We had a flurry of a day. From the time I woke up, I was organizing, coordinating, and trying to figure out how to do this mighty airplane swap. I wrote up emails for the club regarding every airplane we've got, where it's going, where to park, how to get in, Runway and fuel information, all sorts of stuff. Every plane has a different door lock code, every airport has its' own odd operating idiosyncrasies. I had to do it for two 172s, a 172RG, a Cherokee 180 and a Champ, all in different locations. Got that done before lunch, and then we had to actually start moving everything.
First thing I took was the T-6. I took that down to Frankfort and helped them put it in a hangar. Morgan came and got me in the Citabria, and we went from there back to Kokomo, where I got in the Aerostar and took off for Logansport. So did she. Hayden took off in the Cherokee 180 for Logansport. I'm coming in to land on Runway 27, and call 10 miles out, 5 out, 5 mile final, 2 mile final, and someone calls "Departing Runway 9" I call up and say I'm on short final for 27. She continues to taxi out. I ask if the aircraft departing Runway 9 can hold short for a second. They taxi onto the runway. So I do a low pass go-around just off the right side of them, with an annoyed radio announcement. The three of us take turns coming in. The airport there puts the Aerostar and the Citabria in their big hangar, and the three of us load up in the Cherokee to head back to Kokomo. Got a bad mag check. About 50 things ran through my head. I ended up deciding to take it back to Kokomo. Stranding it and us at Logansport posed other problems, it was a 10 minute flight over fields with grissom's huge runway along the way too, and I sent it. It would have been better if I'd been alone in there, and it's not a great example to the new instructor, but I did it anyway. Next up Morgan had needed to take the Cherokee to give a Make-a-Wish flight at 5 pm in Wabash, except now obviously that wasn't happening. So she took the 172RG instead (which was supposed to be in Sheridan already but hadn't left yet because Steve replaced a tire). She took the RG up to Wabash and gave her flight, then back to Kokomo. Meanwhile, Ethan and I took one 172 and went over to Glenndale where I checked him out on the grass strip procedures. We flew .9 doing TOLS, and then put it away in its new temporary hangar. Morgan flew the RG down to Sheridan, and Cameron chased her in the other 172. She put it away, he flew her back to Glenndale, where HE practiced grass strip stuff. We put that away in its new hangar, and Chuck drove us all back to Kokomo Airport at 9 something p.m.
This doesn't even take into account the 15 different plans we had to do today. The Cherokee is currently sitting in the maintenance hangar, it needs fixed and down to Frankfort tomorrow, if possible. The 340 is in the big hangar and it needs to go to Ohio for annual. And I need to get over to Toledo to pick up the Conquest, drop it off at Frankfort. And Toledo had BETTER get it done or I'm hosed on the Marco Island trip on Wednesday and so is Andy, because I don't have a back up plane with the Cheyenne down too.
Meanwhile, the 25th Andy has a flight to Bolingbrook, IL with 3 people. And Kevin's company has a trip to Muskeegon, MI with a "crew". So I'd say Andy could take the Meridian except Bolingbrook is only 3300' long which isn't long enough for the Meridian loaded. It IS long enough for the Conquest. Except there are too many people to fit in the Meridian for the Davis crew, so it has to be the Conquest. Can't do both in one day. So either I have to put Andy in the slower Meridian AND send him to an airport far away from where he's trying to get, or I have to tell the Davis crew I can't do the 25th, which is bad for other reasons I won't put down here. They were supposed to go Thursday, too, and canceled, so I hope they cancel the 25th too and solve this problem.
These are the kinds of circuses we deal with regularly, but today was amazingly complex and tiring. I have spared you by not talking about all the versions of the plans we tried to do today that didn't work for one reason or another until we ended up with the one that mostly did.
I'm exhausted!
Kaylee went to Pilates at 6:45 am and didn't even think it was that bad getting up. She's trying to normalize getting up early for work in Indy again after 2 weeks off. She's excited about going back to work tomorrow, too. That's always fun.
And on that note...
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