Thursday, August 20, 2009 - Q Flights

by Norm

This will be short. There is a team manager's briefing at 8 AM.

Yesterday, Vicki continued to have engine problems with the plane still at Conington. It first appeared to be a dead magneto, but without hitting every detail, it appears to have been the SlickStart. Hopefully, it will be resolved this morning and she can return to Silverstone.

The order of flight for the Q program (Known) was drawn yesterday. This program will determine the order of flight for Program 1, the Freestyle. The scores do not count in the overall contest. Here is what we drew:

Robert Armstrong - 4
Goody Thomas - 20
Vicki Cruse - 32
David Martin - 33
Michael Racy - 39
Debby Rihn-Harvey - 55
Jeff Boerboob - 58
Hubie Tolson - 59

You should be able to check the links to either the CIVA website or to www.wac2009.com to keep up on the scoring.

Wish the team good luck. The flights will soon begin. Yea!!!!

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Robert, Goody, Vicki, and Jeff before their afternoon rotation

Julie Churchill, Conington Airfield

Flying Club Conington

by Norm

Monday afternoon, the team successfully and safely relocated from Dunkeswell to Silverstone, England. The pilots in planes made the trip in 40 minutes, while those of us on the road took slightly over three hours. The pilots where met at Silverstone and taken to the hotel, which is very nice.

After being asked to stop flying in Dunkeswell, the Contest Director, Steve Green, was contacted, and quickly went to work to find an alternative site for practice. He was able to receive permission from the people at a former WWll field south of Peterborough. This airport was named Glatton during WWll and B-17s were based there. All of the fields we have flown from are former Army Air Corps bases with a lot of history. So our plan was to fly Tuesday morning practice flights in the Silverstone box, then fly at the Flying Club Conington (EGSF) for the afternoon practice flights.

The morning practice flights went on schedule for everyone, except Debby. Debby is sharing Hanspeter’s plane, and the two of them were practicing at another field. Debby’s Silverstone practice time is late on Wednesday. By noon, we were ready to leave for Conington with Debby joining Hanspeter. Conington is about 30 miles East of Silverstone, or 15 minutes by air. It was about an hour and a half by car. We arrived and began the practice rotation after a briefing from Julie Churchill.

Now the day got “interesting”. Three flights into the rotation, Debby called with a rudder peddle problem in the CAP 232 at the airport she was at. The problem grounded the plane. Our unflappable team mechanic, Len Rulason, was immediately dispatched to fix Hanspeter’s plane. Twenty minutes after he left, Vicki started up for her flight. Upon her run-up, she discovered a dead left magneto. (This violated the Chenoweth Second Axiom of Flight: “Never do a mag check away from your home field”). Vicki’s flight was scrubbed. Fortunately, there was a mechanic on the field. A replacement mag was located, and should be installed this morning. Len and Vicki are on the road as I am writing.

Len arrived at Debby’s field, identified the problem, and then went to a local bicycle shop for parts. Evidently, the CAP 232 used a part on the rudder peddles that is also used for bicyclists to attach their shoes to the peddles. Who would have guessed? Len finished the fix in the hotel bar last evening. Hopefully, Debby and Hanspeter are now able to get back in the air.

At 1700 hours today, the mandatory pilots briefing will be held at the field. The order of flight for the Qualifying Program will be drawn. At 2015 hour, the Opening Ceremonies will begin followed by dinner. Tomorrow, the first competition flights are scheduled to begin. Everyone is excited to begin the WAC.

August 17 - Farewell Dunkeswell, Off to Silverstone

by Vicki

Today we arrived at an overcast airport and started flying about 11:30 or so with Peter from Slovenia. Next up was Jeff and during Jeff’s flight, Brendon the airport manager pulled Norm aside and told him the flying had to stop. The locals had won and that was it for us. If we kept flying, the airport might suffer some repercussions from the community and no one wanted that.

Norm and Robert worked on alternatives with the contest officials, while the rest of us had lunch, fueled up for the trip to Silverstone and paid our bills. With fees for the hangar, landing and box entry fees (yes, a charge each time we flew in the box) plus the fuel and oil bills, we left quite a mark on Dunkeswell. I came in at $1100.

Finally we received word that we could launch for Silverstone; the runway was marked and open for our arrival. Robert, Goody, Jeff and I flew in formation to the site with Robert as lead. He had the most experience flying across

Europe, so we made him lead

Robert in the lead.

We arrived in Silverstone and taxied to our shared hangar which are very nice temporary structures (there are three total). Robert taxied right in, followed by Goody, myself and Jeff. We won’t get to do that again. It also received a questionable look from one of the organizers, who asked Robert of the Americans always taxi into their hangar. Robert replied, “When they are empty.”

We didn’t have to wait too long before the rest of the team arrived by car. We were also informed that we would be given an alternate practice site tomorrow because of the poor weather and noise issues at Dunkeswell. Silverstone is a year-round race track where a Formula 1 race is held (though I am told perhaps no more) so cars are racing around us and we are in the center of the complex. It is quite an interesting venue. I will try and get some shots of the site.

Silverstone is about 35 minutes (with no traffic) from the hotel. We actually found it right out of the gate. We all checked into the hotel and registered for the contest. Dinner was served and old friends were met. Our team practice times are tomorrow morning, so it was an early night.

Sunday in Dunkeswell by Norm

I think Vicki's post well summarizes Sunday. My only addition is that in addition to all of the aviation activity previously described, I was slipped a note from Brenden, the airport manager, that 200 racing pigeons would be released from Smeatharpe at 3PM. Also, there was RC aircraft being flown at the same area. My only response was to tell the pigeons to "look out".

Today, Monday, we break camp and relocate to Silverstone for box practice in the morning.

August 16 - We All Earned Air Show Waivers Today

Today started out with the usual fog and now the daily Starbucks visit. However Debby and I had to wait about 20 minutes for the 9:00 opening. Norm, our Team manager, must have read the blog, as he went to McDonalds this morning for his treasured orange juice, the British version with “no bits”, and an artery-clogging Egg McMuffin.

We headed out to the airport a bit later than normal, due to the request for no flying allowed before noon. Shortly after hitting the main road to the airport, we discovered we were following this truck which was moving quite fast on a single lane road. I told Norm this was a great thing; this guy could be our lead anytime as we would no longer have to worry about oncoming traffic. Being a tanker truck, we assumed this might be the source of the missing 120W oil for Hubie’s Sukhoi, however it turned off before getting to the airport.

Hanspeter was up first this morning with about a 1500 foot ceiling which got up to 2000 by late afternoon, but didn’t allow any of us to fly a full sequence, just figures that had to start at 100 to 200 feet. We all should have been given air show waivers for today, we earned them. Just after the first rotation, we were informed that the flying must stop at 5:30, so we switched to tightly controlled 10-minute slots. Jeff, being the last in the rotation, gave up his slot to keep within the time limit.

Robert had some airplane issues today. He and Len tried to figure out the problem. Finding nothing wrong, Robert flew the second rotation.

Today was a real zoo, aerobatics, normal arrivals, and parachutists. All of this really gave Brendon a workout as the radio (unicom) guy today.

Here he is on the job at about 1:00, looking quite fresh.

This photo was taken at 4:20 pm. He said that was tea, but after today it was probably something a lot stronger. Though the photo doesn't show it, he was looking quite disheveled.

With Brendon on the radio, this left Curtiss to handle the phone calls, otherwise know as noise complaints.

Here is Curtiss when not on the phone.

Richard is the third guy here and he handles the phone and collection of landing fees when Curtiss is manning the fuel pumps for us. Nicolette had the day off.

Richard told me that usually either Saturday or Sunday are busy days here, but with the weather not so good yesterday, more people flew in today. There were 14 visitors to the airport today but last weekend there were 75, split evenly between the days. Thankfully for us and Brendon, we were not here yet

Saturday - Dunkeswell by Norm

This morning also started out with low overcast and a little drizzle. We arrived at the airport, and Hanspeter went up and flew, but the ceilings were only about 1400 feet. Everyone else decided to wait the weather out. Finally, in the middle afternoon, the ceilings rose and some breaks in the overcast appeared. We began our rotation in earnest. Every pilot got a shot in the box and flying wrapped up at 6:30 PM, due to prior noise complaints. It was a productive day.

It should be added that there was a lot of aviation activity during the afternoon. For example, there are several light sport airplanes based here, and they fly even with the overcast that grounded the team. There are two young pilots in the building next to us, Rob and Chris, that are selling rides to the English coast in a 1936 Gypsy Moth. The plane has a tail skid and no brakes. It departs on the runway and lands on the grass between the runway and their office. Their short final is almost over our heads.Then, there are a variety of general aviation aircraft, 150s, 172s, 177s, Archers, etc. that are being used as trainers. If that’s not enough, there is a parachute jump operation lifting jumpers in a King Air. By the way, the jumpers land in the center of our aerobatic box. They provide a 2 minute warning, we vacate the box, they land, collect the dead, and we resume aerobatics. It is definitely a three ring goat rodeo. The US FAA would have a heart attack. Fortunately, everyone is safety conscious, and we have not had any conflicts.

Hubie and Goody have the Sukhoi tweaked to their satisfaction, and both looked strong in their flying. Every team member is looking quite sharp in their flying. They are working on unknowns and unknown figures. Jeff and David are very precise with the new Extra 330S. Robert is fully at home in his own CAP 231. Debby and Vicki look very strong, and are mastering the small differences between the planes they fly at home and the planes they are using here in Europe. More tomorrow.

August 15 - Starbucks and an Afternoon Cloud Break

This morning started a bit later due to low clouds in Exeter (go figure). While Hubie and Jeff went to the hardware store, Goody, who wasn’t ready (with his suitcase arriving yesterday with fresh clothes for the first time in days, my guess is he was having a hard time deciding just what to wear for the day) stayed behind. Debby, Norm and I went to Starbucks. Here’s proof:

Debby and I enjoyed our skinny muffin and latte breakfast. Our team manager joined us for coffee, but had previously eaten the $24.72 hotel breakfast buffet (up from $24.68 yesterday with the exchange rate this morning) due to his penchant for “the exceptional orange juice.” I may ask the team members to contribute to the Team Manager Orange Juice fund so that we can go to the local grocery store and purchase a liter of OJ to stock his in-room refrigerator. After all, by expensing it to the team members, our manager is costing the team 10.24 liters of avgas per day (avgas is about $ 9.15 per gallon).

At 10:00 am this morning, I gave a quick call out to the airport and asked Curtiss how the clouds were looking, as it was beginning to break up in Exeter. His reply was that they had ground fog this morning. Lovely, as they say quite frequently here.

We eventually made it out to the airport round noon and visited for a bit, then Norm and Debby and I went to the local pub for lunch, where we met Martin the proprietor. The building he is in was originally built in the 1600s but has been added on to since. The food was amazing and not one of us ordered fish, but Debby had chips with her amazingly large but quite good Cottage Pie.

A Skybolt flew into Dunkeswell this morning with another great “G” number. Note the lovely ceiling.

Finally the clouds began to give way (1500 broken) about 3 pm today and everyone got in a flight, with Hanspeter getting the last go at 6:15 before we shut down at 6:30. The airport asked us to stop at 6 pm for the locals, but since we hadn’t flown since Thursday, took pity on us and let us fly until 6:30. We worked in between arrival and departure traffic and skydivers, but it was all good and everyone was just happy to get back in the air.