Daily Archives: June 14, 2009

Why I Wear a Flight Suit to Dry Cherries

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Just a precaution.

In a comment to yesterday’s post about my work drying cherries, Miraz asked:

Could you write a post about your Nomex flight suit. What is it? What’s special about it? Why don’t you just wear whatever you normally wear when flying?

A good topic for a post, so here it is.

First, Nomex. Wikipedia describes Nomex as follows:

Nomex (styled NOMEX) is a registered trademark for flame resistant meta-aramid material developed in the early 1960s by DuPont and first marketed in 1967.

It can be considered an aromatic nylon, the meta variant of the para-aramid Kevlar. It is sold in both fiber and sheet forms and is used as a fabric wherever resistance from heat and flame is required […] Both the firefighting and vehicle racing industries use Nomex to create clothing and equipment that can withstand intense heat. All aramids are heat and flame resistant but Kevlar, having a para orientation, can be molecularly aligned and gives high strength….

The Wikipedia piece goes on to list the different uses of Nomex fabric, including this statement:

Military pilots and aircrew wear flight suits made of over 92 percent Nomex to protect them from the possibility of cockpit fires and other mishaps.

A Pickle Suit

Here’s an example of a flight suit available on Flightsuits.com. (And no, it doesn’t come with the guy.)

It’s not just military pilots. Nomex is also widely used in flight suits worn by EMS pilots and crew members and law enforcement pilots.

A flight suit is usually a one-piece, zip up garment, often with many pockets, that is worn by pilots and aircraft crew members. While they come in many colors and styles, they’re usually a military green or khaki color. The green suits (see photo) are sometimes referred to by the folks who wear them as “pickle suits.”

Flight suits can be made of any fabric, but since they’re available in Nomex, it seems silly to wear one that doesn’t offer the additional protection of the Nomex fabric. And although they come in long sleeve and short sleeve styles, it also seems silly to have Nomex protection on only half of your arms when you can get full arm coverage.

At least that’s the way I see it.

Why does a pilot need protection at all? Well, it’s mostly to save your life (or even just your skin) in the event of a post-crash fire. And fires are definitely possible when you’re carrying fuel (which you should be) if you hit the ground hard in a crash.

Safety Notice 40Robinson Helicopter Company recommends that all pilots — and even passengers! — wear flight suits. Safety Notice 40 was released in July 2006, possibly in response to an accident with a post-crash fire in Texas. Robinson often releases Safety Notices in response to what it sees as dangerous or potentially dangerous situations. Safety Notices are not requirements; they’re suggestions. They’re also Robinson’s way of “covering its butt.” The company is owned by Frank Robinson and is self-insured. By recommending that we wear flight suits, Robinson Helicopter cannot be held accountable for burn injuries if we’re not following their recommendation.

That’s not to say it isn’t good advice. It is. But it isn’t exactly practical to require every person on board a flight to wear a flight suit. And while I might be tempted to wear a flight suit more often if I actually looked good in one, I don’t. Besides, I’ve decided on a more professional “corporate pilot” appearance for my charter flights: slacks with a polo shirt or pilot shirt.

It’s a matter of risk assessment. Tour and charter flying has much lower risk associated with it. I’m usually operating at airports, landing and departing from locations very suitable for that kind of activity. Flight profiles remain outside the “deadman’s curve.” There isn’t anything unusually risky about these flights. Even most of my photo and survey flights are relatively low-risk.

But hovering 5-10 feet over cherry trees at 5-10 knots ground speed puts me firmly into the deadman’s curve. If I have an engine failure, there’s nothing I can do to prevent a messy crash into the trees. With lots of fuel on board, a post-crash fire is possible. Wearing a Nomex flight suit seems like a pretty good idea.

Helicopter Helmet

A helicopter helmet like the one I wear. This is a low-cost model available from AviationHelmets.com.

So does wearing a helmet. I can’t tell you how many articles I’ve read in helicopter flying magazines about the importance of wearing a helmet on high-risk missions. The main thing that worries me is the flinging parts that might just enter the cockpit in the event of a crash. It would be awful to have a soft landing only to have a main rotor blade enter the cockpit and split your head open like a coconut. (Ick. What a terrible visual.) Or even to just clock your head on the door frame hard enough to cause serious damage. The helmet protects me against this.

But I don’t think my passengers would feel very comfortable if I wore it on a charter flight.

So, in answer to Miraz’s question, I wear a flight suit for cherry drying because of the increased risks associated with that kind of flying. I don’t wear it for other, less risky missions because I’m trying to maintain a “corporate pilot” professional look for my passengers. And I look like a big khaki sausage in my flight suit.

Fortunately, the cherry trees — and growers — don’t care what I look like.

Quincy Clouds Time-lapse Movies

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I draft my old G5 for time-lapse duty.

About two weeks ago, I got the bright idea that it was a complete waste of valuable camera resources to use my Nikon D80 for time-lapse photography when I had an older camera I could use. The other camera is my Canon PowerShot G5, which I bought back in 2003 for aerial photography work.

Buying the camera was a huge deal back then. Digital SLRs, if available back then, were too expensive to be an option. The G5 offered 5.0 megapixel (!) resolution — more than twice the resolution of any other digital camera we had. But it also included features we needed, including manual setting for focus and exposure.

Canon PowerShot G5Looking at the camera today, it’s amazingly big and clunky. But it takes a decent picture — certainly good enough for my time-lapse experiments. And frankly, I was having trouble getting my mind around leaving my Nikon outdoors, unattended, for hours at a time. It could be because the tripod got knocked over once and it was sheer luck that it fell toward a rail that caught it rather than toward the empty concrete behind it. I had no love for the G5; if it broke, well, that’s the way it goes. Ditto if it got stolen. In fact, I’d be more upset about losing my tripod or Pclix than the G5.

Oddly enough, the G5 has a built-in intervalometer — a fact I was unaware of. Unfortunately, the interval must be set in minutes (1 to 60) and it can only take 100 shots at a time. This simply wasn’t going to cut it for my needs. Besides, for some reason I still can’t understand, I can’t get the damn thing to work.

So I bought an optical cable for my Pclix. It arrived right before I left for Washington. I tried it for the first time on Friday.

For the optical cable to work, its end must be taped to the camera. The Pclix maker recommends electrical tape, so that’s what I used. Unfortunately, the heat of the day softened the tape. After about 2-1/2 hours, it shifted out of position. The camera stopped taking pictures. Here’s the result, with most of the beginning edited out (since there was really nothing going on):

Disappointing in so many ways. The sky was just getting interesting when the setup failed. And let’s face it — the view of the golf cart shed isn’t all that enticing.

So I tried again yesterday after recharging the camera’s battery overnight. I fixed up the camera differently and pointed it north instead of west. Same settings: one shot every minute, compiled into a movie at 10 frames per second. To prevent the camera battery from running out, I turned off the camera’s video screen. First shot at 9:13 AM; last shot at 7:33 PM. I left the camera outside all day long — even while I was out doing a helicopter ride. I never would have done that with my Nikon.

The result isn’t bad at all. I’m a little POed at myself for including the wires in the shot and it’s a little weird that some of the larger vehicles that drove by appeared in some shots — like the hay truck near the beginning! Again, I think I could have done better. But the clouds are so awesome in this movie. They build and move and swirl around. So cool. See for yourself:

I’ll keep working on this. Hopefully, I’ll get it right soon.

Real Life Helicopters: Wildlife Survey Flight

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How I spent yesterday morning.

At 5 AM yesterday morning, I was at Wickenburg Airport (E25), filling two 5.5-gallon plastic fuel cans with 100LL. I had already topped off the helicopter’s tanks and it was sitting on the ramp, waiting for me in the predawn darkness. I was scheduled to do a wildlife survey in northern Arizona at 6:30. I’d have to pick up my passenger at Williams, AZ (KCMR), an hour away by helicopter. There was no fuel at Williams, and the closest fuel stop to Williams and our survey area was 20 NM north at Valle (40G). The FBO didn’t open until 8 AM, so I wouldn’t be able to get fuel before then. The survey area was 40 NM from fuel at Valle. I wanted my client to get as much air time as possible before our first refueling stop, so I figured I’d put the 11 gallons of 100LL that I carried with me into the tanks when I arrived in Williams.

So that explains why I was at the self-serve island, filling two plastic gas cans before dawn.

A while later, I was airborne, heading north to Williams. The two gas cans were strapped into the back passenger seats. They were good cans and wouldn’t leak on my leather seats. On board was an overnight bag, in case the job went two days, a 6-pack cooler full of bottled water, and the usual survival gear. I was listening to Steely Dan on my iPod as the sun rose at my 2 o’clock position. Moments later, I crossed the ridge east of Antelope Peak, clearing it by a mere 100 feet. From there, I sped north at 110 knots airspeed to get to Williams as quickly as possible.

At Williams, AZ

I had a tail wind and the wind was blowing pretty good at Williams. 210 at 9 gusting to 18 is what the AWOS reported. There was no one in the pattern. There never is at Williams. I made all my calls, then came around from the north to land into the wind on the big, empty ramp.

The terminal, which is very nice but completely underutilized, was unlocked. “Out of Service” signs appeared on both restrooms and the water fountain. I peeked into a stall in the Ladies room. There was water in the toilet bowl. That meant it would flush, even if it didn’t refill. I had to go so I took my chances. It worked fine. That made me wonder why the signs were there.

I was topping off the tanks with those two cans of fuel when my passenger arrived. He showed me maps and we made a plan. The main part of the job was to fly down the side of a 1,000-foot cliff face, 50 to 200 feet off the top, depending on where the rock ledges were. The cliff ran north to south. The wind was coming out of the south. Although my client suggested starting from the south, I pointed out that if we started from the north, the cliff face would be on his side of the aircraft and I’d be able to fly into the wind. That would make things easier all around. He agreed.

I added some oil, burning my fingers on the hot dip stick. We climbed in, I started up, and we took off, into the wind. A westerly heading put us on course for the survey area.

It was about a 30-minute flight. We chatted about this and that. My client was a youngish guy — certainly younger than me — and had spent more than 200 hours in airplanes and 20 hours in helicopters doing surveys like the one we were doing. As the morning wore on, he’d share a lot of his knowledge about raptors — specifically red-tailed hawks and golden eagles — with me.

The Survey

Cliffs
Satellite view of the cliff face we flew down.

We reached the survey area and I geared my mind down from 110-knot flight through 60-knots and finally down to about 20-knots. We’d survey the cliff face at this slow speed, about 50 to 100 feet away from the rock wall.

While this sounds very dangerous, it really wasn’t bad at all. Although it had been windy at Williams, it wasn’t very windy along the cliff. That might be because the wind was coming from the southeast and the tilted mesa beyond the cliff was blocking the wind, or, more likely, it simply might not have been as windy this far west. So It wasn’t as if I had to fight the wind. Flying was easy.

There were just two of us on board, so I had plenty of power, even though I was flying at about 7,000 feet MSL. I was even able to bring the helicopter into a rock, solid out-of-ground-effect hover a few times as needed.

Best of all, if I had any kind of problem — loss of tail rotor effectiveness (LTE), settling with power, engine failure — I could easily build speed by pulling away from the cliff face to my right, where a huge, open, flat valley offered unlimited landing zones at least 500 feet below us.

Frankly, I couldn’t have asked for a better setup for this kind of work. It gave me an opportunity to practice simple flying skills — especially OGE hovering and sideways flight — without having to battle the wind or worry about escape routes.

It took at least an hour to travel down the cliff face from north to south. There was a radar dome at the very south end and we could clearly hear it in our headsets, the closer we got to it. By the time we were within 1/4 mile, the sound was very annoying. I dropped beneath it to round the end of the mesa and it silenced. I realized that this was what “below the radar” really meant.

On the other side, we followed the edge of the mesa, which wasn’t nearly as well defined, north. Again, there wasn’t much wind. There also wasn’t much wildlife to survey. We popped over the top of the mesa and began following small canyons on its east side. We were looking for raptor nests. We’d found some on the cliff face, but they could also be in tall trees.

The mesa-top stuff was low-level — probably 50 to 100 feet AGL — at 30 to 60 knots airspeed. This is considerably more dangerous than the cliff face work we did earlier. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to recover from a settling with power or engine failure incident at that low airspeed/altitude combination. One of the reasons I got the job to work for this client is that I was willing to do this kind of flying. The first company they called — a flight school — refused to let its pilots fly like this. I’m willing to take this risk, so their loss is my gain.

At one point, I landed in a wide canyon so I could strip off my outer shirt. It was getting hot in the cockpit, flying so slowly with the sun shining in. We also dipped in the cooler for cold water. I didn’t bother shutting down. It was a 5 minute break and we got right back to business when we were done.

We’d flown for 2 hours from Williams when I decided it was time to go back for fuel. We traced a route northward to the edge of the survey area, then cut east to Valle. I used my GPS to pick the most direct route. There wasn’t much of interest along the way. Northern Arizona has lots of high desert plateau areas that are covered with dried grasses and a sprinkling of trees.

It took about 25 miles to get to Valle. We had a tail wind.

At Valle

Valle Airport is about 25 miles south of the Grand Canyon. I won’t pretend to know its history. I do know, however, that it’s home of the Planes of Fame Museum, which is an excellent little warbird museum. And I know that the lobby of the airport terminal is absolutely crammed with antique cars and trucks in museum quality condition.

And there were no “Out of Service” signs on the rest rooms.

The FBO guy filled the helicopter tanks and the two fuel cans. The idea with the cans was that if I flew too long on the survey and we couldn’t make it all the way back to Valle to get fuel, I could always land out in the desert, shut down, and add the 11 gallons. That would get me another 40 minutes of flight time, which was enough to reach any number of fueling locations.

I paid for the fuel and we went back outside. The FBO guy had managed to drench the fuel cans with fuel, so I had to dry them off and close them tightly before I could load them back in. I put shop towels under them to protect the seats. Still, one of them leaked a tiny bit during the flight that followed — not enough to do any damage, but enough for me to catch the occasional smell of 100LL.

We headed west again. It took nearly 35 minutes to reach the survey area. We had a head wind.

More Survey Stuff and the Flight Home

We spent the next two hours inching our way along the same cliff face. The light was better now and we spotted another nest. We also did another nearby cliff face and spent a bunch of time zigzagging along the mesa top. We found three more nests up there. The wind had also picked up, so the flying was a bit more challenging. But I’ve flown worse.

Then we headed south to check another area. We found an active prairie dog village there.

And then we were done.

I dropped my passenger off without shutting down. It was 85 NM back to Wickenburg from that point and my goal was to get there without having to detour for fuel or stop to tap into that 11 gallons on board. I bee-lined it, cruising at my best range speed of 100 knots.

For a while, as I flew over empty desert, I thought I might not make it. I considered the kind of place I could land and refuel without bothering anyone. There was no airport on or near my flight path. There wasn’t much of anything other than small mountain ranges, canyons, and rocky outcroppings. I passed over only 3 paved roads.

Then I was 15 miles north of Wickenburg, with about 8 gallons of fuel on board. No problem.

I landed and shut down. It was 95°F on the ramp. I put the helicopter away.

I’d flown 6.5 revenue hours and had learned a hell of a lot about birds.

Another Season of Cherry Drying Planned

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I finally have a plan for the summer.

Yesterday morning, I received a fax I’d been waiting for. It was from a helicopter services company based in central Washington state, not far from the Columbia River. I’d worked as a subcontractor to a subcontractor for them last year to dry cherries with my helicopter. This year, with the middle man out of the picture, I contacted them directly, offering my helicopter and services.

And then I waited.

Normally, cherry contracts start going out in March. This year, with the economy so questionable, the contracts went out a month late. My buddy, Jim, got his on Friday. When mine didn’t arrive by Saturday, I assumed they had enough pilots. After all, there’s a glut of them without jobs and plenty of flight schools that are finding themselves with plenty of helicopters and CFIs but not enough students. I assumed they’d chosen someone else — likely someone closer to the orchards — instead of me.

But on Monday morning, the fax arrived. It laid out the terms for my minimum 21-day contract. The money offered was the same as last year. If fuel prices stay stable — rather than spiking to new highs as they did last year — I’ll do okay. If it rains a lot — and I have my fingers crossed — I’ll actually bring home a decent amount of money. Maybe even enough to pay off my camper loan.

The Logistics

Although a specific start date wasn’t mentioned, I could start the contract as soon as May 15. It’s more likely, however, that I’ll be starting around June 1, as I did last year. Apparently, the cherry crop is running late again.

I told them I need a week’s notice to get the helicopter into position. Because of the distance involved — I’m about 1,000 miles away — it’s a multiple-step process to get all my playing pieces on the board:

  • Ferry the helicopter from Wickenburg to Seattle’s Boeing Field. I have two empty seats for this flight and am actively seeking one or two people to fill them. You can learn more about it here; I can’t exaggerate what an incredible experience this flight is — especially since I let my passengers choose the route. This flight will take 2 to 4 days, depending on what my passengers have in mind.
  • Drop off the helicopter for its annual inspection. I use the services of Rich Carter, who is probably one of the top 5 Robinson mechanics in the country.
  • Fly via airline back to Phoenix.
  • Prepare my camper and truck.
  • Drive from Wickenburg to my first base of operations in Washington State. If my truck behaves and the weather holds, I can do the 1,200-mile drive in two long days.
  • Set up the camper in a campground or grower field.
  • Take an airliner from Wenatchee, WA to Seattle, WA.
  • Ferry my helicopter from Seattle to my first base of operations.

I figure the absolute quickest I can do all this is five days. I’m hoping I get seven.

Of course, I can do a lot of the preparations this month, so when I return from Seattle, I can just hook up the camper and go. The preparations include giving my camper a total check out, loading it up with the things I’ll need to live and work in it for up to eight weeks, and fixing a few little broken things, like the DC jack in the kitchen area, which I use to power my iPod. I’m also considering the installation of a satellite dish that’ll get me Internet as well as television — although I don’t usually bring a TV with me.

Well, at least I can try to do the preparations. I’m working on a book this month and promised my editor I’d be done by month-end.

The Ferry Flight

San FranciscoThe ferry flight is the part I’m looking forward to most. Last year’s route took us due west across the Arizona and California deserts to the coast at San Luis Obispo. We then flew up the coast all the way to San Francisco, where the marine layer pushed us inland. We overnighted at the north end of Napa Valley, then pushed on to Portland the next day, doing a good portion of that flight over the coast, too. The last day, we made the quick flight to Seattle with a flyby of Mt. St. Helens, which was steaming. I still remember those towering waterfalls from snow melt off the cinder cone. You can read about each day of the flight and see more photos here, here, and here.

It’s pretty important that I get paying passengers on board for this flight, so I’ve cut my usual charter rate down to below my cost in an effort to attract deal seekers who want a once-in-a-lifetime flight experience. That’s my preferred approach.

Plan B is to offer the flight to helicopter pilots who want to build time in an R44. The trouble with this plan is the extra effort involved: I need to get the pilot on my insurance, which means he needs to have a certain minimum number of flight hours in R44s and has to have taken the Robinson factory safety course. The rate I offer these guys is lower than my charter rate, so I’d have to eat more of the ferry cost. And, of course, if someone is paying me for the privilege of flying my aircraft, I have to let him or her fly it. Frankly, I like to fly — even 10 hours worth — and would prefer to fly it myself. So Plan B, while certainly possible, is not my preference.

Plan C is even more distasteful. It means flying up there by myself. The good part of that is that I can do all the flying on whatever route I choose. The bad part is that I won’t get any of my ferry costs covered. And since my ferry costs are significant for a 10-hour flight, I’d rather get them covered than have the pleasure of a solo flight.

Besides, it’s nice to have company.

Settling In

Once all my tools are up there, I can settle in to wherever I’m based. I’ll likely spend 3 weeks at the first base and, with luck, get moved to another base farther north after that. Last year I started on the Columbia River near Quincy (south of Wenatchee), moved north to Pateros and Brewster, and then moved back to the high country around Quincy. Then I was done, having been on call for seven weeks with only two days of flying.

No, last year was not profitable. I just about broke even. But it was nice to get away from Arizona’s heat and do something that wasn’t tourism-related.

My TrailerHow much I “settle in” is questionable. While I had the trailer parked in the same campground spot for almost two full months last year (see photo) and spent 10 days at a motel in Pateros, this year I’m more likely to be moving the camper around. It’s pretty much self-sufficient — with solar panels that should keep the batteries charged on those long, summer days — but I’d like to get a full or partial hookup. I’m not opposed to parking on a grower’s property or even at an airport where the helicopter would be based.

I would like to minimize the number of times I have to move it, though. It takes about an hour to set up or break down camp, due to the nature of the pop-out beds. I don’t mind doing all this work, but if it happens to be a very rainy season, I’m not sure whether I’ll have time to do it. I’ve been told to expect 10-hour flying days if it’s a wet one.

Looking Ahead

I’m looking forward to the trip and the challenges it presents. I had a pretty crappy winter here in Arizona, dealing with a lot of bull that I’ll likely blog about sometime in the future, when it’s all a dim memory. While my company’s inclusion in the May 2009 issue of Arizona Highways magazine is already helping me book excursions for the upcoming fall flying season — and perhaps even one or two excursions before I leave for the summer — it’s not going to help me in the summer months, when I really do hate flying here. You cannot imagine the heat, and escaping the heat to the high country introduces all kinds of problems because of high density altitude. Cherry drying is challenging, tedious, and dangerous work, but it’s a change.

And I thrive on change.

Read More Posts about Cherry Drying:

Why Print Publishing is Doomed

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At least in my opinion.

This morning, while preparing to write a blog entry about the importance of creating a meaningful bio for your social networking presence, I came across a link in my Twitter stream:

jenniferwhitley Reading @cshirky: “We don’t need newspapers, we need journalism.” http://tinyurl.com/bpxulr

Easily distracted by any task at hand, I followed the link. I found myself on a plain vanilla — indeed, default WordPress template — blog page with a long column of full-justified text just large enough to read without putting on my cheaters. It was unbroken by advertising (including unattractive or animated ads featuring jiggling fat bodies), images (including meaningless stock photos, inserted as eye candy), or even subheadings (used by so many writers, including me, to help the reader skip head to the “important” parts). It was pure content with only a trio of centered asterisks to indicate a shift in the author’s thought.

And it was good.

The blog post, “Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable,” was by Clay Shirky. It summarized what has brought us to the middle of a revolution in publishing. Print publications are discovering that they can’t compete with the Internet for content delivery, no matter what they try. They’ve refused to see the reality of what’s going on. As a result, they’re not able to survive in the changing world of publishing.

Shirky compares what’s going on with the Internet and publishing today with the revolution of Gutenberg’s movable type and Aldus Manutius’s introduction of small “octavo” volumes that were less expensive to produce and easier to carry around. (I wonder…if Web publishing can be compared to movable type, can e-books and devices like the Kindle be compared to octavo volumes?) These innovation changed publishing. The brought about a revolution in how information was shared and who had access to it. This isn’t any different from today — information is more widely available than ever before.

My point here is not to summarize Clay Shirky’s excellent post. Instead, I urge to you read it. If you’re a journalist or serious blogger or any kind of writer at all, the history he summarizes and the points he brings up may be vital to your understanding of what’s going on in publishing. Indeed, I wish all of my publishers and editors would read it and begin to face the reality of what’s going on in our world. I believe that what he says applies not only to newspapers and journalism but to all publishing, including the kind of work I do.

My point is this: his finely articulated, well-researched, and extremely thoughtful piece is an example of why print publishing will ultimately go the way of hand-copied, “illuminated” texts. It’s quality content, easily accessible, for free, without advertising, on the Web.