I am ashamed, embarrassed, and humiliated.
OK, how's that for an opening?
I started writing this little newsy thing when I retired in 2004. For as long as you have been reading it, the news has been-with few exceptions- great. That is because that is what has actually happened to us in the preceding month.
But if I am to keep it real, I have to share the good, the bad and the ugly. So here goes. I crashed my plane, again.
Two years ago, my floats delaminated and I went for a swim. This morning, I took my maiden flight after getting the new floats on and landed in the bay by my sister's cottage after she had just moved here. Landing was fine but since she was not home I turned around to take off.
As I was just about to leave the water past the point of an adjacent island a breese pushed my tail and put me on one float. The wing tip made contact with the water and flipped the plane over in about 7 feet of water. Whose fault? Mine, mine, mine. Did i mention it was ALL my fault?
As I write this the savage is still 24 hours away so no damage assessment has been made to date although in the water, little damage is apparent.
OK, so I will now crawl into a hole and never come out, right after I get Janice a few phone numbers for good divorce lawyers. Oh, yea..I am fine. Whatever.
(When I am not screwing up)
Our daily life at ...
From the flight deck
This is what my disassembled engine looked like while being overhauled last month
Then, it was off to the races...
This is how I did it before screwing up
(click on the arrows twice)
The
professor
After I
got my pilots license, I wanted to upgrade it to have my passenger rating so I
could take folks that asked, up with me. But my real goal all along was to be
able to fly either in Canada or the US, pretty much at will, as our island is
literally on the US / Canadian border. The fly in the ointment, so to speak, is
that in order to be able to legally fly my plane in the US, I needed to bump my
license up to an instructor rating. Why? Don’t ask, it’s the law. I have no
interest in teaching anyone anything but getting the rating was my next step.
By chance, an unexpected opportunity
came up to take the training and the course in our last month here a few summers
ago. The course had not been offered in the previous 3 years and I thought that
a smart boy would strike while the iron was hot.
The course itself was quite time consuming in addition to the additional flight training. Then there was what turned out to be the grueling physical with the flight medical examiner. Completing the expected pulling, poking and prodding, I was sent off for a full audiology exam and a visual acuity exam. This entailed a dye test of the retina, checking the cornea and more poop-la-doo than you would ever be interested in hearing about.
This year, 3 summers later, it was finally
time for the exam. I mean, how hard could it be? I found out when I
passed after a number of attempts. It was a bugger.
I am now a certified flight instructor, but after todays performance, I doubt I would take lessons from myself. 