Why we fly…

There are many reasons.

Initially, for me, it was the challenge of flight. I loved airplanes, tinkering with models with my dad from an early age. He was an engineer for Lockheed Missiles and Space. I lived about two miles from Moffett Naval Air Station and the NASA Ames Research Center in the Silicon Valley. High speed meets high tech.

Well… Forty approached, two careers later. Leaving the Navy left me in a vacuum of order and operational discipline. Motorola is a great place to work, but corporate America left me with a lack of purpose.

Enter my mid-life crisis, and my new mistress, the airplane.

I had a little accident that nearly took my vision. It made me think about the things that I someday (maybe someday soon) would no longer be able to do.

I took the challenge.

Here we are, in early 2011. I’d been a rated pilot for only a few short months,  but you’d think I’d already discovered a reason to be a pilot.

But we never know what we don't know.

I was sitting in a Pilot Ready Room at Gillespie field one day. I had come to talk to my instructor about my new training plans.

In walks Andreas Henrickson. A Sweedish exchange pilot with a backpack, T-shirt, flip-flops and cammo cargo shorts. He was headed to a place called Eloy Arizona to drop off some skydiving gear.
As happens in the ready room, we started talking flying. I knew his reputation. He flew in to San Diego to train and flew constantly to build hours. He’d done it a couple times… Preferring the Gobash G700 for his training work.

I asked him who was going along. It turned out he was flying solo.

An empty seat in an airplane like the SportCruiser is nothing short of a Greek aviation tragedy. I asked if he wanted someone to go along, splitting the cost.

Well, mention money to a “starving” flight student… (Disclaimer: Flight students are not “starving” because of lack of money, or that flying is expensive. They are “starving” because they get hooked on flying, and look at discretionary income as “flight hours” instead of dollars!)

I ended up madly packing my flight bag, and running to the bathroom, due to the lack of in-flight amenities. I was happier than a puppy in a butcher shop!

We went through preflight checks and he looked at weather. We borrowed some “foggles” that limit view of the outside world for instrument flight training… I’d fly while he navigated and communicated, and vice versa.

Off we went, flying away from the afternoon sun.

We landed in Eloy almost 3 hours later. A municipal airport and skydiving base for “Skydive Arizona”.

We got a sandwich, watched a batch of lunatics take off and parachute down… Took a few pictures and a video. Then I took the left seat for a flight to Yuma for fuel.

I did a really marginal touch and go in Eloy before departure, so I could put a pin in a map… Another field I’ve landed at. It’s a pilot thing, I guess.

We then flew west in to the sunset.

We snapped a few pictures, and approached Yuma Marine Corps Air Station and Municipal Airport.
The airport diagram looked like a drunken tic-tac-toe board to me, and the area looked like a sea of lights.

At the direction of air traffic control, we dodged some F-18s and a C-130 doing touch and gos. They had names like “Raider” and “Shooter”…  It was cool, but it made our little SportCruiser feel small and simple. With a slightly early flare, I thumped the sportcruiser down Navy style. I LOVE landing at night!

We got cleared in, identified the runway (there were several) and I touched down. We were told by ground control that a car would be waving us to our parking spot at an FBO called “Million Air”. This is a facility that typically serviced business jets and VIPs.

A golf cart met us, and the guy used lit batons to guide our tiny plane to its parking space. We sheepishly ordered ten… Not thousand pounds of fuel, but gallons. A quantity that would leave a Honda Civic thirsty!  We only needed to get home, and the AvGas wears our sparkplugs prematurely and can gunk up the oil... No big deal, but with that and the higher cost (the Sportcruiser usually burns 91 octane mogas) I try to avoid 100LL.

Andreas and I shuffled I to the lobby. It was a palace!

This place was a great place to relax. Good coffee, soft drinks, conference rooms, private lazy boy chair rooms with speakerphones and internet… And of course a small theater for viewing movies or playing X-Box games!

Unfortunately it doesn’t take long to pump ten gallons there, and we were on our way.  Telling travel and flying stories, Gillespie field came quickly. A few clicks of the microphone and the runway lights came on. Andreas made a great landing!

We had made plans for having beers to numb the soreness resulting from six hours in a cockpit, but we both looked at our watches. 0500 Zulu tomorrow…

He had an instrument cross country training flight to plan and fly in the morning. I had kids to tuck in… And another flight or two planned the next day. If nothing else, flying keeps us out of the pub!
We shook hands and parted ways, promising to find time to fly together again before he goes home in a month. We’ll see, but I’d love to.

After tucking the plane in for the night, doing paperwork and saying our goodbyes, I drove away with my head spinning about what I learned and what it meant to me.

Spur of the moment flights, foreign airstrips in the desert, skydivers and sandwiches on wheat. Luxury facilities on Marine airbases. Transcendent views, and learning faster than I thought possible…

I have no idea what will come of the next flight. But I can’t wait to find out!
And that's why we do it... It expands our world.

Ron Craighead