintaining visual reference to the interstate, the smoke mostly cleared and the winds at home base had calmed down. I decided to head home. Winds were a quartering tailwind at 8G15 kts. On short final, things got bumpy again, and it wasn’t the prettiest crosswind landing, but we arrived home safe and sound.

So that is my return from being rusty, to having completed a 1000-mile round trip long cross country with my wife, two toddlers, and 70 lbs of luggage—all during the COVID-19 pandemic. I’m so lucky to have a supportive family, an awesome instructor, and a beautiful Skylane.

The post The Return of a Rusty Pilot, Just in Time for a Global Pandemic appeared first on Air Facts Journal.

from Engineering Blog https://airfactsjournal.com/2020/10/the-return-of-a-rusty-pilot-just-in-time-for-a-global-pandemic/

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jacewilliams1 · 4 years

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Ditching a Cherokee off Hawaii

During my first winter in Hawaii, soon after I arrived in what was to become my permanent residence, I was flying a rented aircraft between the islands on my job as director for University of Hawaii Peace Corps training, when my USAF flight training surely saved my life.

It was 7 am Sunday morning, December 15, 1968, in Honolulu. I was at Island Flight Service on the east ramp of Honolulu International Airport, and the twin-engine Piper Comanche I had arranged to rent failed to show up. The Comanche owner had called the Island Flight Service dispatcher earlier Sunday morning from Kauai to announce he would not return to Honolulu until sometime after noon, delaying my planned takeoff.

I needed to reach Hilo to meet, brief, and accompany an evaluation team from Washington, DC. I planned to meet the evaluators in Hilo, where they expected me to arrive at or before 9 am. I planned to fly the team to Upolu Point and Kona airfields, near two ongoing training programs.

Due to the delay, I seriously considered booking Aloha or Hawaiian airlines to Hilo but doing so would have left me without an aircraft to carry our visitors to two distant Big Island training sites.

The only aircraft available that morning was a single-engine, four-seat PA-28 Piper Cherokee, which I failed to fully and properly preflight. I departed Honolulu for Hilo shortly after 9 am.

My delayed takeoff caused me to neglect performing a number of pre-flight duties I normally and faithfully accomplished, including checking the aircraft logbooks which were kept in the Island Flight dispatch office.

As I climbed across Sand Island after my tardy lift off, I reached under the aircraft seat for a life-preserver, and found there was none. I loosened my seatbelt to look in the back seat and baggage compartment but I found no life preservers or survival gear.

I did not even consider continuing the flight without survival equipment, and called Honolulu Departure Control to ask for permission to return to land. The controller said, “Roger that. Is there a problem?”

The Cherokee is (usually) the perfect airplane for hopping between islands in Hawaii.

I replied, “No mechanical problem. I forgot my over-water survival equipment and want to return to Island Flight operations to get them.”

With my return to HNL approved, I landed and requested the Island Flight dispatcher to bring me four life preservers. I checked each for fresh CO2 cartridges, donned one life preserver, and relaunched from Honolulu International to resume my solo flight to Hilo.

Fifteen minutes after my second departure, I noted a drop in the Piper’s oil pressure. I advised Honolulu Control I wished to land at Lanai Airport for a precautionary check of my oil quantity, as the Island Flight dispatcher had given me two quarts of oil, “just in case you need it.” I landed at Lanai and taxied to the airport ramp, shut down, got out, opened the left engine cowling, and checked the oil quantity, which was low. I added a quart, and took off a third time for Hilo.

Forty minutes later, flying southward down the Hamakua coast toward Hilo, and abeam Pepeekeo, I noticed a slow, uncommanded drop in the Piper’s engine RPM. Switching fuel tanks, I applied carburetor heat but failed to correct the gradual loss of power. Then, suddenly the engine stopped, ten miles short of my destination and nearly two miles offshore.

I immediately turned right, toward the Hamakua coast and a distant crop duster airfield in a sugar cane field I knew near Pepeekeo, and again attempted an engine restart.

It quickly became obvious the engine would not restart. It also became obvious that if I tried to stretch my glide I would not reach the crop duster landing strip. I was forced to elect to ditch in the sea, upwind, short of shore, and into large waves.

Realizing I faced ditching in an unfriendly rough sea, I broadcast “Mayday,” alerting Hilo approach control that I was about to ditch along the Hamakua shore, approximately one mile offshore from Pepeekeo Plantation, into waves which appeared to be several feet high.

I asked Hilo for an estimate of the winds. Hilo Approach said winds were estimated at 30 knots from the north-northeast. I turned into the wind, opened the Piper’s single door on the starboard side, blocking it open with my leather-bound Jeppesen chart book. I aimed to touch down along the approaching crest of an incoming wave, upon which I intended to dead stick the Piper. I tried again to restart the engine, without success.

Applying full flaps, I tightened my seat belt and prepared to ditch. I would enter the sea at 55 knots indicated airspeed but actually at only 25 knots if Hilo’s estimate of prevailing winds was correct.

At the last moment a gust of wind carried me into a less desirable approach, above a trough between two large waves, with crests both right and left, several feet above my cockpit.

The Piper PA-28 aircraft with fixed tricycle gear was not my choice of preferred aircraft design for ditching but nose gear-first it would be. I was aware that when the nose gear struck a wave, I would be pitched nose-down and underwater. I recalled US Air Force water survival training in Germany and at Long Beach, practicing ditching procedures.

When the engine quits within sight of the destination airport, it’s hard to resist the temptation to stretch a glide.

The anticipated high impact worried me because the aircraft had only a single seat belt and no shoulder harness. I was holding the microphone in my left hand to give a final Mayday call and flying the aircraft with my right hand, while working the rudder pedals to guide the Piper down the center of the trough between the waves. My right wingtip caught the oncoming wave, cartwheeling me to the right, and in an instant I was under water.

Holding my breath, it was suddenly quiet as the Cherokee sank deeper into the darkening sea. My ears told me I was 8-to-12 feet below the surface and going deeper.

Instantly, I was looking down on myself in the cockpit, with my seatbelt still fastened. I thought in a flash I would go to the bottom if I failed to release my seatbelt. I heard me chide myself for just sitting there: “Open your seatbelt, dummy!” I opened my seatbelt and instantly I popped upward into a pocket of air in the rear baggage area of the Piper. I took in a big lungful.

My feet, luckily, were placed against the right rear window of the aircraft, just above the waterline in a pocket of rapidly escaping air. I broke the window with a mighty shove, cutting my ankles on the sharp plexiglass. I was dismayed to see a blurry red miasma of my blood as sea water rushed into the tail cone of the Piper.

Holding a mighty lungful of air from the darkened cargo compartment behind the Piper’s back seats, I pulled myself around and started headfirst through the window, only to discover that I was hung up. My life-preserver had caught on the edge of plexiglass. Avoiding a puncture of my life-preserver on the sharp plexiglas, I pulled myself back into the cabin. Still holding my breath, I felt the Cherokee’s right exit door, held open by my leather-covered instrument manual, where I had propped it when the engine quit. I pushed the door wide and pulled myself through the open door, free of the sinking aircraft, and swam for the surface. I saw my Jepp chart manual sinking clear toward the sea bottom.

I remember swimming over the right wing, noting a dented leading edge wingtip as I swam upwards, nearly out of the longest breath of my life.

I had managed to leave the aircraft via the only door. I was fully conscious the whole time. I recall being concerned about the dented wing but realized that it didn’t matter. The Cherokee was headed to the bottom. Nevertheless, I regretted damaging the aircraft.

Things slowed down. Now, I was free of a sinking aircraft at the surface filled with blowing foam by strong winds.

As I inflated one bladder of my double bladder life vest, I surveyed a half-mile swim in turbulent seas to reach dry land.

Just because you survived a ditching doesn’t mean the danger is over.

I was aware of the imminent danger of sharks because I had been strongly admonished by one of our Hawaiian training staff members, who said in no uncertain terms that we must keep trainees and staff out of swimming and diving along the Hamakua Coast. He warned me about recent sightings of sharks, including great whites in local waters. He said, “You haole guy one little appetizer for a great white.”

Accordingly, I had circulated a written warning to the Peace Corps training classes and staff about these hazards, and so I issued a “no swimming” edict on the whole Hamakua coast.

Now, here I was, somewhere offshore the Pepeekeo Sugar Mill, swimming with bleeding ankles and wrists, after instructing everyone else to stay out of Hamakua waters. I think I chuckled at the irony.

As the airplane was sinking and I watched the empennage slowly go under water, hissing as the air that had enabled me to live came rushing out of the fuselage, it occurred to me that my briefcase was still in the aircraft, heading for the bottom of the sea, 6,000 feet below.

Clear of my dying airplane, and at the stormy surface, many thoughts raced through my mind. I briefly considered and rejected retrieving my briefcase, a relic of previous Peace Corps travel in the Philippines, which contained important university documents. Removing my life preserver to dive back into a sinking aircraft, however, was a foolhardy notion, which I rejected.

About half an hour later, and still a hundred yards short of land, I noticed a Coast Guard search and rescue Lockheed C-130 from Barbers Point circling about 3,000 feet above me. I learned later they had received word that I survived the ditching and was observed on the surface, swimming toward the shore. The USCG search and rescue center in Honolulu was contacted by a fisherman who had witnessed my ditching. However, the pilot of the C-130, whom I visited at his Barbers Point headquarters several days later, said none of the SAR crew had seen me, due to the turbulent seas.

Luckily, I never saw a great white nor any other sharks.

I swam hard for shore, determined to leave the water as quickly as possible. I watched the huge waves run up a 50-foot, rough, lava ‘A‘ā pali, frothing almost to the peak, then receding, in a rush of white water. My desperate plan was to ride a comber up the pali and grasp whatever I was able to grab as the wave receded, likely leaving me on the sharp ‘A‘ā lava, injured, but hopefully, saved from the cruel sea.

As I contemplated what I knew was my desperate plan, I spied a fisherman with a fishing pole on the Pepeekeo shore. He wore a yellow slicker. I waved to him and, to my great relief, he waved back, warning me with hand signals away from the treacherous pali toward which I was swimming. The man saw I was headed for the pali and vigorously waved me off.

That fisherman saved my life by indicating where I should not go, beckoning me to swim back out to sea, southward toward Onomea Bay. I really didn’t want to stay in the ocean as a possible snack for a great white shark but this man’s signals saved my life.

The beach is beautiful, but many parts are quite dangerous for a swimmer.

I had kept my flying boots on to risk the pali ‘A‘ā but abandoning that high-risk plan, I kicked off my flying boots, which I still regret losing.

I was in fine shape but was swallowing a large quantity of seawater in the foam, and realized that I was still bleeding. I had probably ripped open some veins in my wrist and didn’t know what I had done to my ankles.

I was swimming in high, wind-driven waves as I assessed my condition. I had partially inflated my life vest, using only one of the two CO-2 bottles, the same bottles I luckily had checked before my second takeoff from Honolulu.

As the Coast Guard Search and Rescue (SAR) C-130 circled overhead, I waved, hoping they would see me. They continued to circle and I knew they would drop a life raft if they saw me, but no life raft appeared.

I urgently wished to get out of the water before a big fish found me.

Later, I talked with the commander of the Coast Guard SAR C-130 which circled me, and he said they never saw me. The ocean surface was a sea of foam. Nonetheless, I knew that help was on the way. It was just a matter of time; if the big fishes didn’t turn me into a protein snack first, I was certain that I would be saved.

I was hyperventilating, swimming hard to leave a shorebreak that seemed to carry me closer to the ragged ‘A‘ā lava. I turned over on my back and back-paddled. I still wore my USAF flight jacket, which made swimming difficult, and slowed me down. So, I slipped out of my flight jacket without removing my Mae West, which was a complicated maneuver. It grieved me to lose that USAF flight jacket with my 452nd Troop Carrier Wing ID tag, but I had no choice.

I was still in the water, worried about a great white shark which had been reported nearby, when I saw what I hoped was the mast of a ship. Watching intently, I saw that it was indeed a mast, and it was moving northward, disappearing and reappearing, going southward, back and forth, two or more miles offshore but slowly coming closer. It appeared to be doing a creeping search right off shore where I was last seen and I said to myself, “Ahah, this ship is going to find me.” I had no signal device and no way of contacting the Coast Guard cutter but if he continued a creeping search course along the coast, he was likely to spot me.

Eventually, the Coast Guard cutter’s crew saw me wave and came alongside, throwing a friendly net over the rail. The man who pulled me in was the commanding officer of the 95-footer, a young Coast Guard officer named Lieutenant John Milbrand. The cutter was based in Hilo. Due to the urgency of my distress call on a Sunday morning, the ship was manned by only three out of a normal crew of ten. Lt. Milbrand’s wife Tina, I learned many years later, was a dear friend of my deceased wife, Gail Moffat Hudson.

Lt. Milbrand pulled me aboard, and said he was glad to find me. I assured him I felt the same, and vomited what felt like a gallon of seawater over the side of the rescue vessel. Then I had a cup of strong Coast Guard coffee and felt safe from the Great Whites, at last. I was in the water for about two hours.

If you’re going to make the news for a plane crash, better to be alive to read it.

I was taken ashore at Hilo Bay and met by Walt Southward, Honolulu Advertiser Big Island bureau, whom I knew. Walt interviewed me briefly. His report became a six-column headline and photo of “Dripping Olsen” on Monday’s Honolulu Advertiser, with my rescue details.

Taken by an emergency vehicle to the Hilo Hospital, I was examined by our Peace Corps Training Center physician and friend, whose name I cannot recall, found nothing but a few cuts that had stopped bleeding, and a large bump on my left forehead where I hit a crossbar in the cockpit when I cartwheeled into the sea.

I was an overnight guest of Alan and Patricia White, Hilo residents. Alan was director of the Peace Corps Training Center in Hilo.

I deeply regretted losing the Piper, the only aircraft I lost in nearly 12,000 hours of flying.

Later, I investigated the logbooks of Piper Cherokee 140 N4698R at Air Service Corp. and discovered that the aircraft had been involved in a training incident with a student pilot a week or ten days earlier. The student made a poorly controlled landing, collapsing the nose gear, which caused the engine to experience a sudden stoppage when the propeller struck the ground.

I learned from the aircraft owner’s insurance company that their investigation found that the airplane had been restricted to flying locally and should never have been released to fly off Oahu Island.

I didn’t wish to act upon my losses but I obtained a letter from the aircraft owner, Mr. Vetousek, in which he admitted the aircraft I ditched enroute to Hilo was restricted to local flying on Oahu, and should not have been dispatched for inter-island flight by Island Air Corporation.

I learned that the fisherman who waved me off the pali was Matsuichi Heya. I drove to his house near Pepeekeo Mill the next day. Mr. Heya explained that the reason he waved me off from trying to ride a wave up the pali was because, in 1944, he saw a U.S. Navy pilot ditch in almost the same area I ditched. Like me, the pilot survived his ditching, and swam to where I had headed. Sadly, he died on the rocks. Mr. Heya said he didn’t want me to do the same.

I thanked him for saving my life, shook his hand and hugged him, a gesture which at first was alien to Mr. Heya but which he returned with a hug to me.

The post Ditching a Cherokee off Hawaii appeared first on Air Facts Journal.

from Engineering Blog https://airfactsjournal.com/2020/07/ditching-a-cherokee-off-hawaii/

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jacewilliams1 · 4 years

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Five airplanes every pilot should fly

You don’t get to pick your parents and most pilots don’t get to pick the airplane they learn to fly in. If the local flight school has a beat up old Cherokee, that’s what you’ll fly, whether you love Pipers or not. But once you earn your license, it’s a real thrill to check out in (or at least log some time in) a variety of airplanes. I actually think this is more interesting than adding a new rating—new models offer new adventures and new lessons to learn, and there are no annoying FAA tests to pass.

What should you fly? Almost anything with wings. I might skip the rare Soviet warbird that hasn’t flown in 25 years, but unless you have reason to doubt the design or construction, strap in and go flying. You won’t catch Barry Schiff; still, it’s fun to try.

While all airplanes have stories to tell, some are more important and more interesting than others. Here are five I believe should be in every pilot’s logbook or on their to-do list. These aren’t necessarily the best or most exciting airplanes ever to take to the skies, but they define specific ages in general aviation and make up the rich history of our industry. Call it the general aviation canon.

1. Piper Cub. The familiar yellow taildragger almost single-handedly created general aviation in America, teaching an entire generation of pilots to fly. Consider the numbers: in 1939 there were fewer than 35,000 pilots; by 1950 there were over 500,000. One key reason so many Americans earned their license was obviously the military, but that meant the Cub was often their first airplane. In fact, nearly 20,000 were built in less than a decade. For comparison, only 10,000 piston airplanes total were delivered between 2010 and 2019.

A yellow Piper Cub in the grass is the essence of recreational aviation.

But the Cub is also a survivor, a symbol of a general aviation boom that didn’t really happen. At the end of World War II, some enthusiasts assumed that the thousands of returning military pilots would want to settle down to family life with an airplane in the garage. It didn’t turn out that way (commuting by Cub wasn’t quite as practical as boosters predicted), and many interesting airplanes disappeared as the post-war boom turned into a bust.

Not the Cub. Almost 100 years after it was introduced and many decades since it was last produced, the Cub remains an iconic airplane. It’s fun to fly, affordable to own, and challenging enough to be rewarding when mastered. Some are basic airplanes with no electrical system, some are fully restored showplanes, and some are modern reincarnations of the famous design—all of them are recreational aviation in its purest form. Spending a late afternoon with a Cub on a grass runway is just about the most fun you can have in aviation. It’s like going back in time, but without having to stroll around a dusty museum.

2. Beech Bonanza. After the bust of the early 1950s, general aviation began its next big boom in the 60s. Cessna thought the post-war future looked like the 195, a gorgeous but fairly dated airplane with a tailwheel and a radial engine. Beechcraft, on the other hand, designed a strikingly modern airplane with low wings, retractable gear, and an engine we would recognize today. The public voted with its checkbook, and by the mid-60s the Bonanza was a best-seller. In particular, the V-tail S35 and V35/A/B models were memorable designs, the pinnacle of general aviation flying in that decade. When you showed up in one of those sleek airplanes, you not-so-subtly told the world you had arrived.

Beyond making good airplanes, Beechcraft helped to create the era of personal transportation by light airplane. Here was a machine that could go beyond the local area, with both the performance and reliability to be a personal airliner. Ads from the 60s show businessmen and families alike traveling in the comfort and speed of a Bonanza, a dream that pilots still chase today.

Much like the Cub, the Bonanza lives on. In this case, you can buy a brand new one, but you’ll find even 55-year old models doing everything from chasing $100 hamburgers to logging hard IFR flights. It’s still a joy to fly, with responsive controls and solid performance. I was raised on Cessnas, so the first time I hand flew a Bonanza I felt like I had stepped out of a pickup truck and into a sports car. I instantly understood why people loved it. The Bo has had many imitators over the years, but not until the Cirrus (see below) did the graceful Beech finally face a real threat—an incredible run of over 50 years.

3. Cessna 172. Here’s my nominee for best all-around general aviation airplane. It’s not fast, it doesn’t haul that much, and most pilots wouldn’t call it a beautiful airplane, but it’s capable of handling a wide variety of missions without complaint. As a trainer it is unmatched, taking the place of the Cub as the most popular flight school airplane. As a cross-country IFR airplane it is surprisingly capable, as Richard Collins proved many years ago during his criss-crossing of the US in one. It has also served as a photo platform, a law enforcement tool, and a perfect first airplane for new owners.

The Cessna 172 is the most popular trainer for a reason.

One reason for its success is its forgiving nature and bulletproof design. It has enough power to take three people on a 300-mile trip but not so much that pilots quickly get in trouble, a complaint early in the V-tail Bonanza’s life. The systems are basic but reliable: just watch the abuse the landing gear takes during a typical pancake breakfast fly-in if you want proof. The 172 (don’t call it a Skyhawk) is the everyman airplane.

It also represents the glory days of general aviation, a 10-year span in the late 60s and 70s when it seemed like flying would become a mainstream activity. Cessnas were on popular TV shows and sales were as red hot as the Miami condo market in the mid-2000s. In 1978, over 17,000 piston airplanes were delivered, a stunning number never to be equaled (or even approached), and the Cessna 172 led the charge.

4. Cirrus SR22. After the GA winter of the late 1980s, many pilots wondered if the industry would ever recover. Cessna restarted its single engine line in 1996, but arguably the real rebirth of personal aviation came from two brothers in Minnesota. When the Klapmeiers’ sleek SR20 hit the market in 1999, it had some radically new assumptions (fast airplanes can have fixed gear, safe airplanes have a parachute, big color screens are better than round dials) and some sexy marketing to go with it.

Many scoffed, but it worked. Cirrus has delivered more than 5,000 airplanes since 2006, dwarfing Cessna’s 182/206 line of traveling airplanes and even outselling the vaunted Bonanza by a wide margin. In one of the most impressive turnarounds in aviation history, the SR22’s accident record has gone from a liability to a strength, and the once-scrappy startup has established a powerful brand with devoted fans. It is the airplane non-pilots dream about.

Whether it’s the parachute or the occasionally abrasive fans, Cirrus has made some enemies over the years, but in my experience, the biggest skeptics have the least experience with the airplane. My advice? Don’t hate it until you fly it. The SR22 is everything a modern airplane should be: it’s a joy to fly, the performance is impressive, and the interior comfort is magnificent. On a cross country trip in one last year, I found myself cruising along at 170 knots in air conditioned comfort, with deice protection and great avionics to point the way. Not bad for a fixed gear piston airplane. I think it’s fun to fly, but at the very least, passengers love it—and that should count for a lot.

The RV-12 is one of the few successful Light Sport Airplanes.

5. Van’s RV series. What will follow the Cirrus? Maybe nothing in the transportation segment of the market. But to me, the next generation of recreational aviation has been around for a long time and is only now starting to claim the spotlight. As certified airplanes have become more and more expensive (that 172 is now a $400,000 airplane), the “Van’s Air Force” of homebuilts has become a more attractive option for everyday pilots. The build time has been reduced with the use of ingenious quick-build kits, and the avionics options are actually better than most certified airplanes.

Which RV to fly may be the hardest question. The RV-12 is what an LSA should be, light on weight but heavy on fun. The RV-10 is basically a half-price Cirrus, with excellent performance and seats for four. The RV-8 is your own personal airshow airplane, with thrilling performance but reasonable operating costs. All of them exhibit great flying qualities and affordable operating costs (I remember being shocked the first time I flew an RV-12 and saw a fuel burn of less than 4 gallons per hour).

While I’m not a homebuilder, I’m excited by the energy and the innovation in that world. The latest models are safer than previous generations and practical enough to be used both in flight schools and for cross-country travel. If there’s going to be a rebirth of piston aviation, I would put my money on RVs and not Skyhawks or Bonanzas.

Bonus: I promised I would stop at five airplanes, and I will. But if you’re looking for extra credit, let me add a category: light jets. Along with experimental airplanes, the real growth in general aviation over the last 10 years has been in turbine airplanes. These are wildly expensive and certainly overkill for VFR pilots in search of the next great airport diner, but the progress here has been stunning. I got to ride in the right seat of a Citation Mustang a few years ago and couldn’t believe how easy it was to fly. Compared to a Cessna 421 or a King Air, the top of the heap in the late 70s, the Mustang was a walk in the park—even single pilot. Life is just different in the turbine world, from the systems (FADEC, automatic pressurization) to the maintenance (much better than typical piston shops) to the training (regular simulator sessions). Light GA manufacturers and pilots could learn a few things from the jet jockeys, so if you’re ever offered a ride in a CJ or a Phenom, don’t hesitate.

What airplanes are on your personal to-fly list?

The post Five airplanes every pilot should fly appeared first on Air Facts Journal.

from Engineering Blog https://airfactsjournal.com/2020/07/five-airplanes-every-pilot-should-fly/

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jacewilliams1 · 4 years

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The joy of a flying dad

My dad recently flew west and I have been thinking about the gift of flying that he gave me from a young age. Flying has been a great joy in my life. I am very thankful that my dad was the original aviator in our family, because without his interest in flying I’m not sure I would have ever had mine. I’ve had much fun and learned a few lessons along the way.

Washington-Virginia Airport was very close to DCA, in an era before heavy security restrictions.

Dad became a pilot in the early 1950s. He was in his late 20s when he learned to fly at a small airport located inside what we now call the Class Delta airspace—approximately four nautical miles southwest of Reagan National Airport (KDCA). That GA airport, known as Washington-Virginia (or Crossroads), was gone by 1970, the victim of land development. Though I don’t remember flying there with my dad, his stories of his early experiences operating so close to a big city airport like National while also being careful to clear the drive-in theater movie screen on short final to one of the runways seemed amazing to a little kid. My dad was an early superhero.

I am not surprised that my dad became enamored with flying. It was very different from anything he experienced growing up in a quiet Midwest town. From the get-go, his parents weren’t that keen about the idea when he announced that he was learning to fly. Their disapproval seemed to spur him on in his role as the family contrarian. It’s reported that my grandfather never flew in an airplane while he was living.

My earliest memories have something to do with an airplane. My dad took me flying regularly (I did not get sick like my sister), he taught me the basics (though he was never a CFI), and he even started and kept a logbook just for me. It’s amongst my most treasured possessions. My first logged flight as the sole manipulator of the flight controls was in April of 1966. I was seven years old but I suspect that I had likely had my hand on the yoke long before that. According to that first entry, we operated a local flight that started and ended at DCA in a Cessna 182 E model. Those were the days long before 9/11 and the lockdown of the DC airspace!

My logbook reminds me of my first time in the left seat (of a 172) when I was 11 years old. My dad was friends with an FAA inspector who gave me my first official flight instruction as a favor. It was heady stuff.

I remember Dad taking me to a big airshow in 1972. It was held at Dulles Airport, featured one of the military demonstration teams (Thunderbirds I think), and was where I first saw Bob Hoover fly his P-51D Mustang. Not a lot of memories remain except the joy of hanging with my dad and eating two airshow hot dogs with a large Coke.

Sometimes we would go places and Dad would rent an airplane to do a short sight-seeing flight. Typically, he would need to do a checkout first and then be able to take me. This was how I got some of my first grass field takeoffs and landings, and saw coastlines and beaches from the air.

The original pilot in the family.

Pages of my logbook bring back many lessons learned and the beginnings of my learning, as I developed my own aeronautical decision making (ADM).

Legal vs. Proficient. I remember a regular pilgrimage we flew every year from the DC area to Hartford, Connecticut, to visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins. We delayed a flight to allow morning haze to burn off even though we could have taken off in very low IFR conditions and probably would have been just fine. Dad wasn’t comfortable with the risk and taught me the difference between legal and proficient. He didn’t want the possibility of an emergency that forced a return to the departure point, which would require a level of performance that he wasn’t routinely used to delivering as a private pilot. I have routinely made decisions along these lines based on watching him always make these kinds of choices.

Fuel Management. In the pre-GPS days, none of the airplanes had DME so groundspeed was determined the old fashioned way, using the clock, a sectional, a nav log and an E6B. I tracked our groundspeed on one of our cross-country flights, which ended up quite a bit lower than predicted due to headwinds. The trip dragged on and Dad said we were going to stop to get gas even though we were only 30NM from our destination. We could have made it but we hit Dad’s predetermined time limit for our fuel load and we stopped. In my own flying this has happened a couple times and I learned the right thing to do first from Dad.

Tools. Dad taught me the importance of having what you needed in your flight bag. He always had the right tools for the job: current charts, multiple flashlights (red and white), an E6B, headset (back in the days when handheld mics were still widely used), and a handheld transceiver to prepare for lost comms on an IFR flight. I still have that radio. He never skimped on the tools to fly well.

Later in life Dad flew as my co-pilot. We were in Civil Air Patrol together. He marveled at the Garmin G1000, the iPad, and fuel flow computers that I started to fly in the early 2000s. It was staggering to him to essentially be flying the same airframes but with all the added sophistication of the computer-based electronics. One of my favorite and last pictures was him flying in a CAP 182 with all the screens. I am thankful for a Dad who introduced me to flying and taught me by his example how do it right.

The post The joy of a flying dad appeared first on Air Facts Journal.

from Engineering Blog https://airfactsjournal.com/2020/03/the-joy-of-a-flying-dad/

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