Flying

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Hi all. Thought someone might need a chuckle.

Rules of the Air

Article copied from Flying September 1997, without permission

Every takeoff is optional. Every landing is mandatory. If you push the stick forward, the houses get bigger. If you pull the stick back, they get smaller. That is, unless you keep pulling the stick all the way back, then they get bigger again.

Flying isn't dangerous. Crashing is what's dangerous. The ONLY time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire. The propeller is just a big fan in front of the plane used to keep the pilot cool. When it stops, you can actually watch the pilot start sweating.

When in doubt, hold on to your altitude. No one has ever collided with the sky.

A 'good' landing is one from which you can walk away. A 'great' landing is one after which they can use the plane again. Learn from the mistakes of others. You won't live long enough to make all of them yourself. The probability of survival is inversely proportional to the angle of arrival. Large angle of arrival, small probability of survival and vice versa. Never let an aircraft take you somewhere your brain didn't get to five minutes earlier. Stay out of clouds. The silver lining everyone keeps talking about might be another airplane going in the opposite direction. Reliable sources also report that mountains have been known to hide out in clouds. Always try to keep the number of landings you make equal to the number of take offs you've made. You start with a bag full of luck and an empty bag of experience. The trick is to fill the bag of experience before you empty the bag of luck. Helicopters can't fly; they're just so ugly the earth repels them. In the ongoing battle between objects made of aluminum going hundreds of miles per hour and the ground going zero miles per hour, the ground has yet to lose. It's always a good idea to keep the pointy end going forward as much as possible.

Remember, gravity is not just a good idea. It's the law. And it's not subject to repeal.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 02, 2004

Answers

Oops. Sorry about that. It seems that not all my carriage returns worked. That should be about 10 separate lines, not one big paragraph.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 02, 2004.

Sound advice, Carol. Reminds me of a wicked curve in Central Texas that I used to treat with respect when wringing out the roads. I thought of it as a Dead Man's Curve, and believe it's oaken guardians had indeed claimed some inebriated or foolhardy driver. What has this to do with flying? When I was little, my mother was secretary to an Air Force major at the base where my dad was stationed. I don't remember where I first heard it, but the cliche stuck with me and came to mind about that mean curve which I tested, but only to certain limits, a few times: "There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots. There are no old, bold pilots."

-- J (jsnider@hal-pc.org), May 03, 2004.

LOL, thanks for the chuckle Carol. I never saw it before. I know someone who flys their own small private plane and will have to print this out for them to enjoy also.

-- (sonofdust@not.flying), May 03, 2004.

I know a stretch of road like that J. Right on the bend there was a huge gum tree which the council refused to cut down. It was mysteriously ring-barked after it claimed the life of a young local farmer late one drizzly night.

Glad you enjoyed it Rob. Being able to fly a plane must be the free- est feeling in the world, all that space. I hope your buddy takes you up sometime.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 04, 2004.


LOL, no I think I'll stay here on the ground, or under it, or above ground, or somewhere close to it.

BTW, you know it's a small plane when they ask how much you weigh!

Poopie.

-- (sonofdust@above.ground), May 06, 2004.



My son used to work on an island and had to travel back and forth in one of those very small planes. The pilot had to circle the airfield (paddock) a couple of times to scare the sheep off the runway before he could land. On one trip home they flew right over my house and it felt very strange knowing that my baby was sitting way up there in that little tin box.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 07, 2004.

Though Daddy was an enlisted man, he and Mother made many friends when he was in the Air Force. She was a Major's secretary and he was a crew chief on the flight line and shot skeet and managed and played third base on the squadron's hot fast-pitch softball team. Some friends flew fighters. Maybe 5 years Daddy finished his hitch and we moved to a rural resort area, I was in the house by myself one afternoon and heard a whining sound. I went outside and a jet was makingmade a wide turn to the south. It was an F101 "Voodoo," which gets my vote as the prettiest jet ever. It came back so low it almost clipped the top of the big oak tree beside the carport and so slow that I could hear the "thlup" of the air collapsing behind the plane. He circled around again and came over the same way, upside down, then passed back over, higher and faster, going back the way he had come, did an 8-point roll and nosed her up. I saw a couple of white flashes from the tail, not quite at the same time, and he was just GONE, quickly becoming a mere sparkle among the high fluffy by about the time I heard the staggered booms of the afterburners. It was a recon plane, and we got some pictures in the mail later showing a tiny me standing in the front yard of our tiny house beside a tiny oak tree. I wanted to fly as a young man, even thought about making a run at the Air Force Academy, but do not have the eyes. "Navigator" didn't have the same appeal somehow.

-- J (jsnider@hal-pc.org), May 07, 2004.

Prettiest ever?

Certainly the prettiest jet!

Had a Revell 1:72 model of the Voodoo that I still remember fondly.

-- Robert & Jean (getingwarmer@ga.inthespring), May 07, 2004.


What a thrill to see a jet going over that close, J. I grew up near an airbase and I find I still have to look up and watch whenever a plane goes over. Guess I'm just a big kid eh! Well maybe an old kid would be closer to the truth. I never did get to be big.

Did you put the Revell model together yourself Robert? I have not so fond memories of helping my son build model-kits. It requires patience and steady hands, neither of which either of us has. I was glad when he grew out of that stage. Give me lego any day.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 10, 2004.


Robert, I think I still have one of those. I painted it white and left some of it gray, just like on the box. I built a bunch of WWII planes when a kid, and the Voodoo again when I was older. (Refer to the old favorite things thread.) My favorite jets are the Voodoo, and, running a close second, the SR-71 Blackbird (only one I ever saw in-the-flesh landed right over me approaching the base in Abilene one time while I was driving on I-20). They are two different types of looks and not really comparable. The Voodoo is angular and the Blackbird has a heavy mix of nice organic curves as well. 3rd place on my jet list--the Navy's old "Panther Jet's" that I think the Blue Angels flew at one time. Prop favorites have got to include the P-38 Lightening, P-51 Mustang, A&B-26's and the Luftwaffe's ME-109's, pretty planes all, depending on which logo was on the side of your own in those days, I'm sure.

Carol, first airplane model I built was an old green gullwing German dive bomber of the type that was used a lot in the Spanish Civil War whose name escapes me right now. I had the steady hands and eyes for close work back then and was meticulous with the glue, etc. Nowadays the Lego rules, or at least it seems so as many of the "models" I see on the shelves for kids are snap-together jobs. I never got into the radio-controlled stuff. My model airplane phase mostly lasted two or three years in Jr High, roughly coinciding with my model ship phase. This military stuff overlapped my model car phase. I had another craving to build models for a short time after I was out of college and married and built that last Voodoo and a couple of cars. I was especially good with the paint finishes on the last few. But my son played with them when he was a youngster and pretty much wrecked them. He is of the generation that thought the way to play with hot wheels was to throw them together and watch them bounce. I blame it on too much TV. He didn't do that with the old models, which really weren't made to play with at all, but he was still pretty ham- handed. Some of the remains of the models are still in a box in the attic or somewhere. The wreckage of our childhoods and/or youthful compulsions are scattered in hidden corners and pressed between the pages all around us, it seems. Sometimes they are tangible and sometimes just memories that ambush us as we idly leaf through the pages of our lives.

-- J (jsnider@hal-pc.org), May 10, 2004.



Carol, the old green dive-bomber was a German "Stuka." I remembered this a couple of days after last posting. Funny how things like that simmer on the back burners, then the answer finally bubbles to the surface unexpectedly. Semi-ugly plane, totally ugly name (though probably the name of the designer or something--if so, apologies to anybody's great uncle Mannfred Stuka,et al). They were known as whistling death or screaming death or some such macho moniker due to the sound they made when "stooping" (to borrow a bird term). Technology left them behind pretty quickly as WW II progressed,and they soon became obsolete vestiges of Nazi enforcement, being used in more backwater action (in Ethiopia, I think (probably by the Italians), as well as Spain).

-- J (closuredemands@its.due), May 14, 2004.

An OLD joke:

The crusty old WWI veteran ace was regaling a group of listeners down at the Home one afternoon. He was telling of a great aerial battle he had been in, over the skies of France.

"Three planes appeared from out of the sun, and me all alone in my little Sophwith Camel. One Fokker dove at my left wing, one Fokker dove towards my right wing, and one Fokker came up behind my tail with both guns ablazing! I thought I was a gonner fer sure, then..."

Just then, one of the ladies in the group interrupted him.

"Captain, if I recall properly, the Fokker was a much faster German plane than the English Sophwith, and would surely have shot you to ribbons, isn't that right?"

The old gent squinted at her for a brief moment, then answered,

Well, sure, but THESE fokkers was all flying Messerschmidts!"

-- Lon (Fokker@the.bayou), May 14, 2004.


Yes, yes - nBuilt a whole "fleet" of the ships (15-25 different models of destroyers, air craft carriers, tankers, .... Even a sea plane tender!

The airplanes were all up in the overhead hung from the wires across the ceiling: With 5 brothers in one room, we had to duck when in the top bunks of the two bunk beds to keep from hitting the planes.

Very, very few cars.

I always liked WWII planes (bombers and figters) more than jets 'cause the prop airplanes were "bumpier" and less sleek and streamlined. Had more "stuff" hanging out of them on and all over them that had to be glued on.

Sure wish we had cyano-acrylate glues then!

-- Robert & Jean (getingwarmer@ga.inthespring), May 15, 2004.


J & Robert. Do boys still make model 'planes and ships? I'm out of touch with anyone under 27yrs. If not then I think the next generation of boys has missed some valuable lessons and a very rewarding hobby.

Thanks for the chuckle Lon. Hadn't heard that one before.

Five boys Robert. I hope your Mum had at least one girl as well.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 16, 2004.


Girls?

Oh. Yeah.

Them.

Only had 4 sisters.

-- Robert & Jean (getingwarmer@ga.inthespring), May 16, 2004.



Oh Robert, your Mum must have been one busy lady.

-- Carol (c@oz.com), May 17, 2004.

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