The Wandering Minstrel

I became interested in the local airport in Wickenburg yesterday. As a retired, inactive pilot, I won’t be using the airport, but I wanted to know a little about it from an aviation point of view. I did a web search on the airport and one of the links returned was FltPlan.com. It turned out to be a treasure trove of aviation information. One very useful feature is an interactive VFR Sectional Aeronautical Chart. In a matter of a few minutes I found out about terrain, nearby airports, controlled airspace, military operational areas and the names of mountain ranges, wildlife refuges and more. Sectional charts can be very handy for more than just aviation things.

Taken from the site’s tutorial and main page:

FltPlan.com is a FREE service which assists you in creating/filing IFR flight plans, obtaining a weather briefing and provides you with a navigation log for flights in the U.S., Bahamas, Bermuda, and flights to/from many Canadian/Mexican airports. While this website is geared towards the IFR Pilot it can still be used by VFR Pilots or Instrument Pilots going VFR.

Professional Full-Service Flight Planning:

• Flight Plan Filing. Over 4.3 million flight plans created in 2009.
• FAA Certified Weather. Over 4.2 million weather briefings requested in 2009.
• Flight Tracking. We handle more Blocked N#s than any other service.
• CBP Certified eAPIS. Full featured and secure eAPIS manifest filing.
• FAA CDM Participant. Flight Plans submitted 20 hours in advance to TFMS.
• ICAO/FAA SMS (AC 120-92a Safety Management System) Now Available

One-Hundred and Seven years ago on this day, the entrepreneurial Wright Brothers launched the age of powered heavier-than-air flight. Coincidentally, my first solo flight took place on this date in 1961 in Santa Monica, California - forty-nine years ago. How time flies (pun intended).

Clickable image - Orville Wright lifting off for the first powered flight. Wilbur Wright watches near the right wingtip.

A friend sent this in an email the other day about the fastest airplane ever and a Blackbird Pilot’s account of events . . .

One day, high above Arizona, we were monitoring the radio traffic, of all the mortal airplanes below us. First, a Cessna pilot asked the air traffic controllers to check his ground speed. ‘Ninety knots,’ ATC replied.

A Bonanza soon made the same request. ‘One-twenty on the ground,’ was the reply.

To our surprise, a Navy F-18 came over the radio, with a ground speed check. I knew exactly what he was doing. Of course, he had a ground speed indicator in his cockpit, but he wanted to let all the bug-smashers in the valley know what real speed was.

‘Dusty 52, we show you at 620 on the ground,’ ATC responded.

The situation was too ripe.

I heard the click of the RSO’s mike button in the rear seat. In his most innocent voice, he startled the controller by asking for a ground speed check from 81,000 feet, clearly above controlled airspace.

In a cool, professional voice, the air traffic controller replied, ‘Aspen 20, I show you at 1,982 knots on the ground.’

Priceless!

We’re on the road again tonight heading back to California. We’ll be back in Arizona in a week or so. Meanwhile, check out this interesting mailbox that The Better Half photographed in Wickenburg this afternoon.

As soon as I saw it, I immediately recognized the short airframe, short wings and landing gear fairings as being those from the famous Gee Bee Model R racing airplane built by the Granville Brothers back in 1932. It made us both laugh. Clickable image.

I went on to the Garmin website this morning to make sure that the maps and software for my Nuvi 205W GPS. I was all up to date so I surfed around their site for a few minutes and found the Garmin G500H “glass cockpit” display.

I had no idea that Garmin makes products for helicopters. I’m intrigued by one instrument they make - the G500H helicopter flight display. I watched this video at the Garmin website and found they had uploaded it to You Tube. If you’re an aviator or a gadget fan in general, you should find this very interesting.

I’m retired from flying these days but watching this video got the old juices flowing. Avionics has certainly come a long way since my first liftoff in a needle, ball and airspeed equipped Bell 47D1 forty-some years ago.

The Better Half took this photo of a T-shirt while she was window shopping (I was in the bank up the street correcting yet another bank screw-up). The shop features a unique array of WW2 and military memorabilia. She knew I would like this shirt with the P-51 Mustang and the classic pinup girl nose art. She was right. Clickable image.

DrJim, who blogs at Every Blade Of Grass, liked the expression so I decided to use it as the title of this post. Jim was commenting on the post yesterday about Miss Piggy.

Clickable image - Sitting in the H-4 Cockpit

As we continue to sort through all the old junk in the closets and drawers, we find little nuggets like this ancient photo of me sitting at the controls of The Spruce Goose. It was on a slide when I found it last week so I took it to the photo shop to have it scanned onto a CD ROM.

The story dates back to 1982 when I and a contingent from the Hughes (Aircraft) Radio Club were invited to take a private tour of the H-4 Hercules in Long Beach, CA, prior to opening the exhibit up to the public. The huge wooden airplane was in a dome adjacent to the Queen Mary.

We got the whole deal. We walked out into the wings of the plane where an engineer was stationed behind each of the eight giant R-4400 Pratt & Whitney radial engines. I even got to climb up on the top of the Goose (covered in plastic tarps) and walk on the wings and fuselage. It was incredible! Everything was there - the 20 passenger seats behind the cockpit, the radio rack with all of the original ARC radios from that era and the cockpit itself in its original condition.

Of course, I wasn’t the only guy to sit in the same seat occupied by Howard Hughes that day, but I was the best looking (according to The Better Half, that is).

My Mom (still around at age 90) says I was present the day Hughes lifted the Hercules off in Long Beach Harbor in 1948. My Dad had taken the family, Mom, me and my two brothers, to witness the taxiing-turned-test-flight. Sadly, I was taking a nap in the car and can’t remember the event. I was five at the time.

Back in the early 1980s, I had the pleasure of serving as flight instructor to primary student Fraser Heston. A mutual friend and former student, Ralph, introduced Fraser to me and wanted to have Fraser take his primary instruction in Ralph’s Piper PA-18 Super Cub, a descendant of Piper’s Venerable J3 Cub. I was one of the few taildragger instructors at SMO then, so I got the job.

Clickable image: Fraser Heston posing by Ralph’s Super Cub (found during the big house cleaning)

One of the big events was when Fraser was to have his first solo flight. His Father, the immortal Charlton Heston brought the family to witness the event. After a few trips around the traffic pattern as dual instruction, Fraser was ready to make his three take-offs and landings to a full stop (touch and go landings don’t count for taildraggers). I got out of the airplane near the gas pit where there was an observation deck. I introduced myself to “Chuck” and his family as Fraser taxied out for take-off.

Fraser’s three trips around the pattern were flawless. His landings were smooth and uneventful - which is a good thing. We cheered from the observation deck as Fraser taxied back for each subsequent takeoff. after the last landing, Fraser taxied to the tie-down area next to the observation deck and we all met him there.

Chuck proposed a toast to the event. The family brought a bottle of champagne and several little plastic champagne glasses. Chuck had to pour the champagne into glasses on the horizontal stabilizer of an adjacent Cessna since Ralph’s airplane’s horizontal stabilizers aren’t horizontal on the ground. We toasted to Fraser’s perfect first solo flight. The family then adjourned to have brunch in Westwood Village.

The Better Half and I were honored to be invited to the screening of “Mother Lode” a few weeks later. We both met with Chuck Heston, the star of the film, and with Fraser, the writer and producer. On the way out, The Better Half (literally) bumped into Lou Ferigno, star of “The Incredible Hulk.” That was a fun night.

I am very proud to have these events in my pilot logbook. I still brag about having this experience from time to time. This is one of those times.