JS-1 Lands In Dry Lake South of Moriarty, NM

[Dan Marotta]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/hawkdc9/19149700349/in/shares-h1cVuT/

I'm told that the glider had to be dismantled in place and carried out a
piece at a time. All that salt mud...

--
Dan Marotta

[Bill T]

Not all dry lakes are "dry".

As one smart instructor once said, "if it's not a runway, and your sneaker tracks are not there, why are you landing there."

BillT

[Darryl Ramm]

Ramy, tell us the story again about the "dry" lake and the helicopter rescue... :-)

[Tango Eight]

On Thursday, July 2, 2015 at 7:37:23 PM UTC-4, Dan Marotta wrote:
> https://www.flickr.com/photos/hawkdc9/19149700349/in/shares-h1cVuT/
>
>
>
> I'm told that the glider had to be dismantled in place and carried
> out a piece at a time.* All that salt mud...
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Dan Marotta

That's a great photo.

T8

[[email protected]]

Awesome photo.

Let the crime scene investigation begin...or LSI (Landout Scene Investigation)

Looks like he got out, walked to the tail, lifted the tail out of the self made rut (no wingtip skid marks to cause the crooked final position), checks the fuse, walks back to the cockpit, puts canopy cover on but then....why is there a single set of foot prints walking up out of the frame away from the cockpit and a second single set of footprints walking up out of frame away from the tail?

[Dan Marotta]

Must have been some alien influence. It *is* New Mexico and all... On
our state aviation map, there's a flying saucer icon a bit northwest of
Roswell. Hmmmmmmmm... Those dry lakes are northwest of Roswell. I
foresee a new reality TV show on Discovery - "Mysterious space ship
crash lands on New Mexico dry lake". Only evidence of life forms are
tracks in the muck! Government is not talking...

I think Tim took that photo before the group of volunteers arrived.

On 7/3/2015 7:29 AM, wrote:
> Awesome photo.
>
> Let the crime scene investigation begin...or LSI (Landout Scene Investigation)
>
> Looks like he got out, walked to the tail, lifted the tail out of the self made rut (no wingtip skid marks to cause the crooked final position), checks the fuse, walks back to the cockpit, puts canopy cover on but then....why is there a single set of foot prints walking up out of the frame away from the cockpit and a second single set of footprints walking up out of frame away from the tail?

--
Dan Marotta

[Bob Whelan[_3_]]

On 7/3/2015 7:29 AM, wrote:
> Awesome photo.
>
> Let the crime scene investigation begin...or LSI (Landout Scene
> Investigation)
>
> Looks like he got out, walked to the tail, lifted the tail out of the self
> made rut (no wingtip skid marks to cause the crooked final position),
> checks the fuse, walks back to the cockpit, puts canopy cover on but
> then....why is there a single set of foot prints walking up out of the
> frame away from the cockpit and a second single set of footprints walking
> up out of frame away from the tail?
>

I don't see it that way at all. I think the canopy cover saved the pilot from
alien abduction. When the pilot saw the alien spacecraft approaching, without
exiting the cockpit, he managed to extract & install the canopy cover, then
close and latch the canopy, hiding inside. The alien spacecraft landed, the
(sole - evidently a scout craft from the mother ship) alien pilot then walked
from his ship to the glider, performed the operations noted above, walked back
to the spacecraft, launched, took the photo, and - evidently being a member of
his (her? its?) own society's millenial generation - couldn't help but share
it on our web. Clearly scout ships lack sufficiently powerful tractor beams to
extract a whole glider from such muck, and the alien knew from personal
experience with spaceship technology that trying to force entry into a sealed
ship would undoubtedly be fruitless.

I sure hope the JS1 pilot left his SPOT tracker on and was retrieved before
baking to death! Anyone know for sure?

[JS]

The JS1 is up there with (I believe) Ely Dan's photo of a Lak12 landout:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ws71r7kiboak0id/Ely%20Moon%20Landing.jpg?dl=0

In that case a dry lake wasn't a dry lake, it was sand dunes.
Also shows the improvement in digital images.

Too familiar with the mud that collects on your shoes in that situation. Kempton used a photo of the LS6 on Goshute Lake in one of his presentations.
Elevation 7000'MSL and a 200' ground roll.
Jim

On Friday, July 3, 2015 at 5:19:46 AM UTC-7, Tango Eight wrote:
>
> That's a great photo.
>
> T8

[[email protected]]

Bob you are a genius. I was almost to the conclusion that the pilot walked around the sailpane once and then as he walked away the second time he simply retraced and stepped into his previous foot prints but your conclusion is much more thought out and conclusive.

I think we can all agree that without the metallic cover, the pilot would have been used as a live medical experiment on board the mother ship.

On a side note, the scout ship does in fact have a strong enough tractor beam, however they wanted to bring home an example of the best sailplane earthlings have and this one was a Js-1, not a Schempp-Hirth which explains why it was unable to make it back to the airport in the first place.

[bumper[_4_]]

Probably goes without saying. When landing a power plane (or glider if you have to) on a desert "dry" lake, avoid the darker brown areas and look for evidence of other vehicle tire tracks that might affirm suitable conditions.. If there's any question, it's best to land as near the edge of the playa as conditions permit.

[[email protected]]

Close, Bumper, but actually, if conditions permit, it's best to land at an airport. With cold beer available.

[Jonathan St. Cloud]

On Friday, July 3, 2015 at 3:54:28 PM UTC-7, wrote:
> Close, Bumper, but actually, if conditions permit, it's best to land at an airport. With cold beer available.

I landed on a dry lake once, I had not thought about the depth perception issue before hand. I had to just let the glider find the ground. Was lucky enough to talk a passing airplane down to pick me up and fly me back to the airport so I could get my car and some helpers. They buzzed me and I contacted them on 122.8. While I was gone a passing trucker (the road was two miles from the dry lake had called in an airplane crash. When I came to get my glider near dark the cops and ambulance where there. This was the only time other than a check ride where I have been asked for my pilot's license.

[Ramy[_2_]]

This brings old memories. I have a similar photo of my tracks around my glider when I landed in a similar "dry lake" 15 years ago. In my case the mud was way to deep to walk away from the glider. It was bottomless. I was 1 mile from the shore and needed a helicopter rescue. I know much better now to avoid dry lakes and as Bumper says, look for the brighter spot and car tracks if you have to land there.

Ramy

[Jonathan St. Cloud]

An airplane can fly over someone is distress and drop flowers, a helicopter can actually stop and assist.

[bumper[_4_]]

On Saturday, July 4, 2015 at 8:42:02 AM UTC-7, Jonathan St. Cloud wrote:
> An airplane can fly over someone is distress and drop flowers, a helicopter can actually stop and assist.

Tell that to a Husky pilot!

Flying back home from OR one day with the wife, low over NV's Black Rock desert, I spotted what looked like a body on the playa.

(skip over many details here)

Bottom line, we landed, guy was still barely alive, and so we called an airliner overhead and asked for a relay to Reno approach and a helicopter ambulance.

Story actually made AOPA's eMag but little else.

Had we not been flying at a couple of hundred feet over the desert, we never would have spotted him as all he had on was khaki pants that blended in pretty well with the alkali lake bed.

Okay, we did get a helicopter to assist, so that part is valid I guess. But we "assisted" the guy with water and the shade of a Husky wing while we waited for almost an hour for the helicopter to arrive.

bumper

[GLDRPLT]

should be on the cover of soaring!

[GLDRPLT]

> On a side note, the scout ship does in fact have a strong enough tractor beam, however they wanted to bring home an example of the best sailplane earthlings have and this one was a Js-1, not a Schempp-Hirth which explains why it was unable to make it back to the airport in the first place.

this:

http://i3.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/011/848/cold.jpg