An Eclectic Mind

With many thanks to a handful of spectators.

The end of my first cherry drying contract of the season is coming to a close. The grower has begun picking and should be finished by Monday.

I was called out to dry his 30-acre orchard block twice. The block is located in a resort area and is surrounded on three sides by condos, a golf course, a campground, and a small strip mall. The Columbia River flows past nearby. I described my first drying call in my blog, in a post called “The Orchard I Dried Yesterday.” There’s an aerial photo of the orchard in that post.

During that first call, I noticed a lot of bystanders taking pictures of me. I didn’t have any photos of me drying cherries and I wanted some. I wanted to see what I looked like and how close I really was to the trees. I was especially interested in seeing how far my tail rotor was above the trees; in solo flight, the tail tends to hang down a bit in the back, especially with full (or nearly full) fuel. This particular orchard was hilly and every time I came down toward the river, I knew the trees behind me were higher than the trees beneath me. I didn’t see any sign of green (or red) on my tail rotor, so I assumed I was okay. But I was still curious.

So I made up a flyer and posted it on telephone poles along the road at one end of the orchard, right where some of the spectators had been standing. The flyer requested that anyone who took photos or video of the helicopter over the orchard send them to me or call me. I provided an e-mail address and my Web address.

Blackberry photo taken by Berni, a spectator at Crescent Bar on June 21, 2009.

I dried a second time less than a week later. After landing back at my base, refueling, and locking up the helicopter for the night, I came back to my trailer. And I found this photo in my e-mail in-box. I was both thrilled and disappointed at the same time. Thrilled because I finally had a cherry drying photo. Disappointed because I was very sure that I fly much closer to the treetops than it looks in the photo.

I emailed the photographer and thanked her(?) for the photo. I got an e-mail back that said, “Are you the pilot? Hard to tell when you are above us. We loved watching you.” I replied that I was the pilot and appreciated the photo. I told her it was the first time I’d seen a photo of myself drying cherry trees. She replied that “it was wonderful to see you in the air. We all waved, the kids got better shots and I will send them too you also.”

That perked me up. Maybe there would be a shot that showed me closer to the trees.

Meanwhile, the weather cleared out and dried up. My grower started picking. It didn’t look as if I’d be flying again at Crescent Bar that season. My husband scheduled a trip out to see me. I wondered if I could get him to take some photos or video while he was here. I started wishing for more rain.

A shot of me over the trees, taken by one of Berni’s kids.

Then last night I got another e-mail from Berni. There were five attachments. These were indeed better shots, and they showed me right over the trees. No disappointment at all — in fact, I was surprised to see how low I was flying and how close my tail rotor looked to some of the trees in this first shot. But after looking at it a bit longer, I realize it must have been taken with a zoom lens. In the photo, it looks as if the cliff is right behind the trees; in reality, it’s a bit farther back. That depth illusion is caused by a telephoto lens.

Another shot by one of Berni’s kids.

Another shot looked a lot more realistic regarding distances, including my height over the trees. I generally try to maintain 5 to 10 feet over the treetops. This part of the orchard block, which is closer to the road, has younger trees with uniform tree height and flatter terrain. It was much easier to dry, although it was also much windier, especially the first time I dried. I think this shot is pretty representative of how I look when I’m drying.

One of Berni’s kids took this really cool shot, too.

I’m also including this last shot, mostly because it’s really cool. I know I look pretty dorky in the helmet, but look how clean and shiny the bottom of my helicopter is! I actually remember seeing this shot being taken. I was approaching the end of the row and the road where the spectators had gathered. There were some wires there and I really couldn’t go right up to the edge of the road. I distinctly remember seeing someone pointing a camera straight up at me just before I turned to go up the next row. Judging from the background, he must have zoomed in. The result is a pretty cool shot.

Anyway, I want to thank Berni and her family again for sending the photos. I really do appreciate it.

Now I want to track down the guy with the video camera on the first flight. That should be some interesting footage.

Flying, Summer Jobs cherry drying, helicopters, photography, Washington

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A lighter look.

My buddy Rod called me yesterday and we chatted for about an hour. Rod’s an experienced utility helicopter pilot who got his start in agriculture (spraying), spent some time doing tours at the Grand Canyon, and worked his way into long-line work. He’s a great pilot who’s extremely conscientious, takes great care of the helicopter assigned to him, and gets the job done responsibly and safely. It’s no wonder he never has any trouble getting a job when he wants one.

Rod’s only problem is burnout. After a season working fires or moving stuff around at the end of a long line, he just wants to go home and be with his fiance and dogs. The 14 on/14 off schedule usually sounds okay at the beginning of a season, but by the end of the season, the 14 off just aren’t enough days off. That’s when he takes a break and does other stuff.

Rod always gets a kick out of these young guys who want to be helicopter pilots. We both know that these wannabes really don’t know what it’s all about. Everyone thinks it’s a glamour job, but Rod knows better. He does the kind of work that pays well and takes the unglamorous “perks” that go with it: extensive travel to places in the middle of nowhere, crappy motels, greasy spoon restaurants. Even I can attest to the less glamorous side of flying helicopters — look at me right now, blogging from a 22-foot travel trailer, parked in the RV park/golf course in the middle of a farm town.

Although Rod’s not very computer literate, his fiance is. They found this video on YouTube, and sent me the link last night. It takes a more realistic — yet hilarious — look at what it’s like to become a helicopter pilot. The words and video clips together make this a classic. It even has a catchy tune.

Enjoy!

Flying, Multimedia aviation, helicopter video, helicopters, jobs, videos

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A clip from a recent cherry drying flight.

Yesterday morning I set up my POV.1 camera on the nose of my helicopter with the idea of gathering some footage while I was doing a cherry drying flight. Right before taking off on a flight later that day, I turned on the camera. Then I just forgot all about it until I returned to my landing zone at the end of the flight.

I got a lot of footage. The camera recorded roughly an hour of it. I wanted to put some part of it online yesterday, so I picked a piece that was interesting.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but I’d turned the sound recording off on the camera. This is probably a good thing; all you would have heard was helicopter noise. So for this particular clip, I recorded a narration in QuickTime and pasted it into the clip. It describes what I’m doing, including why I’m flying sideways for part of the flight.

Apologies for the poor quality of this video. I need to work on my compression schemes to get a good setup for use with the POV.1 camera. This obviously isn’t it.

Flying, Summer Jobs cherry drying, helicopter video, helicopters, weather

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Remembrance of a friend lost.

I first met Erik by phone back in 2006. I’d placed an ad on a helicopter forum, looking for summer work with my helicopter. Erik saw it. He called and introduced himself, then asked if I’d ever heard of cherry drying. It was the beginning of a long-distance friendship.

Erik was a helicopter operator based in Seattle who was building a cherry drying business in Central Washington. He’d just broken into the business and was looking for another experienced and reliable pilot to share the work he expected to get.

That first summer, he was unable to get enough work for two of us. But we stayed in touch by phone. We’d talk every few months, sometimes staying on the phone for an hour or more. He was interested in getting a Part 135 certificate for his business and I offered to help with the mountain of paperwork that the FAA requires.

The second year, 2007, he gave me a lead on a cherry contract in Wenatchee. I followed up on it with a bid. I didn’t get the job. He tried to convince me to fly up anyway. He assured me there would be work. I declined; I couldn’t afford to gamble with such a long ferry flight (10 hours each way). He called me at the end of his first day of drying. He was exhausted. He’d flown 10 hours that day and would fly a lot more that season.

Last year, 2008, Erik lined up enough work for both of us. I made the commitment to come up at the end of May. I’d get my helicopter’s annual inspection at his mechanic in Seattle, then get to work with him in early June.

That was the plan, anyway. Two things happened to change it.

In April, there was a late frost that destroyed about 30% of the Central Washington cherry crop, including half the orchards we’d contracted for. Suddenly, there was only half as much work to do.

Around the same time, one night, Erik woke up, got out of bed, and collapsed on the floor. He was paralyzed from the waist down. One of his vertebrae had crushed.

And that’s when they discovered the cancer.

I didn’t ask many questions. It was hard for me. I listened to what he told me when he called, groggy from medication. I didn’t understand most of it, but I didn’t want to ask questions — especially the big one.

When I flew my helicopter up to Seattle, I rented a car and drove to the hospital where Erik was recovering from back surgery. It was the first time we met in person. Although he’d lost an inch or more in height from his back injury, he was still very tall — maybe 6′5″! — and not at all what I expected. But we greeted each other like old friends.

Erik was learning to walk again. I followed him and a physical therapist and a hospital orderly around the hospital floor as Erik took baby steps. He had to stop twice for rest, sinking into the wheelchair the orderly steered along for him. He was upbeat; this was just a setback. He’d be fine. He expected to be flying again soon. Perhaps he’d even come see me in Central Washington, where I’d be handling all the cherry drying work.

He didn’t come by that summer. I spoke to him a few times. He usually sounded tired and weak. But optimistic. Always optimistic.

Erik’s situation had a profound impact on me. I’d always been a kind of carpe diem person, but now things became urgent for me. Erik was 56 years old. Older than me, but still not very old. His life had taken a sudden change for the worse with paralysis, pain, cancer, chemotherapy, and a never-ending stream of health problems. He couldn’t fly, he could barely walk. His life had been taken from him. The same thing could happen to me. Or anyone else. Erik’s situation reminded me that life was short and you had to make the most of it while you could. Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do now; there might not be a tomorrow.

Things for Erik took a turn for the worse in autumn. I tried to plan a trip to Seattle to see him again. With book deadlines, the holidays, and house guests, I couldn’t get it together. Maybe I didn’t try hard enough. Maybe I couldn’t bear to see the new reality of the man I’d associated with that upbeat, friendly voice on the phone. Maybe I just wanted to remember the voice and the person I’d imagined with it.

Then I heard he was in remission. I tried calling him several times. I had three phone numbers for him and tried all of them. Every number had a recording of his voice, asking me to leave a message, promising a call back. His work phone number even suggested that he might be out flying. I knew how unlikely that was.

When I dropped off my helicopter in Seattle again this May, I tried to set up another visit. More calls, more e-mail. No response. I didn’t know what to think.

And then today’s phone call from a mutual friend. Erik had passed away. There would be a memorial service for him in Seattle on Saturday. Because of contractual obligations, neither of us could go. I called a florist and arranged to have flowers delivered. I signed it: “Our Thoughts and Prayers are with You; Jim, Maria, and the Cherry Drying Pilots.”

Erik’s gone, but my memory of him and those phone calls remains. He expanded my horizons by bringing me to Washington State, by introducing me to a new kind of flying, a new way to squeeze a few bucks out of my helicopter investment.

And he reminded me that life is short. Live it while you can.

Days in My Life, Flying cherry drying, health, Washington

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A bit of a challenge, mostly because of wind.

There was no rain in the forecast yesterday. But that didn’t stop rain from falling on the first orchard I’m contracted to dry this summer. The rain started at around 7:15 PM, falling from a cloud that had already drifted to the east. When the grower contacted me with my “heads up” call, he said it was “dumping rain” and would likely need me in about 15 minutes. I suited up, buttoned up the camper, and headed out to the helicopter. I was just pulling the cover off the helicopter when he called to launch me.

I was in the air 10 minutes later and at the orchard block 5 minutes after that.

As shown in the illustration below, the orchard is at the foot of a cliff along the Columbia River. It’s a hilly site, that actually has a gulch near the back side. The orchard itself is quite old and about half the trees are quite large and dense. The rest are younger. This shot is from last year and it is still representative of its layout and look.

I approached from over the cliff; my base is on the high plateau east of the site. I zipped across the flat farmland up there, passing through the same rainstorm that had likely drenched the orchard. When I reached the cliff edge, I was just downriver from the orchard block. I dumped collective and descended at about 1200 feet per minute. It wasn’t enough. I still had to swing out over the river to lose more altitude before coming in low to start the dry.

It was windy. The wind was coming off the river hitting the orchard from the lower left corner (in the image). I could clearly see where the wind was hitting the young trees, blowing their tops around wildly. This meant two things:

• The wind would do a lot of the work for me. That was a good thing.
• It would be very difficult to hover with the wind at my tail as I flew up rows toward the cliff. That was a bad thing.

So I started at the top left corner, along the fence that separated the orchard from the condos beside it, and headed down toward the river. The wind was blowing my downwash behind me, to my left — my blind spot. I couldn’t see how I was affecting the trees. I dropped down to about 5 feet off the treetops and moved to my right. My downwash should be blowing the first row of trees. I moved down the first row at about 6 knots.

Beside me, in the condo parking area, people were gawking.

At the end of the row, I knew I wouldn’t be able to turn and fly with a tailwind. So I moved to the left about two rows over and turned my nose to the right. I went back up that row sideways, pointing mostly into the wind. Now I could see the downwash. I was blowing the trees pretty good, with my downwash getting down under the branches.

I continued the pattern, flying forward down to the river and sideways back up to the cliffside. I could see where the wind was hitting the trees and where the trees were generally untouched. I concentrated on the sheltered areas, doing my best to shake the branches around. At the bottom of the orchard, near the roadside, the wind was tough. A flag there was standing straight out. A few times, I had trouble getting into position for my return flight and had to zip around to approach differently. I realized later that I should have started in the top right (in the photo) corner.

I did the left side of the orchard, up to the row adjacent to the shed. Then I did the trees in the gully behind them, which I’d neglected. Then I repositioned to the upper right, where I should have started in the first place, and did the section between the corner with the water tower, the house, and the row I’d ended on behind the shed. Then I went sideways back and forth (instead of up and down) on the remaining section of the orchard, between the shed and house and then everything forward of that.

There were people watching from the parking lots and roads. One guy in the parking lot had a video camera. (I wonder if I’ll be on YouTube. Here’s another pilot I found on YouTube doing the same thing.)

When I was finished, I flew past the grower. He waved enthusiastically. I pulled pitch and climbed out at 1500 feet per minute. It didn’t take long to climb over the cliff and head back to base. The cool air coming through the vents as I sped along at 110 knots helped cool me down.

I landed and cooled down the helicopter. I’d flown a total of 1.1 hours, including the 14-mile round trip flight to and from the orchard, and had dried about 30 acres of cherries.

Flying, Summer Jobs cherry drying, helicopters

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