Look Before Landing
Thunderstorms rolled through on Wednesday of last week,
knocking a few limbs down near the airport, but no damage was seen on the
field. The SkyDive Caravan 208B is too big to fit in any of our hangars, but
rode out the gusts okay. One of Sky4’s Cessna 150 trainers was stuck in
Harrisonville while buying fuel, surviving on tie-down ropes.
Transient traffic observed last week included a 1956
Cessna 172, a 1964 Mooney Mark 21 (out of Des Moines, IA) and a noisy Beech
King Air B100 turboprop, picking up passengers. The rare B100 uses 700-hp
Garrett engines that run at a constant rpm, even on the ground, using propeller
pitch to control thrust. The Missouri Army National Guard provided some Black
Hawk helicopter fly-bys.
Local acts of aviation were performed by BCS’s AirTractor
AT502 skimming over farm fields, Sky4’s Cessna 150s were busy training student
pilots and SkyDive KC lofted some loads of jumpers. Former jumpmaster Chris
Hall got current in a Cessna 150, Roy Conley flew his Grumman Tr2, and I was
taken to Joplin and Springfield by a C-150.
This coming weekend, starting Friday morning, the
Jefferson City airport is closed down for the annual Columbia-Jeff City
airshow, with no provisions for flying in and out of the Capital City. Use
Columbia Regional as an alternate.
A too-hasty traffic pattern, mixed with an ill-advised
straight-in long approach, resulted in a tragic accident at Fort Morgan,
Colorado on August 31st. A Cessna Skyhawk skipped entering the
landing pattern, opting to make a straight-in, while at the same time an Extra
300 made a tight base-leg and turn to final, landing atop the unseen
high-winger. The two entangled airplanes crashed onto the runway, where the
wreckage was soon consumed by fire; the Extra is made of fiberglass. Only one
person was killed in the Extra 300, the other one surviving with injuries, and
the two occupants of the Cessna came out okay. The lesson is, once again, fly a
regular traffic pattern and keep watch for unexpected traffic.
Budget carrier Spirit Airlines took Chapter 11 bankruptcy
last Friday, the second time this year; it entered Chapter 11 back in March but
isn’t making it yet. The bright yellow Airbuses based in Florida may not be
around much longer unless the court and creditors can work something out.
The much-ballyhooed “near midair” at Minot, ND on July 19th
has turned out to be a non-event, after investigation. A Skywest Embraer
regional airliner pulled up and went around after spotting a B-52 bomber, which
had been cleared through the airspace by the tower so it could make a pass over
the fairgrounds to the west at a public event. And a flight school’s Piper
Cherokee was also just a mile away; it didn’t deviate.
Our previous weekly quiz was about term “vertical
visibility” in an aviation weather report; no responses were received. It’s
used when fog is so thick there’s no measurable ceiling height, so the machine
records “VV100 ft.” For next week, tell us the Boeing B-52’s official name;
hint—Fortress. You can send your answers to [email protected].
.JPG)
