Flying Friday

It was an early one this morning. Steve had to be down at Sheridan by 7 a.m., and I was out at Glenndale by 8:30. Originally I was going to fly with a student, but instead I sent him off solo and went flying with Kaylee in the Citabria. I put her up front, and it's the first time she's been in the front seat of a tandem plane, first time she's started and shut down an airplane herself. She was a little uncertain about being up front in the "In Charge" seat, but once she got the plane started successfully, she was pretty much ready to go. She can't quite reach the rudders properly from the front seat, so I had to help with that, but she controlled the power, the elevator and the ailerons herself today, doing the takeoff, straight and level, turns, and bringing us down final through to the landing. She's very quick and responsive, so when I say "left, left, back, hold it right there", etc. she'll do it at appropriate amounts. We had a bit of a crosswind today, so I was telling her how much left aileron to hold, and I was bringing in the right rudder, and she actually did do the level off and flare without me having to take over the stick. When I said "Now bring the stick back to your belly and hold it there", that's exactly what she did, nice and smooth, and luck or not, it worked out quite nicely. ;) Something else new she learned today was the trim. She figured out how sensitive it was and how to adjust it to help keep you level, and she learned how to use a couple of the instruments to help her figure out when she's not climbing, descending or turning (since she only has peripheral vision right now...isn't tall enough to see over the cowling). More importantly, she had a fun time with it. (So did I).

After hot dogs for lunch, I flew with Scott in the Citabria over to Kokomo to drop him off, topped off the airplane when I got back to Glenndale, put it away, and then we went out to Kokomo Airport where it was Registration and Practice day for the IAC Competition. The "Hoosier Hoedown". Nathan says it should be renamed the "Boiler Hoedown" because there are way more Purdue guys there than IU guys. ;) There are 36 participants in something like 23 airplanes, which is a really nice turnout for a first-time event. Obviously the aerobatic folks were needing an Indiana venue as well. Nathan is the technical inspector, and he goes through and inspects the airplanes (and the pilots' paperwork) very carefully to make sure that they are safe and good to go fly. As the day wound down, we started putting the airplanes into all the available hangar space, and it's quite a sight. We got ten airplanes in Nathan's hangar, and that space also includes the big ole T-6, his huge bus, two Corvettes and a four-wheeler. Now THAT'S a hangar. And a stacking job. I went up to the scaffolding and took some photos from up there, but I need a wider angle lens and/or more distance from them to get them all at once. We also got over 13 airplanes in the maintenance hangar of the airport, and a couple in Ed's hangar where I used to keep the Pizza Hut plane. At the end of the day all the planes were warm and dry and tucked into some seriously tight spaces, and the Mission was Accomplished.

Jon finished the Baron today, so after running it and checking for leaks (nope!), I took Jon and Justin up on the maintenance checkout flight. Technically shouldn't have. Did anyway. I was ready to abort as necessary (as always in a twin), but she ran like a charm. I only kept it up long enough to check out the systems and performance, and came on in for a sunset landing. Love that airplane...

Steve and Kaylee left the airport early to go to a Blues concert being held in Foster Park. It's a free concert, they do a different one each Friday evening. They had a great time, enjoyed the music, ran into several friends, and had ice cream afterwards which really made Kaylee smile. :) We all didn't get home until well after 9 p.m. from our respective events.

It was a good day for all, I think...