Outlanding stories

It wasn't a particularly long flight, and the landing wasn't in some weed
patch, but it's a good story anyway....

A few years ago, I was on a cross-country flight in East Tennessee near the
end of the Clinch Ridge about 40 miles from home when the weather behind me
started closing in, blocking my planned return to the field. The weather
in front of me looked pretty good though, so what's a glider pilot to do but
keep going! An hour later I'm another 30 miles further away circling
6000' above a nice looking airport (Green County) and I get on the radio to
call home to see about a retrieve. Fortunately, one ship is still in the
air and the message is delivered, but I'll have to wait a couple hours
before they can reach me. No problem. After another hour of local
sightseeing I'm tired and have shed my altitude, so it's time to land. The
landing is quite uneventful and I push the ship off the runway and take a
walk over to the FBO. They're not too used to seeing gliders land there,
so the usual crowd of GA pilots start asking questions. I get myself a
cold Coca-Cola from the drink machine and head back to the ship to wait.
Taking a nap under the shade of the wing seemed reasonable, so that's what I
set about doing. A few minutes later a couple of older gentlemen walk up
and start asking about the glider. We talked for awhile and out of the
blue one of the guys asks, "Would you like a steak dinner?". Is the sky
blue? Of COURSE I'd like a steak dinner. It turns out they were throwing
a big party down in one of the hangars and were absolutely wearing it out.
Dinner was great. Just as I was finishing dessert I heard the towplane
starting to make incoming radio calls, so I headed back for the glider to
get ready to leave. Most of my newfound friends had never seen an aerotow
before, so several of them jumped in their planes and immediately took off
ahead of us so they could see the whole thing from the air. Many of the
others got in their trucks and drove out so they could see from the ground.
After launching, there were lots of radio calls to the effect of, "good
luck", "come again any time", "glad to meet you". Fortunately, the ride
home was pretty uneventful with a landing just before sunset. I won't
forget that day for a long time.


Mark Lenox, E15

At 00:42 26 October 2005, wrote:
One of my favorites from JJ, try this link:

http://www.valleysoaring.net/story/jj/jj-torch.html


Very funny! I noticed the story starts with JJ in a
DG-300, then somehow turns into and ASW-20.

Getting forgetful JJ?

'got another one:

must have been in '87 or '88, I flew in a regional contest in
Lawrenceville, IL. My trusty old H301 was actually registered in
Germany at the time, showing the D- number plus the black, red and gold
flag on the tail.
The day died and I landed in Brazil, IN (not SouthAmerica!). The field
seemed pretty deserted and by the time I got out of the cockpit, a
mechanic in a grease covered overall came strolling out from one of the
hangars, hands burried in his pockets, spitting tobaco. He looks at the
glider and lets off a 'what the f#!$@! - man, no engine? and where's
that f@#!ing tail number from?' At that point, I decided to have some
fun with old green-tooth and I greet him in German while pointing to an
old German ICAO-Hannover sectional I had burried in the side pocket. At
first he didn't understand but when he realized that the map covered
part of Germany and the Netherlands, he got really excited and called
his buddy over telling him that a glider had just come in straight from
Europe!

Uli Neumann

That's a good one, Uli!



Larry

"GM" wrote in message
oups.com:

'got another one:

must have been in '87 or '88, I flew in a regional contest in
Lawrenceville, IL. My trusty old H301 was actually registered in
Germany at the time, showing the D- number plus the black, red and gold
flag on the tail.
The day died and I landed in Brazil, IN (not SouthAmerica!). The field
seemed pretty deserted and by the time I got out of the cockpit, a
mechanic in a grease covered overall came strolling out from one of the
hangars, hands burried in his pockets, spitting tobaco. He looks at the
glider and lets off a 'what the f#!$@! - man, no engine? and where's
that f@#!ing tail number from?' At that point, I decided to have some
fun with old green-tooth and I greet him in German while pointing to an
old German ICAO-Hannover sectional I had burried in the side pocket. At
first he didn't understand but when he realized that the map covered
part of Germany and the Netherlands, he got really excited and called
his buddy over telling him that a glider had just come in straight from
Europe!

Uli Neumann

That reminds me of a 1-26 story I read once about a father son team
that were doing a cross country in a 1-26. The son was flying the 1-26
and the father was following along with the trailer. The son got low
near an airport and ended up landing there. He announced that he was
going to land on the taxiway. As he turned final the unicom operator
came on an told him that landing on the taxiway was not authorized. He
told them it was to late since he was on short final. As he came to a
stop a sheriff's car pulled up and and asked him for his drivers
license. The boy explained that he was not old enough to have a driver
license and that all he had was his pilots license.

Brian

Bruce Hoult wrote:

Gosh. What was the tow plane?? Isn't the HP14 close to a 40:1 glider?

I'm used to a Pawnee climbing straight out from the airfield with a Grob
or Janus two-up behind and *always* being within gliding range of the
airfield. Normal climb is about 600 fpm at 65 knots, or about 11:1.

Obviously you have the luxury of operating at or near sea level. At
Owl Canyon Gliderport (4CO2), at 5,500 MSL, towing behind a 250hp
Pawnee-D, I see 3-400 FPM. I am functional at both ends of the
rope, tow pilot and CFI-Glider. In a no-wind situation, a straight
out tow will usually result in being beyond gliding distance of a
NORMAL, SAFE PATTERN.

Allowing ones self to be towed out of gliding range of the PATTERN
is looking for trouble. Towing out of gliding range of the
gliderport must mean we are headed for the wave, and trouble. :-)


Best regards,

Jer/ "Flight instruction/mountain flying are my vocation!" Eberhard

--
Jer/ (Slash) Eberhard, Mountain Flying Aviation, LTD, Ft Collins, CO
CELL 970 231-6325 EMAIL jeratfrii.com http://users.frii.com/jer/
C-206 N9513G, CFII Airplane&Glider FAA-DEN Aviation Safety Counselor
CAP-CO Mission&Aircraft CheckPilot BM218 HAM N0FZD 235 Young Eagles!

hannu wrote:
I was granted one glass of water,
though. From then on it wasn't too bad (considering derigging Ka-2b isn't
that bad - a big consideration).

I think I have made even both of the readers left snore, so it's no point
going on...

More, more!!! Why only one glass of water?

Best regards,

Jer/ "Flight instruction/mountain flying are my vocation!" Eberhard

--
Jer/ (Slash) Eberhard, Mountain Flying Aviation, LTD, Ft Collins, CO
CELL 970 231-6325 EMAIL jeratfrii.com http://users.frii.com/jer/
C-206 N9513G, CFII Airplane&Glider FAA-DEN Aviation Safety Counselor
CAP-CO Mission&Aircraft CheckPilot BM218 HAM N0FZD 235 Young Eagles!

Uli Neumann

Uli, that was GREAT!

Lets have you fly a non-N registered into Oshkosh in 2006!
See you there for brats and Beer!

Hi from Colorado!

Best regards,

Jer/ "Flight instruction/mountain flying are my vocation!" Eberhard

--
Jer/ (Slash) Eberhard, Mountain Flying Aviation, LTD, Ft Collins, CO
CELL 970 231-6325 EMAIL jeratfrii.com http://users.frii.com/jer/
C-206 N9513G, CFII Airplane&Glider FAA-DEN Aviation Safety Counselor
CAP-CO Mission&Aircraft CheckPilot BM218 HAM N0FZD 235 Young Eagles!