An Eclectic Mind

What it’s all about.

If you’ve been following this blog, you might know that I’m currently in central Washington state, preparing for a cherry drying gig. The short explanation is that I’m one of many pilots hired by cherry growers to use my helicopter’s downwash to blow rainwater of cherries during the last three weeks before harvest. If the cherries aren’t dried properly, they’ll split and possibly rot and the growers will lose their crop. I’ve written extensively about this and don’t want to repeat it all here. If you’re interested in this kind of work and my involvement, check out the links at the bottom of this post.

My partner in this endeavor, Erik, advised me to “walk the orchards” before I have to fly them. The idea is to get a firm handle on where the orchards are, where the cherry trees begin and end, and where the obstructions are. It’s good advice.

Now this might sound like an easy task, but it’s not. The trick is finding the orchards. All I have is a single set of GPS coordinates that are supposed to mark a point in the orchard and an aerial photo with the “block” of trees outlined with red china marker. If I were flying, I’d probably find the orchard pretty quickly — provided I could figure out where the photo was taken from. But I was on the ground in my truck. And some of these cherry blocks are buried deep within other blocks of fruit trees.

My original list of orchards included nine blocks of trees. Two of them have been cancelled — a late frost damaged some crops and made them unprofitable to cultivate, dry, and pick this year. (If Washington cherries are expensive this year, this is part of the reason.) Yesterday, I walked four of them; today I walked another two.

I’m not going to provide details about these orchards and their exact locations or names or anything else. I don’t want anyone to get pissed off if readers decide to go exploring based on the information I provide. Instead I’ll be vague and skip the names. As you’ll see, names and exact locations don’t matter.

I started with orchards along the Columbia River. The first was very easy to find: it’s the only orchard — cherry or otherwise — in an area being overrun with housing. I knew exactly where it was without using the GPS coordinates. I parked near one corner and got out with a notepad and my Garmin GPSMap 60c. I turned on the tracking feature of the GPS, wiped out the previous track log, and started walking.

The 30-acre orchard climbed up the side of a hill. There wasn’t much in the way of obstructions — just a set of power lines along the road on the bottom edge of the field. I noted that when I dried one side of the orchard, I’d be in the backyards of a few houses on the other side of a chain link fence.

The trees looked old, with thick trunks and branches cut by aggressive pruning. The cherries were mostly reddening, although some were still greenish yellow. They looked tasty, but I didn’t touch them. I climbed one side of the field and started across the top, which sloped down. I noticed an empty wire animal trap at the base of a tree. The next trap had a large raccoon in it. It looked healthy enough — at least then. Who knows what the grower would do with it? I don’t want to know.

I came down the opposite side of the orchard where a house was under construction within the block. Probably for the grower. It would be a pleasant place to live, near the river, surrounded on three sides by cherry trees. After checking out a packing area in the middle of the block — I’d been warned about wires stretched to places like that — I finished my walk and returned to my truck.

My GPS and drawn a box around the block, following my exact path. Cool.

The next block was a bit tougher to find — mostly because there didn’t seem to be any access road. I wound up making a right instead of a left and passing through a single-lane tunnel under the main road. Then I drove among various blocks of trees until I found the main office and warehouse area. The 8.6 acre block of trees was adjacent to this area.

I could immediately see that this block of trees would be a nightmare. The trees were planted beneath two sets of high tension power lines that crossed the block diagonally. The wires from one set hung low over the block. A tower for the other set stood in the middle of the trees on one end of the block. And just for good measure, there was a drying fan in the field, too.

There was no way I’d get anywhere near about half the trees with my helicopter.

The other 10.5 acre block in the same orchard was completely different — and a lot easier to find. It lay in almost flat terrain with just two fans and some low wires on one side to worry about. The aerial photo I had showed tall poplar trees on one side of the field; these had been taken down since the photo was taken. I took this photo from the road that wound down to the river. The outlined area is what I’ll be drying. I was lucky; a road wound all the way around the orchard so I drove it instead of walking it.

The last orchard I walked yesterday was a 28-acre block farther downriver. I made my way to it using the GPS for guidance, following the gravel farm roads until I found the cherry trees. Then I shut off the truck and stepped out with my equipment to repeat my orchard-walking exercise.

I immediately sensed a difference in this orchard. First was the shiny metal ribbons that hung on trees. They’d flash in the wind and sun to scare the birds off. Second, was the sound of the bird cannon — a device that uses compressed air to make a loud shotgun blast sound to scare off birds. Later, I saw a bird trap with about two dozen starlings in it. It was obvious that this grower was very concerned with birds stealing his fruit.

The block was really two blocks, one of which was lined on one side by tall poplar trees. There were no wires and no fans. I was making my way down one side of the field when I heard an ATV approaching. A few moments later, I was introducing myself to the grower. He was a friendly man who told me that he rides the blocks a few times a day to scare off birds. We talked about the work I would do and he told me not to dry a specific area of trees. They were Rainier cherries, which bruise easily. He had ground-based equipment to dry those. We also talked about the apricot trees that were part of the block. I’d been warned not to dry them and was interested in seeing what they looked like from the ground so I could identify them from the air. After a 15-minute chat, we parted ways. I continued my walk; he continued on his bird patrol.

I found the apricot trees a while later. They were shorter and their rows lined up with another row of poplar trees. I felt confident that I’d be able to identify them from the air.

Back at my truck, I decided I’d had enough for the day. It was about noon and I was hungry. Since I was halfway to Wenatchee, I figured I’d just drive up there and check it out. I wound up visiting a Petco for birdcage litter and stopping at a Thai restaurant for lunch. I took the rest of the afternoon off.

This morning, I resumed my orchard walks. It was challenging. Although I only visited two orchards, the blocks I was looking for were both very difficult to find. I had to rely on my GPS to home in on each one, following narrow roads between blocks of trees. Later, when I spoke to one of the growers and told him I’d walked his trees, he said, “You found my cherry trees?” I had to explain my methodology. I think he was impressed.

These two orchards were on higher ground and the cherries were far less developed. They were mostly yellow-green and small. The first 12-acre block was on relatively flat ground with wires on one side of the block and a fan (which I couldn’t see) in the middle of the block. It was the only block that used trench irrigation — water flowed in one of two trenches down the base of each row of trees. The second block, which took more than 20 minutes to find, was 15 acres on a steep slope. I got plenty of exercise on my way back up the hill. The views down toward the Columbia River’s steep rocky shores from among the trees were excellent.

I found another orchard after that, but decided to call my contact to make sure I’d be drying it before I walked it. Good thing I did. This is one of the orchards that wouldn’t need drying. Another orchard was also considering a contract change so he could have a dedicated helicopter pilot — which may or may not be me. Either way, that contract would not begin until July 1, so I had plenty of time to explore the block if I needed to.

I pick up the helicopter in Seattle tomorrow. It’s supposed to be a nice day. But the rain comes back on Monday, so I’m likely to start flying then.

But I’m glad I walked the cherry blocks. Now I feel a bit more prepared.

More about cherry drying in this blog:

• Drying Cherries with the Big Fan (11-Mar-06)
• Summer Plans (6-Jun-2006)
• Getting Ready for this Year’s First Summer Job (1-May-08)
• Cherry Drying 101 (with Video) (25-May-08)

It’s not the money — it’s the challenge.

I’m one of the few people I know who is on the cusp of two careers.

My second career, as a freelance writer, has kept me busy since 1990, writing books and articles about using computers. It’s a great career for me, mostly because the work seems to come naturally, so it isn’t very difficult, and because I get to buy a lot of cool computer toys to write about. (Of course, it would be better if someone just gave me those toys, but at least I have legitimate writeoffs.) But as printed publishing begins to wane and the computer users throughout the world mature beyond the need for beginner to intermediate books, my writing opportunities fade. I’ve embraced new media like ebooks and digital training via screencasts, but I believe my heydays as a computer how-to author are over. Sure, I can continue to move forward and earn a comfortable living, but it just isn’t the same as it was — for more reasons than I’m willing to discuss here.

My third career, as a helicopter pilot, began to get interesting back in 2001, when I got my commercial rating. That’s when I was allowed to fly for hire. In 2005, when I took delivery of my Robinson R44 Raven II and got my FAA Part 135 Certificate, things really took off — if you’ll pardon the pun. In addition to the tour and air-taxi work I get primarily out of the Phoenix area — if I had to do all my flights from Wickenburg, I’d starve — I also get a great variety of other challenging jobs: aerial photography, search, survey, etc. Not only does this keep the flying work interesting, but it’s enough to cover all the costs of owning and operating the helicopter. Lately, it’s even been earning a tiny profit.

The two careers fit perfectly together. I don’t hang out at an office at the airport, waiting for people to come in. (I almost got an airport office here in town. Fortunately, I had enough brains to turn down that opportunity.) Instead, I go about my writing business until the phone rings. Then, when the flight is scheduled, I put down whatever I was working on, head out to the airport, preflight, pull the helicopter out, fuel up, and take care of business. When I’m done, I put everything away and come back to my office to continue work. Or to take the rest of the day off.

Summer Jobs

I got my first “summer job” as a pilot working at the Grand Canyon in 2004. I wanted a new experience — and I got it. I also got the benefits and drawbacks of working as an employee, which is something I hadn’t experienced since 1989 when I left my last “real” job to go freelance. Benefits: steady paycheck, social interaction, learning new skills with guidance (as opposed to self-teaching). Drawbacks: fixed work day and work week, social interaction, company politics, relatively low pay.

I need to comment here on the low pay aspect of that job, since so many people seem to zero in on it. For me, it was low pay because I could make a lot more doing my other work. In fact, sometimes I did. For example, if I were a “spare” pilot who was not scheduled to fly except perhaps at lunchtime, I’d bring along my laptop and spend the day writing articles for one of my editors. If I knocked off just two articles in a day — which I could easily do — I’d earn just as much as I would flying for an entire week. And since I was accustomed to making more money, I had to keep doing my other work to maintain my standard of living. So on my weeks off from the Canyon, I’d come home and work on a book. Frankly, just about all of my pay from that summer job went to paying my income taxes on my other job.

This year, I’m flying in Washington state, doing some cherry drying. Because I’m operating my own aircraft and have a lot of associated expenses, the pay is much better — as long as I can collect it. So pay is not an issue. The work is challenging — I’ll be getting some special training in advance — and even a bit dangerous — I’ll be wearing a helmet and Nomex flight suit. And I’ll be living in a trailer either with or without a hookup, far from home and family and friends.

At the same time, I’m scheduled to write two books, one of which is a revision. Those two books are likely to earn me the same amount of money that the whole season in Washington earns me.

Why Bother?

So you might wonder: why bother?

These summer flying jobs offer benefits that I couldn’t get any other way: regular work that comes with a paycheck and tasks that challenge me to perform beyond what I normally do. By meeting these challenges, I learn and perfect skills.

The regular work part is a no-brainer. If I stayed here in Wickenburg for the summer, I’d have to deal with the brutal heat. Would you want to fly in an un-airconditioned aircraft when it’s 110°F outside? (That’s about 41°C for you metric folks out there.) I’ve done it and I don’t want to do it any more than I have to. And most potential passengers are smart — they know that summer heat is not just uncomfortable, but it causes turbulence that makes for a rough ride. So not only are you slow-roasting under a plastic magnifying glass-like bubble, but you’re being bounced around enough to make you sick. And it isn’t as if there’s a lot of this work. Last July I only had one paying gig that didn’t even take in enough money to cover my helicopter loan payment.

So if it’s regular work I’m after, leaving the area is the obvious solution. But it’s the challenges that I really want.

Flying at the Grand Canyon in the summer of 2004 taught me more about flying in wind, high density altitude, and poor visibility than any other flying I’d done up to that point. I’ve used those skills numerous times since then to operate in conditions far windier than I would have without that experience and to safely make my way through questionable weather conditions. I also picked up tips about ground safety, passenger briefings, and just dealing with passengers, as well as the entire business of flightseeing.

This year, I’m entering a whole new world of agricultural flying. It’s more precise, more dangerous, more lonely. My first field has 108 acres. Depending on how the grower wants me to fly, it’ll take 2 to 3 hours to dry it all. That’s 2 to 3 hours hovering over the tops of trees, flying a precision pattern at a constant speed and altitude. When this is over, I expect to be able to hover in any direction in almost any condition. That could set me up for other agricultural work, like frost control or possibly even spraying.

This is why I look for summer jobs. To learn more and to develop my flying skills.

Career Pilots Need to Get Serious

And I think this is why I always advise new pilots to include a season at the Grand Canyon or some other challenging environment as part of their career path. Sure, a pilot could build 2,000 hours as CFI working at or near sea level in a place where the weather is close to perfect. But what skills — beyond autorotations and other emergency maneuvers — would that build? It’s the challenging work that pilots should be hunting down. The flying that takes them to the next level.

The flying that makes them better pilots.

Running the big fan.

It’s official. I’m going to Washington State for the cherry drying season.

(You can learn more about the kind of work I’ll be doing in “Drying Cherries with the Big Fan.” The photo here shows what helicopters try to prevent: split cherries, in this case, with brown rot. Would you want to eat this? Yuck.)

This is the third year I’ve tried to get into this kind of work — the second year that I’ve tried hard — and I’m finally in.

This has pretty much set the basis for my schedule for the entire month of May.

100 Hours

As those of you who are pilots know, every aircraft is required to have an annual inspection. N630ML’s annual inspection is due in June. But aircraft used for commercial (for-hire) purposes must also have an inspection every 100 hours of flight time. This 100-hour inspection is almost the same as an annual inspection. In fact, an annual inspection meets the requirements of a 100-hour inspection. Since I fly just over 200 hours each year, I normally get one annual inspection and one 100-hour inspection.

As I type this, N630ML has about 15 hours left before its 100-hour inspection is due. It’ll take us about 12-13 hours to fly to Seattle, which is where I’ll get my annual inspection done. That leaves very few hours to spare. Even though I’m allowed to go over the 100 hours by as many as 10 hours if I’m moving the aircraft to a facility to get this job done, I’d rather keep the aircraft 100% legal for commercial flight, right up to the time I drop it off.

So I’ve been turning down flights. I can’t tell you how many I’ve turned down. Tours to the Grand Canyon, tours of the Phoenix area, pipeline survey flights, air-taxi flights. The list goes on and on. Where were these people in January, when I was twiddling my thumbs and flight conditions were perfect?

You might say, well why not fly those hours and get the maintenance done here in Arizona?

It isn’t that simple. The maintenance takes up to a week to complete. Because my former helicopter mechanic went belly-up in February, I have to build a relationship with a new shop that’s willing to “make room” for me on its schedule when the time comes. Otherwise, it has to be scheduled far in advance. I don’t know when I’ll need it.

My partner on the cherry drying work, Erik, suggested his mechanic. Two months ago that seemed like a perfect solution. I’d just keep flying until I had about 15 hours left before maintenance was required, then put it in the hangar until I was ready to take it to Washington. I never dreamed I’d reach the 15 hours left mark so quickly. Great for my business and bank account, but I wish I had 10 more hours to burn off with other people picking up the tab.

Erik’s mechanic is based at Boeing Field in Seattle. He works on Robinsons all the time and has a lot of experience with the one thing no local mechanic wanted to tackle: painting my blades. Arizona’s dusty environment, coupled with my frequent off-airport landings, strips the paint off my main rotor blades at an alarming rate. We had them “touched up” once, but I want it done right. This guy can do it.

So I scheduled the maintenance for May 19. That means I had to have the aircraft in Seattle by then.

The Ferry Flight

I’m really looking forward to the ferry flight from Wickenburg to Seattle, WA. We’re planning a coastal route that’ll take us up the coast of California and Oregon before coming inland to Portland, OR. We’ll do that over two days, starting on Saturday, May 17.

I say “we” because I won’t be flying alone. Louis, a CFI (certified flight instructor), will be joining me, sharing the costs to make the flight more affordable. Louis has close to 300 hours of flight time but wants more. He also wants the experience of a long cross-country flight. This one, which will include deserts, mountains, valleys, and coastal lands, will give him plenty of experience. He’ll be sitting in the left seat, as a CFI normally would. I hate flying from the left seat.

He’ll be doing most of the flying while I take photos. I plan to have my door off for part of the trip. We can stick it in the back seat where it’s out of the way. I’ll do mostly still photos with my Nikon D80. I should be well positioned to put the sun behind the camera for most of the flight.

I’ll also have the POV.1 hooked up, possibly to the helicopter’s nose. The control panel for the camera had to be replaced because of a power-related problem, so I haven’t had a chance to check that position yet. I’ll probably do it on Friday, before Louis and I pack up the helicopter. I’ll try to get some interesting video during the flight. I’m sure I’ll capture each takeoff and landing and, hopefully, get some good footage along the coast.

In addition to taking photos, I plan to spend some time practicing my navigation skills. I think I depend too much on my GPS to get me from point to point. So I’m going to practice following a route on a map. I figured I’d pick a place out in the desert between Wickenburg and Palmdale, CA, set the GPS to give us the heading, and let Louis fly it. Then I’d cover the GPS’s map with a Post-It note and follow our path through the otherwise featureless desert on a sectional chart. Louis’s task will be to stay on course without checking the GPS. My tasks will be to know where we are at all times and have him adjust his course if he needs to. I think it’ll be a good exercise for both of us — and it might just make that part of the flight a little less boring. (Having flown it about a half-dozen times, I can’t begin to describe how boring it is. You can read about my first experience flying through that area in “Wickenburg, AZ to Placerville, CA - Day 1,” one of my very first blog entries.)

Although Louis is in charge of flight planning, I came up with two possible routes. One is the coastal route he said he wanted to try. The other goes right up California’s Central Valley. That’s the route I know best — I’ve taken it as far as Placerville (in my old R22, N7139L) and Georgetown (in N630ML), in the foothills of the Sierras. I created two possible routes just in case weather moves in. I don’t want to get delayed. I need to be in Portland by the evening of May 18.

Portland?

Yes, you read right. I have to make a stop in Portland on the way to Seattle. That’s where I’m meeting up with Dave, a cherry dryer turned ENG (electronic news gathering) pilot. Dave says drying cherries is the most dangerous work he’s ever done in a helicopter. He trained Erik and has agreed to train me.

Let’s face it: when you’re drying cherries, you’re operating in the deadman’s curve of the height velocity diagram. You’re flying at about 5 knots about 15 to 20 feet off the ground. If you have an engine failure, you’re not drying cherries anymore. You’re chopping them. (Perhaps we can call that “doing a George Washington without an axe”?)

Because you’re going slowly, you’re flying below ETL (effective translational lift) which means you’re on the front side of the power curve. You’d basically doing an out-of-ground effect hover the entire time you’re operating — which can be the full 2-1/2 to 3 hours between refuelings, if the field is large enough. (They say an R44 can dry 40 acres in an hour; I’ll see if that’s true this summer.) Not only is that incredibly boring and tedious, but I’m sure it’s fatiguing.

Now add a little wind — maybe the quartering tailwind that can cause LTE (loss of tail rotor effectiveness). While Robinson helicopters have very authoritative tail rotors, a few gusts from behind will certainly give the helicopter a case of what I call “the wigglies.” Remember, a helicopter wants to point into the wind, like a weather vane. Blow a little gust up its butt and you’ll be dancing on the pedals to keep it pointed the right way.

While it’s common to release the collective while cruising in straight and level flight — the old set-it-and-forget-it approach to cross-country flying — a cherry drying pilot operating in anything but dead calm air will be lucky if he gets enough time with his hand off the collective to scratch his nose or reach for a bottle of water. So there’s a good chance he’ll be holding that collective tightly, making constant pitch adjustments. I’ve discovered that when I do any kind of intense flying — like chasing race cars — I hold the collective with what CFIs call a “death grip.” (That’s me: either let go completely or get finger impressions in the throttle grip.) The trouble with that is that Robinson helicopters have a very effective throttle governor that automatically adjusts the throttle based on power requirements to keep the RPM in the green. It works like a charm — really! Unless, of course, you’re holding the damn throttle grip so tightly that it can’t turn on its own. Then you might just prevent it from getting enough power to keep the RPMs up. That low rotor RPM horn should be enough to wake up any pilot, but I’d rather not hear it at all. I know I’m going to need to relax that grip.

I also have to wear a flight helmet and a Nomex flight suit. I bought the helmet last week. When I get the flight suit, I’ll put both on and model them for readers. I expect to look like a big, fat, white-capped khaki pickle. But what’s worse is that I have to wear these things in June and July, when temperatures could get into the 90s and it’ll definitely be humid. (Remember, it just rained, right?)

On the positive side, an R44 Raven II with just one person on board isn’t likely to have any density altitude-related power issues, especially under 2,000 feet MSL (mean sea level) elevation. So it’s not like I have to worry much about having enough power to fight a little breeze in a turn or climb over the occasional power line. (Did I forget to mention that the fields are sometimes bordered by power lines or have power lines running across them?)

So what you wind up with is flying that is potentially dangerous and more than a little challenging while being completely and utterly boring. By boring, I mean not fun. Chasing race cars is dangerous and challenging and fun. Drying cherries is likely to be dangerous and challenging and boring.

Drying cherries does pay better, though. And it’s something new and different for me. I’m always interested in trying something new and different, trying things that’ll hone my flying skills and make me a better pilot.

Seattle, Wenatchee, Quincy, Wenatchee, Seattle, Oakland, Mountain View, Oakland, Phoenix, Wickenburg

That’s my planned return route. All business.

When I get to Seattle’s Boeing Field, I’ll drop off the helicopter with my new mechanic and say goodbye to Louis. I’ll spend the night somewhere relatively close to Seattle-Tacoma Airport (SEA).

Then, in the morning, I’ll hop on a 45-minute flight to Wenatchee. I’ll rent a car and start exploring the area around Quincy, WA, where I’ll be based. I’m looking for a campground where I can get a full hookup and WiFi. There are at least two options that I know of — maybe I’ll find others. Or maybe the private airport where the helicopters will be based will give me electricity and water for the trailer. But I do need WiFi — I’ll be writing two books while I’m there, waiting for the cherries to get wet.

I’ll spend the night somewhere around there — Quincy or Wenatchee — after getting a real good feel for the place. Then I’ll drop off the rental at the airport and hop on a flight back to Seattle, with a connecting flight to Oakland, CA.

I’ll spend the night at a nice hotel in Jack London Square, courtesy of one of my publishers. In the morning, I’ll have breakfast with an editor and make the drive with her to Mountain View, for a meeting with a software developer.

When that’s over, we’ll speed back to Oakland so I can catch a 2 PM flight to Phoenix.

There, I’ll pick up my car, which Mike will have left earlier that day when he came to the airport for his flight to New York. I’ll be home before sunset.

The Long Drive

I’ll be home just a few days and all of it will be spent preparing my pull trailer and truck for the long drive to Washington State.

To save money and give me a bit more flexibility, I decided to stay in the trailer where I could prepare my own meals and have plenty of room to work rather than stay in a cheap motel. The going rate for campsites appears to be $30 to $40 per night, which isn’t exactly cheap, but I’ll have my own home away from home. And I can bring Alex the Bird for the summer, too.

The truck needs its new 82-gallon fuel transfer tank, pump, and static reel installed. I also need to pack it with the things I’ll need for the trip: Alex’s big cage, a 6-foot ladder, and various helicopter-related equipment, like the new hail-protection blade covers I bought.

The trailer needs to be filled with all the computer equipment I’ll need to write those two books and do any other writing I may want or need to do. I also need to pack it with the usual collection of items a person needs on a three-month stay away from home.

Then, right after Memorial Day, I start the long drive. Just me and Alex the Bird, driving about 1400 miles on the most direct route I can. I figure it’ll take about 3 days. I need to be in Quincy by that Friday to hitch a ride with Erik’s friend back to Seattle so I can pick up my helicopter and get it to its base for June and July.

That’s Job #1

Come June 1st, I’m on contract in my mobile summer home, waiting for the rain.

But that’s only my first summer job. I have another one starting in August. More about that in another post.

The weather in Anchorage.

I’m preparing to take a trip to Anchorage, Alaska next week for a job interview. If all goes well, I’ll be moving up there for the summer, flying tourists around glaciers and delivering 50-gallon drums of dog food to sled dog camps via long line.

In trying to get a handle on what to pack for my 3-day trip, I’ve been monitoring the weather in Anchorage, using the National Weather Service Web site. Here’s what I read this morning at 6 AM my time (4 AM Anchorage time):

Remainder Of Tonight…Mostly cloudy with a few sprinkles. Lows in the 30s. Southeast wind 40 to 55 mph along turnagain arm and the higher elevations with occasional gusts up to 70 mph. Elsewhere southeast wind 10 to 25 mph with localized gusts to 40 mph.

Okay, I added the emphasis. The NWS evidently doesn’t think 70 mph gusts of wind is unusual, since the forecast didn’t include a weather advisory. I know there would have been one in the Wickenburg forecast page if the winds were expected to reach 70.

My Experience with Wind

I flew tours at the Grand Canyon in 2004. In the spring, the wind was howling, occasionally reaching 50 mph or more at the airport. Because we flew Bell 206L (Long Rangers), which had a two-bladed rotor system that didn’t do well in high turbulence, we’d shut down if the wind got that bad. But the experience of flying at the Grand Canyon in spring and having to deal with all of that wind made me a lot more comfortable with high winds than the pilots who haven’t had to deal with it. That’s why I always recommend flying at the Grand Canyon as a first “real” job after flight school and duty as a CFI. Lots of good experience there.

Still, I don’t expect to fly in Alaska with 70 mph gusts. (I hope my potential employer doesn’t expect me to, either.)

Yesterday, I did a flight to Scottsdale with a client. Although the winds were relatively calm when we flew down there — variable at 4 mph according to the Scottsdale ATIS recording — they were forecast with gusts to 30 mph for that afternoon. Sure enough, when we left the area at about 5:15 PM, the wind was 16 mph gusting to 23. That’s certainly not bad enough to keep me on the ground, put I did have to give the pedals a workout as I lifted off the ramp. I also had to put in a lot of directional correction against the wind when I took off, just to prevent it from blowing us over the runway (which would have gotten me in hot water with the Tower there).

What’s Wrong with Wind?

There are two things that can make high wind especially bothersome for helicopter pilots:

• When flying in mountainous (or even hilly) terrain, the wind coming over those mountains (or hills) makes the air turbulent. Here’s how I describe it to passengers. Imagine a stream with rocks in it. As the water flows downstream, it sets up eddies and weird water flows around the rocks. The water has to go up or around the rocks in its path. It then goes down or rushes in from the sides on the downstream sides of the rocks. Can you imagine it? Now imagine the mountains or the hills as those rocks and the wind as the water. The helicopter is like a little boat bobbing around in that water. That’s the turbulence you feel when you’re flying relatively close to the ground on a windy day near rough terrain.
• A gust spread — that’s the difference in airspeed between the steady wind and the gusting wind — sets up what probably meets the definition of wind shear. Most pilots know that a wind shear is created where the wind suddenly shifts direction or speed. A gust changes the speed, right? The result, therefore, is the same kind of turbulence you’d feel in a wind shear. The bigger the gust spread, the bigger the shear, the greater the turbulence.

Not all helicopters handle turbulence the same way. Generally speaking, a fully articulated rotor system is better for handing turbulence than a semi-articulated system. But no matter what you’re flying, you’re going to feel those bumps. So will your passengers. Fortunately, they’re likely to get sick before the pilot does.

When I flew at the Grand Canyon, the wind was so bad a few times that I started feeling sick. Some of my passengers, as you can imagine, were making full use of the plentiful barf bags we had on board.

Will Alaska Be Worse?

Right now, I’m left to wonder whether Alaska will be more of a challenge due to wind than the Grand Canyon was. Although I’d prefer calm winds — who wouldn’t? — I’m up for the wind challenge, if I have to face it.

I just hope it’s not 70 mph.

An empty summer packs up quickly.

Less than a week ago, on the morning of Friday, February 8, I was looking at a pretty empty summer season. I had one book contract lined up — an annual revision I usually work in in June and July — and no idea where or even if I’d be flying for someone else during the April through September timeframe I’d set aside for Alaska.

Two other books had been dangled in front of me on and off for the past two months. If I got them, they’d keep me busy from now until the summer time. But it didn’t look as if I’d get them.

And while I was hoping to spend the entire summer flying for someone else in Alaska, the recent demise of Silver State Helicopters dumped all of their CFIs (certified flight instructors) on the job market. If any of them had 1,000 hours (or said they had 1,000 hours), they’d be lined up for the few entry level jobs at the Grand Canyon, Gulf of Mexico, and Alaska. My experience level is a bit higher than entry level for those jobs, so employers would have to pay me more. Why pay for steak when hamburger will do? Despite four resumes out there in the land of the midnight sun, my phone remained silent. So it didn’t look as if I’d be going to Alaska after all.

And that was the state of things last Friday morning.

A Telephone Call Changes the Scene

I did have one other resume out in the wild: I’d sent it about a month before to an Illinois-based Part 135 operator. They were looking for a full time pilot to help them with a special contract and then do odd flying jobs as needed in the midwest. (And yes, I’m being purposely vague. Last week’s fiasco has put me into high caution mode.) I exchanged a few e-mails with the owner, who said that a contract pilot — which is what I’d prefer — might work out better for him. He told me to call him. I did, but never seemed to get him on the phone. I waited for him to call. He didn’t. I sent him an e-mail, asking if the job had been filled; if it had, I’d stop bothering him. He wrote back to say the job wasn’t filled, he was definitely interested in me, but he was swamped with work. He’d call. He didn’t. All this happened during the course of a month.

On Friday, I decided to call again. I wanted to either cross off this opportunity or bring it into the realm of possibility. I got the owner on the phone. We hit it off right away. I got the feeling he’d spoken to a few other people about the job and they weren’t interested in some of the more unusual aspects. (Again, I’m being vague on purpose; I don’t want anyone to screw this up for me.) I also got the feeling he was being inundated with resumes from Silver State casualties of Chapter 7 — guys who have earned their 1,000 hours in a simulator or as an active passenger during dual instruction flights. He wanted someone with experience flying passengers for hire, which I’ve been doing since 2001. We joked around a little. He told me that mid-month, he would fly me up to his base for a face-to-face meeting and a chance for me to see their equipment. I assume a flight would also be part of the interview process.

I hung up the phone feeling good. This opportunity had gone from a long shot to a 75% or more chance of getting the job. And without going into details, I can assure you that the job will be very interesting, with plenty to blog about — if I’m allowed to.

Two More Calls, Three More Books?

My phone rang on Monday morning. It was one of my editors. He’s been swamped since the holidays and has just dug out of the pile of work on his desk. He pulled one of the dangling books out of the air and slapped it on the negotiation table. We talked terms, we agreed. (My co-author on the book agreed yesterday.) I’m looking for a contract in the mail any day now. Time frame? Well, the book is already listed on Amazon.com, so I guess I’d better get to work on it soon.

He also dangled that other book around some more, but no decision was made. We didn’t even talk terms. So although I can’t count on it yet, it’s definitely still in the picture.

Yesterday, I got another call from another editor I work with regularly. She flat-out offered me a book deal with terms that would be tough to turn down. So I said yes. The contract should come within the next week or so. Timeframe: late summer. Sorry; no details will be forthcoming anytime soon.

What’s good about all this is that I have enough writing work lined up to support me through the summer, when Flying M Air continues to incur expenses but does not incur much (if any) revenue.

Another Call with another Flying Possibility

Between the two editor calls, I got a call from a California-based Part 135 helicopter operator. They’d seen my helicopter forum post that had a subject line like “Single Pilot Part 135 Operator with Helicopter Available for Summer Months.” This guy is interested in expanding his business to offer a major city’s commuters with helicopter transportation into that city from the suburbs. (Yes, I’m being vague again; jeez, I hate this.) Rather than invest in a lot of equipment and train pilots, he thinks we might work together with me and my helicopter subcontracted by his organization to provide the flights. If things work out, he’ll expand; if they don’t, no serious money lost.

While this is very interesting to me, I’m worried that there won’t be enough revenue in it to support me and my aircraft. After all, I’d have to relocate for the entire summer and the city in question ain’t exactly cheap to live in. But it is a really nice city, one I wouldn’t mind living in at all. I told him about my other opportunity and how I wanted to pursue that first. He said that if that job didn’t work out and I was still available, I should call him in a month or so to talk about flying for him.

I’m calling that “Summer Job Plan C.”

Plan D, I should mention, is cherry drying in Washington State, which, as usual, is always dangling out there but never quite attainable.

Today

My helicopter calendar has a few — but not many — things on it. I’ll be doing rides at the Buckeye Air Fair again on Saturday. I picked up a Sky Harbor Charter for March with some folks who already told me they want another day trip when they come to Wickenburg. And I have a Wickenburg area tour prebooked through a tour company for March 1.

The Southwest Circle Helicopter Adventure simply is not selling. It could be my limited marketing budget. But I can’t see paying $10-$15K for a magazine advertisement if it’ll take the sale of more than 10 excursions just to pay for the ad. (The trip really is a smoking deal and I don’t make much money on it.)

But I do have some possibilities on desert racing aerial photography gigs lined up for March and April. We’ll see how that goes. The ferry cost is hard for most of those companies to swallow. I’d do a lot better with race photography gigs if I’d relocate to Lake Havasu or Bullhead City. (And believe me, I’m thinking about it.)

Today, I’m finishing up an article I started on Monday for FileMaker Advisor magazine. Then I’m going to work on my outline for my half of our WordPress book revision. If I finish that before the end of the day, I’ll finish up my series of articles about using Viddler with WordPress. And maybe — just maybe — I’ll record another video blog entry.

But only if I can do something with my hair.