Kiwanis Gourmet Lawn Party - get your tickets here

The Big Top Awaits

And, so it goes - the 33rd annual welcome back luncheon, now managed by Kiwanis of LBK, and known as the Gourmet Lawn Party, will be held on December 6th, 2014.

So, aside from posting these photos from prior year events, I'm busy selling raffle tickets - you have till December 5th to purchase one - win $20,000 with a one in less than 500 sold chance, for just a simple C note ($100) donated to our scholarship foundation,   Yep, fully deductible.

Guests decompress at the end

prior year advertisement

The Line Up 

Food vendors set up

The Band Played On

Finally I solo, now on to the next tests

Sherman Bilbo

This was the week that was, in terms of my finally reaching that point where Sherman turned me loose in Venice, Florida to do three landings without him in the aircraft.  Later that day, back in Sarastoa, I signed the wall - next to where my son signed when he completed his private pilot license.  He is currently working on his IFR (instrument flight rules) rating - he has a test to take and then has to fly with an FAA examiner to prove he understands all that is required to fly on instruments.  I think I 'll stick right now with VFR (visual flight rules) and be happy.  My next things will be cross country work.

signing the Wall of Fame (and lost Fortune) 

N817SP on day of solo

After I soloed I hitched a ride with CFI (Certificated Flight Instructor) Elina Lunin in her personal twin engined Piper Apache Geronimo, down to Punta Gorda.  She flew down to fuel up, but I suspect she just wanted to visit friends. Elina used to teach at a flight school 40 NM south of Sarasota (KSRQ), where she is the newest instructor at Universal Flight Training, my school.

So, after I soloed, Sherman asked me to work up a flight plan for my first cross country, which I had set for Lakeland (KLAL), via Wauchula (KCHN).  We had flown once to KCHN, and back, but that flight wasn't more than 50 miles, so I couldn't count it anyway.  At this point, with 70 plus hours, I'm going to try and make every mile count toward a requirement, lest I go broke before I fly directly to the poor house.  It helps to own your own plane, and on Saturday I figured I was ready, but needing a few extra miles, I chose to fly to Bartow, Florida rather than Lakeland.  Bartow has twin mains 27R and 27L, and we landed on 27Left, which is an east-west runway, with its reciprocal being 09 or 90 degrees on the compass (due east).  The other runway was a single strip, that being runway 23 (meaning 230 degrees or oriented SSW) and runway  05 (NNE heading).   I was supposed to fly on Saturday with Sherman, but when I got there Elina was available, and since she had given me a lift in her plane, I figured turnabout was fair play so she got to fly in my much smaller, less powerful Cessna 172.   There is a minimum requirement to obtain a Private Pilots license, calling for 20 hours of flight training from an authorized flight instructor including at least 3 hours of cross-country, i.e. to other airports.  So, that one trip ticked off 2/3rds of a minimum WITH an instructor - one more ought to do the trick.
                                                     

At the Bartow Air Base Museum

Back to Barlow however, where I had Elina take a picture of me standing in front of some Colonel's Air Force Blues.
In the late 60's, I wore this same uniform, in the enlisted variant of course.  My dad, the late Colonel Jack (called that behind his back) was a pilot, with several thousand hours including 132 missions flying cargo planes from India to China.  He flew C-46 Curtis Commandos and C-47 Douglas Skytrains, better known as Gooney Birds.  While my son wants to keep going I think I'll stick with fair weather flying.

Bartow airport is six miles north of the City of Bartow, carved out of 900 acres of former farmland.  Ground was broker on December 8, 1941 (the day after Pearl Harbor) and the field was operated as a P-51 Mustang Replacement Training Station, where graduates went on to Europe and Asia.  Deactivated in November 1945 and turned over to the City of Bartow, but reactivated for Korea in 1950 and finally closed by the Air Force in 1961 and the facilities were turned back over to the City.   The new terminal was completed in 2007.  The town may not be much, but the terminal is pretty nice - and the place where I made my first landing for a required cross country.  My next cross country trip is the one I should be working on tonight (instead of this blog) and will go to Sebring, Florida.  That's where Corvettes are raced for twelve hours once a year, a mini 24 hours of Lemans type endurance race.  I'm looking forward to flying there, although I know I could get there quicker in the Corvette.  I'll fly over to Sebring at Normal Cruise - 112 knots (129 MPH).  No cops.

Elina Lunin - checking the oil on her Piper PA-23

Patriot's Point, Charleston, SC

USS Yorktown (CVA 10) at Patriot's Point.

F4-J Phantom II fighter-bomber

The view approaching the USS Yorktown (CVA 10) showed a number of aircraft on the flight deck.  By and large, these were almost all  post World War II jets, plus one of the helicopters assigned to carry out air-sea rescue, including participating in recovery of the Apollo 8 astronauts in the Pacific following capsule splashdown.

For this blog entry I'd chosen to showcase the two aircraft forward (that's the front of the ship) where they both sit displayed as if awaiting a "cat shot" from the under deck mounted steam catapult.  The Tracer, on the left was the forerunner to the more well known Hawkeye (still active, therefore none on display)  The Tracer was built in 1954, and ultimately left the fleet sometime in the 1970's,  replaced by the somewhat quicker Hawkeye.  The Tracer had a top speed of 280 MPH at 4,000 feet, which meant the catapult operator could set the cat shot differently than when helping the Phantom aloft.

View from the CAGs chair midway up the island

I've shown the view from the CAG's seat, halfway up the "island" on the carrier.  I sat in his chair and took the pictures herein.  I've always been fond of the F-4, as it was also adopted by the USAF and the Marines.  Built in my adopted home town of St Louis, the F-4 was the predominant aircraft at Ubon Royal Thai Airbase, where the 8th Tac Fighter Wind (the Wolfpack) had three squadrons of Phantoms.  I'd hear them taking off over the sounds of records playing at AFTN 840 radio,where I worked from midnight till six AM.  A very powerful wake-up call for those not yet awake.

Early AWACS - the Grumman E-1B Tracer

Below is a good look at the Tracer, which also carried the nicknames Willie Fudd, and Sloof with a Roof.  The WF original Navy designation resulted in explaining Willie Fudd,  but the other nickname warrants knowing more about the S-2 Tracker.  Rather than tell you, I took a picture of the on-board placard (below).  Also, for more information, I'd direct you to the website for the Yorktown, found at www.PatriotsPoint.org.

SA-2 Tracker, aka Sloof

For more:  www.PatriotsPoint.org 

Those daring young men........

These pictures were taken on my recent cruise, where the Vision of the Seas (Royal Caribbean) had several "aerialist" acts.  On the left side, I've captured the performance, showing the colorful costuming.  The more revealing pictures show the rehearsal where the young men in black were preparing for their late evening performance.  I'd call it more musical bungee jumping than a true circus aerial act, but considering this was done on a cruise ship from decks four thru eight, there was sufficient elevation and "zooming up and down" to give the audience oohs and aahs.

The actual rigging was quite elaborate and to my memory I had never seen this type of platform structures on the eighth deck of a ship, allowing for a forty foot performance area, clearly greater than was available in the actual theatre part of Vision.  This ship will come to Tampa in December so we might see her again.  The men were not exactly on the flying trapeze, but they certainly did fly about the atrium on Vision of the Seas.

The CNN Studio Tour

This is the actual Humvee used by CNN during the first Gulf War

Earlier this month (July, 2014) my son flew our plane up to Atlanta to log his longest cross-country flight and to experience landing at an airfield whose elevation was 998 feet MSL.  Considering the all of his prior landings in Florida were at 30 feet MSL, he found it a different approach to say the least.

CNN World HQ - food court and flags

Allegedly, this is the longest indoor escalator going 8 stories high

This is where the "news" (at least as CNN sees it) comes in, and is massaged into the message they air to the world

Well, we made it (obviously) and he visited with friends from his college days, and I visited with my cousin Bill, my aunt Marg and Bill's wife Barb.

A highlight of the trip was on Sunday, when we ventured downtown to visit the HQ of CNN and to take the tour.  Typical of me, I asked the girl at the ticket stand if they had any special pricing, for seniors or veterans.  It turned out they did - FREE for vets with ID (which my VA card sufficed to prove) and.....get this...my son John Benjamin (JB) got three dollars off the regular $15 adult rate for accompanying me.  He at least didn't ask for a wheel chair, considering it would have been a bumpy ride up the eight story escalator, followed by walking down seven floors during which time we saw a lot.

While the escalator seemed tall, I'm not sure the one in Rosslyn, VA on the D.C. Metro isn't longer or the one at the National Zoo, but I digress.

This is one of three facilities where CNN does its live news feeds, the others being New York and Washington.  One of my fellow AFN veterans works for CNN in Washington, D.C., as a producer for Wolf Blitzer, on The Situation Room.  Wolf is paid $3 million, Anderson Cooper gets $11 million, my buddy as producer far less.  Clearly, Mr. Cooper has a better agent.  I included a picture (below) of a Satellite phone from the same period as the Humvee - that would be twenty year old technology now, so I'm sure today's is far more man portable.   Another digression: ManPads = a military term for Man Portable Air Defense Systems.  That would be something you shoot into the air, as opposed to a report you make to put "on the air".

Ultimately, technology of reporting has changed from my days in military, and later civilian television. Back in 1972 through 1975, I worked at Channel 13 in Indianapolis, as a weekend floor director.  I was the guy with the headset plugged into one of the two manned cameras in our news studio.  I was there to relay signals to the anchor John Lindsey and the sports guy Jerry Harkness, and the weekend weatherman Dave Letterman (yeah, that's the same guy).  Boy, have things changed.

Yes, they still have anchors, but the studio cameras are not operated by camera people in the studio - they're robotic and operated with a joystick from the control room.  No more "floor directors" either, instead the anchors wear earbuds that can hear the director's cues from the control room.  No more "chromakey", but now a "green screen" for weather maps.  The world changes, while mankind seeming refuses to evolve.  We still have wars at least to report on, and television like the military continues to go into harms way.   Oh, do I watch CNN?  Not much, I think the women on Fox(y) News Channel are far easier on these old eyes.

Satellite Phone -E.T. Call Home
Anybody want to lug this around?

Fourth of July weekend

Here's my now Canopy Cover installed

Ripley takes his seat on the center console

This past weekend was one where

both Elizabeth and I were busy, 

starting out early on the Fourth of

July participating in the LBK Town

Freedom Festival Parade.

Not much of a parade, of course, with a distance of about one quarter of a mile, from the bank down to the post office turnaround, and back to the bank.  We had far more people than last year (which included my wife who didn't go in 2013).  So many people more that next year they might have to extend the parade 

route to include the turn-around at

the Jewish Temple.

In fact, it's billed as the shortest parade in the nation, and after the parade there are kids games, food, and a butterfly release.  Parade started at 0900, line up was

more like 0830.

By the time I arrived at 8:35, there  were already two brand new

2014 seventh generation C-7 Corvettes in attendance.  My C-6 as situated between a John Deere Tractor and a U.S. Tow boat 

on a trailer.  My buddies' C-5 was pretty much bringing up the rear of the rolling stock

After the parade, I went out to the airport and with J.B. Wild's help, put the new Canopy Cover on our airplane.  I also (prior to putting the cover on, naturally) managed to do some touch-and-go's at KSRQ (Sarasota) for about .8 hours on the Hobbs.  That's the meter that tracks engine hours and in this case translated to probably taxi out, take off, shoot four Touch and Go's, and then one full stop landing.

Susan riding "back seat" on Steve's tractor

After I came back from the airport we fixed some dinner and
I did a bit of studying for my pilots written exam, and then we drove over to the peninsula behind the Marina at the LBK Club Harbourside to watch the fireworks from afar.

Ripley was sniffing, not interested in cooperating.

The outfits chosen were all my wife's work, having purchased my teeshirt, and making
her own with rick-rack and ribbons. The umbrella came from an earlier outing with the Corvette Club, where fellow
veterans were given one free from a vets
organization in Lakewood Ranch.

Corvette Club Braves Rain, Wins Big

Over 150 Corvettes were expected, but forty failed to show, so our stalwart crew took top honors as the winner of the Participation Award.  That's RJ Munson in the middle with the club award, and for the Gulf Coast Corvette Club of Bradenton, it was a repeat from last year when we also scored most cars from one club.  And last year, my C-6 red convertible won the First Place for my class.  This year that honor stayed with the GCCC, but went to the fellow on the far left, who drove down from his home in the Carolinas to compete.  Last year he drove a C-5 (fifth generation Corvette), but in the interim period he purchased a bright yellow 2010 Coupe, which ultimately took top honors in class.

2014 Corvette C-7 Coupe

The red C-7 was parked next to mine, and was one of half a dozen 2014 Corvettes entered.  While this one did not win, it did show off several of the features of this initial year of the seventh generation Corvette.  First year models are often problematic, so my lust for a new car is muted (that and fear of my wife breaking either my leg or simply my wallet).  However, the 2015's are expected to feature a Z06 Convertible.  Yep, you read that correctly - next year for the first time there will be a rag top Z06 - so Chevy must have figured out how to negate the torque issue that would in the past have proved what happens with too much horsepower and too light a frame are put together in a 500 plus horsepower package.  When I moved up from the 2001 to the 2004 cars, both had the LS-2 engine, with about 350 horses.  I did not purchase the first year of the C-6, which was 2005, nor the 2006 or 2007.  It wasn't until the 2008, which introduced the LS-3 engine, with 430 horsepower.  And the subsequent Corvette I purchased also had that LS-3 engine, a Cyber Gray coupe.

                                                                                 

That's my 2010 Red Grand Sport in the  background, with fellow Kiwanis members Jim Larson and Glenn Peterson (with wife Lisa) standing in front of mine and behind the C-7 also pictured in this post.  Jim Larson is also a member of the GCCC, and owns two Corvettes, neither of which he entered into the show.  On this date, Jim drove his 2000 fifth generation to the Circle and joined me for breakfast at the Blue Dolphin, during which time the skies opened up and kept raining for a solid five hours, until around 2:00 PM when the sponsoring club decided to award prizes.  It held off just enough for me to escape the grass and drive the six miles to home.

   

 

Ripley's friend passes on to a place in all our hearts

Sassy Wild, 2003-2014

a big yawn at breakfast time after a sleepover with Ripley

 Sassy was a big girl, a gentle girl who loved her friend Ripley.   She came into my son's life some eleven years ago, as a puppy, and was always his best friend with four legs.  She lived in North St. Louis County, then Eureka, Missouri, and survived his short lived marriage yet never left his side.  She moved with him to Indianapolis, and never complained about spending all day waiting for him to come home.  She even endured living with his grandmother, who never realized how great a dog she was, and later lived with another dog in a small two bedroom in the Broad Ripple area, where she at least had a nice fenced yard to run.

the last sleepover, April 2014

When J.B. moved to Florida, she never complained about that long cross country ride, as she was with the boy she loved, as he loved her.  She even made friends with Bobby, the gruff New Yorker who was a family friend willing to take her out during those days our son's schedule kept him unable to walk her during the day.  My wife and I had the privilege of walking her some days, and she was always happy to see us.

From time to time, she'd come out to the island, and spend a night or two, where she'd play with Ripley's squirrel toy or just sit with her smaller buddy.  She was a powerful girl, who loved little dogs and would pull on her lead whenever we walked her, we'd have to restrain her with great difficulty.

I will always remember her as that proud lab/chow mix, who enjoyed walks and would lay down a prodigious pile of poop.  I last saw her about a week ago, and while she was getting thin, I figured it was just old age.  Big dogs don't always last as long as smaller breeds, like Beagles, but she had a problem which manifested itself in what we believed was a stroke.  One vet ended up taking an inconclusive Xray and we took her to Critical Care Vets, where Ripley had his back surgery (earlier blogs spoke of this escapade of his).  Dr. Anne Chauvet was not present, but her able staff administered a MRI, which revealed a cancer with fluid around her heart, and my wife was able to have them wait until my son arrived, so he could make his goodbyes.  They witnessed a devoted dog trying to hold on until her master arrived to let him say goodbye.   Blessedly, the cancer took her quickly as it was not operable.  Many tears that day, many the following, and some while I write this.

Sassy, I'm the lucky one - I'll never have to hold the memory of your passing with dignity, weak with fluid surrounding a very faint heartbeat, holding on those final moments with my wife and son.  I'll just have to remember the good days, where you'd want to pull me up the street wanting to say hello to smaller dogs who frankly where somewhat terrified at the sight of an 85 pound freight train on four legs bearing down on them.  I knew you just wanted to say hello.  And in remembering those moments of a wonderful friend at her strongest, I will offer these pictures taken within the past 30 days.  Sometimes we adults think its heroic to try to spend thousands more to eke out another six weeks, while not thinking about the dog enduring more procedures ultimately end up at that same place.   My son made the hard call, as he had done with my Millie three years ago - I know there's a horrible hole in his heart tonight, as there is in mine - this eulogy is my way to grieve.  No offense meant to my son's way of grieving, mine just is a bit more cathartic, and public.  As we'd say whenever she'd stay over on her blanket on the floor at the foot of the bed "lay down Sassy, it's time to go to sleep"...............

Nose art, a lost art

on a Black Widow night fighter from WW2

If you Google "nose art" I'm sure you'll find many, many fine examples, but when I see some, I generally try and take pictures to keep.  A couple of weeks ago, in Lakeland, Florida was the annual Sun 'n Fun air show.  I took quite a few pictures, but these are certainly favorites.  The B-17 "Texas Raiders" is part of the CAF (Confederate Air Force) and shows tonnage of bombs dropped as well as the pin-up gal in western attire.  Often, nose art featured scantily clad women.  A lot of aircrews during WW II would name their planes, and would indicate tons of bombs dropped, or in the case of fighters, might put small enemy flags beneath the cockpit canopy to show the prowess of the pilot assigned to that aircraft.

B-17 "Texas Raiders"

The B-25 (below)  is painted to reelect a Russian motif, and many of these Mitchell light bombers were shipped to Russia by convoy.  We sent over a number of aircraft to the Russians during the second World War,  including P39's, P-40's, B-17's and B-25's.  The heaviest and  most coveted was the B-29.  They requested same, but we never voluntarily provided.  Three B-29's were forced to land there during the later stages o the war, and were simply not returned,  Russian engineers took over, reverse engineered them, and soon there was a look-alike Tupelov copy.



Not all nose art will be found on warplanes, as "Downwind" out of Port Orange, Florida, is on a T-34 "Mentor" trainer, a post Korea war trainer, of which many were decommissioned and sold to individual owners by the Air Force.

Seen on a T-34 Trojan, Daytona Beach

Apache Princess - B-25 at Fantasy of Flight

         This painting is not exactly historical, as there was a B-25 known as Apache Princess, but the owner of this restored bomber took the liberty of painting his wife's face onto the sexy squaws body.  Nice join, Kermit Weeks.



Regarding the redheaded vixen portrayed on The Downwind; its a clever play on aviation words - the downwind leg of one's landing occurs just before you enter into your cross wind and follow through on your final approach to the field.  Downwinds run parallel to the length of the runway, and it's typically a very long leg.

The  wording reads "Russian to get you"

I found this blond Cossack to be a very nice  piece of art work.

Of coarse not all the pretty girls were inanimate drawings on the noses of older aircraft.  There were also several working the crowds and one actually working to fuel several thirsty jets.   And not all of the are was on  the nose, as evidenced by the T-shirt on the backside of this very busy young women.   She was heard to say "so many jets, so little time".



those are both L-39's, a Czech jet trainer which also can be fitted with ordinance.

Name That Plane

This is one fast, sexy looking bird and lives next door to 817SP

 OK, it looks easy right?

You say it's a P-51,  and of course it is a P-51 - that's one of the most identifiable aircraft of World War II.

But wait, let's test your knowledge further, is it a P-51 A?  Is it a P-51 B, or is it a C model?  Now those who really know their planes will tell you this is a P-51D, because the A, B, and C all lacked the highly identifiable "bubble canopy".

Cavalier II Mustang, with Merlin V-12 engine

So, it's a P-51D you say?  Look closely at the end of the wings....what are those doing there?
Tip tanks were not in use during the second world war, but this was clearly a military P-51D.  And there's a local connection too.

The year is 1957 (I'm ten years old, but know a P-51 from a P-40 as well as a P-38) and the last of the active duty P-51's have been pulled from Air National Guard service, with many released to the civilian market.

David Lindsay, a newspaper publisher, forms Trans Florida Aviation in Sarasota, to transform these former warbirds into well equipped and fast civilian business aircraft.  He bought up surplus P-51s and added a second seat, updated the avionics, and installed a new tail (taller) vertical stabilizer with a laminar flow airfoil.  He called these "Cavaliers".  The plane, known for its ability to protect the bombers all the way to Berlin and back, was a logical choice for CEO's wishing a fast, long range (110 gallons on the Cavalier 2500) and plush.  Lindsay renamed Trans Florida into Cavalier Aircraft and purchased the right to the P-51 from North American Aviation.   He would gain Military Assistance Program money from the federal government and also convert P-51D's for several South American air forces.   The Cavalier Mustang project ran its course, but not before one was modified from the Merlin V-12 engine to be powered by a Rolls Royce Dart 510 - at Lindsay's expense.  The military here (USAF) and elsewhere were not interested, in this Turbo Mustang III, and Cavalier sold that project to Piper.  Piper built two (2) PA-48 Enforcers, but they had little in common with the original P-51.

This Cavalier conversion has returned home to SRQ, now has a hanger next to the Manatee Sheriff's Helicopters at Retrix North Fixed Base Operation.  It had spent a number of years with the El Salvadoran Air Force