Coincidental Floss

If you read the cleverly titled (because I titled it) blog Information Mike, written by friend and colleague Mike Singer, you’ll see that, earlier in the Oshkosh week, we took a trip to a place called Fisk and watched the controllers there do their thing. If you haven’t read it, click the link and give it a read now. I’ll wait.

Anyway, while we were out at Fisk, politely conferring with the controllers, asking intelligent research-related questions like "Hey, Mister – can I look through your buboculars?", the idea of a visit to the control tower at the airport itself came up. And, by "came up", I mean we said "Hey, mister, can we PUH-LEEZE go up in the control tower?!?!" Foolishly enough, they promised to work something out. At which we point we gave them their binoculars back.

My turn in the tower came on Saturday. As it happens, they close the control tower during the daily airshow (the airspace is handed off to the show’s "air boss"), so the best time to visit the tower also just happens to be (thanks to the view) the best time to be in the tower. It’s a heady feeling, to say the least, watching an airshow from above – especially given the dramatically increased height of the new tower.

Two of my colleagues, Brandon Seltz and the aforementioned Mike Singer, went up that day as well, quite a bit higher than the tower … and, at times, considerably lower! Brandon and Mike have been the driving forces behind some of the work we’re doing with Dale "Snort" Snodgrass and American Topgun Productions (yes, I know, and no, I won’t tell). Dale wanted a chance to say "thank you" to the two of them in particular, and, ignoring my jealousy-driven suggestions of memberships for each of them in the Jelly of the Month Club, decided to give them each a ride in a Mustang. North American, not Ford. The real thing, the one that Christian Bale points at frantically in the movie Empire of the Sun and calls the "Cadillac of the sky!" They each truly got the ride of their lives, and my therapist has told me repeatedly that the seething, bitter envy I feel is far outweighed by my happiness on their behalf.

Then again – they actually earned their flight, the chumps, while I, in good Socialist fashion, chatted my way into my hop in the Soviet Yak-9 by claiming that I needed it.

Saturday night afforded one last photo run through Aeroshell square, snapping sunset pics, before everyone started heading out on Sunday. I can’t quite articulate why, but somehow, the image of the V-22 guys loading up a ladder they bought from the ladder guy really captured the spirit of AirVenture perfectly. So perfectly, that, even though I thought I had, I don’t seem to have taken a picture of it.

You’ll just have to trust me.

Sunday rolled ’round, and, thanks to some threatening weather, the grounds were all but empty. I knew a number of people (such as friend-of-friends Fern Villenuve, first team leader of Canada’s Golden Hawks flight demonstration team – the first person I’ve met whose face is actually on money) who figured if they didn’t leave Saturday, they’d be stuck in Oshkosh (not always a bad thing) for another week. Of course, I couldn’t be absolutely certain that the grounds were empty without seeing it for myself, so I went back up in the control tower. Because I could.

Other exhibitors were quietly (and some not so quietly) packing up and shutting down throughout the day, but we kept ours going until the very end. You should assume that we did this because of our near fanatical dedication to reaching every last customer we possibly could, and not because we’d contracted with a company called The Production Network who, in the person of the incomparable Steve Mallinson, was completely responsible for the teardown of the booth.

Just as it has done the other nine times I’ve been, the end of AirVenture came too soon. Once we’d abandoned Steve shut down the PCs and headed out, we took one last end-to-end run on the golf cart, reluctantly returning it to the EAA, just as the first real storm of the week kicked in.

From Oshkosh, it was on to Toronto for a week or so but that’s another story.

I decided to go ahead and finish the story and just replace the previous post with this one. This event was clearly the most notable of my Day 5, so I think it deserves its own full-ish post. Congratulations to those of you who read the first version – it is now, officially, mega-rare, the rocket firing Boba Fett, the Beatles’ Yesterday and Today Butcher Cover, the inverted Jenny postage stamp of blog posts.

On Friday the 1st, after a couple of days of false starts and missed connections, I met up with my new (best) friend, Jim Cook out of Auburn Alabama, and we had an absolutely beautiful flight in his Yak 9. "How did this happen?" I hear you asking (though it sounds suspiciously like "big deal!") Well, it went something like this: Jim came by the booth earlier in the week and introduced himself, and, thanks to my desire to go up with him in said Yak, we found common ground very quickly. As it turned out, we have mutual friends in people like Snort Snodgrass and Sean Carroll (not there actually are people like either of those gentlemen), and, while Jim was telling me a bit about his background as an Army aviator flying the Blackhawk, I was kicking him in the shins and demanding a ride.

When I met Jim at the airplane, we did a test fit. Jim describes the Yak as a "1.75 seater", and the backseat doesn’t go out its way to favor anyone over about 5′ 11". I slid down in, and found that my knees were about one inch too high to fit under the back of the seat in front of me. This kept from sitting down fully, and would have meant that the flight was a no-go unless I was willing to consider surgery. (I was.) Then, magically, my right foot slipped a little, and my right knee popped under the seat back. I figured out what I’d done, repeated it with my left leg, and, Yuri’s-your-uncle, I was in. Wedged in, but in nonetheless. Then, just to show off a bit, I got back out.

After waiting about an hour for the fuel truck driver (Slacky McLostington) to show up, we gassed up, and it was time to commit aviation for the glory of the Rodina. I worked my way into the seat, repeated my knee adjustments, then affixed the four-point harness. Once I was set, Jim started the engine, and, after whining for a few blades, 12 cylinders of 1600+ horsepower Allison goodness came to life, the relatively small Yak rocking back and forth in time with the idle. Taxiing out, we S-turned along (like most of the best airplanes, you can’t see straight ahead in the Yak 9 when you’re on the ground, so you weave, veering left and looking right, then reversing that) behind the EAA marshallers on scooters. There was quite a crowd lining up along the taxiways, jockeying for position to take a picture, or just wave, especially the little kids. I waved back to as many as I could, not because I was deluded for an instant that they were waving at me, but because Jim had his hands (and feet) full, and because the airplane had no hands. "Stay in school and off the crack, kids, and one day you might be randomly lucky like me, sitting in an airplane like this through no particular hard work of your own, though probably not."

After the runup, we were cleared for takeoff on runway 36L. The power went in, the tail popped up, then the mains, and we were in a climbing right turn heading east over Lake Winnebago. Jim had cautioned me about the noise, recommending earplugs under my headset, but I was glad I’d forgotten, because the noise, the confident growling power of this machine was, in a word, glorious. The views were every bit as spectacular as you’d expect, and the the weather was "severe clear" in almost every direction. The only exception was at twelve o’clock, level: there was a "cloud street" around a mile or so long, with a string of small and obviously fascist cumulus puffs that were, simply put, asking for it. Jim wove us in and around and through the edges, doing loops, rolls, wingovers, and cuban 8s, the long forgotten pressure on my knees relieving any time we were inverted or went negative. The clouds knew when they’d been outclassed, and quietly did their part providing an all-too-rare sense of speed at altitude as we tore past. At one point, we nudged through 5 Gs, I clenched a little, grunted a little, and smiled a lot. 

All too soon, it was time to head back to the airport. We entered a long, curving right base for 36L; the curving approach keeps the runway in sight in a taildragger like this for as long as possible, right up until the point when you actually need it and touch down. By then, the theory is that the runway is probably where you think it is, and, if not, it’s fairly close. Rolling out at idle, the engine popped, the short stacks clearing their throats for attention they already had. The tail came down, and we turned off, once again following an orange vest on a red scooter with a volunteer in between who led us straight back to where we started, then proffered us each a bottle of ice cold water once we’d opened the canopy. The water was welcome, a cool jolt that unfortunately wasn’t quite enough to wake up my legs, which had dozed off somewhere over the lake. I clambered up and out, and didn’t so much hop down off of the airplane as bounced on lifeless legs that, thankfully, remained straight.

Then it was time for pictures and handshakes, promises to stay in touch (we have, so far), and a blurry golf-cart trip to our booth for a few hours. I’d literally come back down to earth at this point, but part of me was still up over the lake, giving the imaginary Luftwaffe a bit of what for.

I took a lot of pictures of the airplane before and after the flight, got a few pictures from one of Jim’s friends of us departing and arriving, and snapped some stills and video on my phone during the flight, then put these things together as short video, linked below. Now, I’m not a photographer, and, if there’s one thing worse than a non-photographer taking pictures, it’s a non-photographer taking pictures with a camera phone. And, if there’s one thing worse than that, it’s that same person shooting video with said camera phone. I’d apologize for the quality, but I think the images that need to will apologize for themselves.

Like it says in the clip, Jim – Spaseba, Tovarisch!

http://cid-c24f386005a2ccef.skydrive.live.com/embedrowdetail.aspx/Public/Yak-9.wmv

This one began with something that began a few years ago as a nice gesture, evolved into a tradition, and now, thanks to me and my soulless corporate approach to things, has become mandatory: the patented Hal Bryan AirVenture End-to-End Golf Cart Experience. As I wrote in my official guide to the show that I handed out to all of my fellow boothizens (as part of the care package that my friend and colleague Mike wrote about here), AirVenture is big. If you’ve never been, it’s bigger than you think, if you haven’t been in a while, it’s bigger than you remember, and, if you have, you know I’m right. By giving them the lay of the land, the tour helps people decide in what direction to stagger during their precious free time in order to see what interests them, and also helps them become a little more self-sufficient when it comes to getting back and forth between the booth and the hotel, etc. We start in front of the Super 8, work our way around the north 40 camping area, then pass through the warbirds and across the taxiway to the experimentals. From there, we pass the tower(s) and the government pavilions, then straight across Aeroshell square. Next comes the light sport aircraft, the past grand champions, and then the antiques and classics. Continuing south, we head past the vintage campground and the ultralights, then, finally, to the southiest end of the south 40 camping. Then it’s back north for a spin up through Aeroshell square, a look at the sponsor facilities behind Hangar C, a quick look at the Fly Market, and, finally, a trip round the two best-kept secrets of AirVenture, the EAA AirVenture Museum and Pioneer Airport.

I love giving these tours, because I love seeing this place, my home for 1/52nd of a year, through new eyes. Not to mention the fact that I love having an audience; when I’m narrating, I’ll catch myself starting to gesticulate, making broad, expansive hand gestures that put a little bit of pontiff in my pontificating. Day 4’s tour customers were Rick Hudson and Shawna Williams. Paul Lange was supposed to be there as well, but he was in a meeting that I can’t talk about.

And speaking of which … at noon, Mike Singer and I met with 8 of our colleagues from the EAA to talk enthusiastically about something that I shouldn’t mention here. Just picture a lot of people in blue shirts nodding and trying not to interrupt each other.

After that, I met with a colleague and potential partner at the booth, gave her a demo and then met with her in the air-conditioned "Exhibitor’s Comfort Center" for about an hour and a half. I won’t mention who she works for, but it was the kind of meeting that started with "do you think we should look at working together" and ended with "well, yes, but, once we’ve actually dominated the entire world, what do you propose we do with it?" At one point, I actually used the word "synergy" and, to my shame, I meant it. Then I apologized, unnecessarily. One thing I can say without apologizing is that this company (I know her boss and one of her colleagues as well) is doing things that are undeniably brilliant. We’re still not sure exactly *how* we’ll work together, but we’re all convinced that it’s the right thing to do. If I could hire them to handle our marketing in the aviation community, I’d do it yesterday.

A bit later on, I stopped in at Flight1’s booth to catch up with my friend Jim Rhoads, and he showed me their new Citation Mustang add-on (utterly gorgeous, and the first FS add-on I’ve come across with an opening toilet seat) and their new instructor’s console. This last was running on ESP, and, after about 30 seconds, I came away convinced that this was the "killer app" the platform needs to get the attention of flight schools of all kinds. While I was busy being impressed, an older gentleman came up, followed by a few of my colleagues. The gentleman’s name was John, and he’d come to Flight1’s booth from ours to buy a copy of RealAir’s Spitfire add-on (one of my personal favorites.) John and I had a wonderful conversation about his flying history, and about the role that Flight Sim plays in his day-to-day life. He enjoys it with the sort of passion that I’ll happily remember any time that I find myself a little slow to get out of bed and head out to work. His gratitude was energizing and humbling. I hope I’m half as sharp as he is, when I’m half his age … in 3 and 1/2 years.

Not a bad day’s work, especially since it was my day off.

Wait … listen … do you hear that? It’s the sound of me not complaining!

 

No, I wasn’t, as it happens. You see, I’d been invited to an executive luncheon to discuss some partnership opportunities best left undetailed. It was a great meeting, but the meal itself was jarring. It started with a fruit salad – a bit of pineapple hollowed out with a couple of spoonfuls of sweet rice, some strawberries, and some sliced mangoes. The word at my table, including that of some new friends from a company that makes Very Light Jets (friends, but not great friends – no stick time was offered at any point in the meal) was that the presentation was sans pareil. As it turned out, the meal was also sans main course, since the next thing to arrive was dessert. I was a bit nonplussed (not to mention nonfull), but I shrugged it off and focused on the meeting itself, which was considerably more substantial.

Later that night, I ran into a couple of people who’d also attended,  and tentatively broached the subject of lunch with "Now, was it just me-" only to be met with an immediate "Oh my god, no! We couldn’t believe it!" Vindication was satisfying, though a ham sandwich would have been more so.

The most notable customer at the booth that day was a guy who was kind of enough to point out that he was a real pilot with literally hundreds of hours who was just about to give up on our little video game. He went on to explain that, in some of our aircraft, our gauges just "go nuts." I had him show me the problem on one of our demo stations. We started at Denver in the Beech Baron, and he took off and started pointing out problems as he climbed out. First, as he moved the yoke all the way fore and aft to try to maintain a particular pitch attitude, he pointed to the Vertical Speed Indicator, which was indicating momentary climbs and descents … as the airplane climbed and descended. Then he showed that the altimeter was moving as well, as if the altitude was changing … which, conveniently, it was. I pointed out that everything was happening exactly as it should with a diplomacy that was, well, sans pareil.

Then he went on to point out that the airspeed indicator was broken, because he was only making 90 knots at full power. At 10,000 feet, with mixture set to full rich. I suggested that he either lean the mixture or just turn on the Automixture feature in FSX, and he said "Why on earth would I want to lean the mixture?!?!"

"Because of your altitude…? It’s common practice to lean a piston engine above 3,000 feet, otherwise it will continue to lose power as you climb," I replied.

"Well, I’ve never heard of such of thing. I never touch the mixture when I fly, and I’ve flown for years!"

What was there to say to that?

We’ll leave that in the rhetorical category, and close with a few pictures:

 

Those of you that read my post on FSInsider entitled Of Jetpacks and Autogiros knew that I was especially looking forward to seeing the unveiling of the Martin JetPack, which happened on Tuesday morning at Aeroshell Square. The area was packed and, unfortunately, there was no clear indication as to where the event was actually going to unfold. The area is also very flat, so, unless the event were to have unfolded within just a few feet of me, there’d be no chance of seeing anything over the heads of those around me. Eventually, there was some general commotion about 50 feet away, and then Glenn Martin of Martin JetPacks gave a brief introduction and unveiled something that I couldn’t see from where I was standing. It wasn’t long before I could hear it, however, as could most of the greater Winnebago county area, as this particular jet pack is actually powered by a 200hp 2 stroke engine, driving a pair of ducted fans. From where I was standing, it sounded like what I’d imagine it would sound like to wear a gas-powered weedeater as hat. The noise, however, along with the technical absence of a jet and the inevitable bulk of the thing really don’t detract from its sheer that-looks-like-fun-itude. Check out EAA’s coverage here:

http://www.airventure.org/2008/4wed30/jetpack.html

And speaking of coverage, while jockeying for and failing to get into a position for a better view of the goings-on, I bumped into somebody. Actually, that’s not true. We were wedged together in the crowd, and it wasn’t until the crowd ebbed an inch or two and we actually weren’t connected at the shoulder that this person noticed me and said "Hi Hal!". As it happens, it was a young man named Pete Muntean. We first met Pete at Oshkosh 10 years ago, when he was a slightly shy and exceedingly sharp kid that hung around the Flight Simulator booth. All day. Unlike some of the "full-timers" at shows, however, Pete was a huge help, and could do anything we asked in the sim while we talked through our demos. Over the years, we’ve seen Pete turn from a nice kid into a good man, in spite of some terribly tough times. Pete’s a pilot now, going to school, and his latest adventure of many is an internship with CNN, lugging a camera around behind Miles O’Brien. If you happen to see CNN’s coverage of the event, and notice something unusually artistic about some of the crowd shots, it’s because Pete let me push the red button on the camera, allowing me to add "yeah, I shot some B-roll for CNN" to my curriculum vitae.

In keeping with the retro-futurist theme of the day, I had a good look at the Terrafugia Transition, one of the more solid attempts to attack the "roadable  aircraft problem" in several years. I’ll believe it when I see it fly, but it does show considerable promise. Even though the simulator model they’ve released for download is designed for X-Plane … And speaking of flying cars, I got a chance to catch up with my friend Greg Herrick of Aircraft Owner magazine and the Historic Aviation catalog. Greg’s jaw-dropping aircraft collection includes an original and flyable Taylor Aerocar among other gems. One thing I’ve missed if it’s here is the Super Sky Cycle – hopefully, I’ve just not seen it yet, along with other things I’ve somehow missed like the free lunches in the sponsor tent and the air show just about every day.

After another satisfying day of customer questions ("Can I run it on my Mac?", "Does this thing do instrument approaches?", "Is there a ‘show special’ price?", "Does it model a Tubman 601?", etc.), the gaggle of us flopped on the grass in front of a giant inflatable movie screen for the premiere of Speed and Angels. It was great to see it on the big screen under the stars. Rather, it was great to see two thirds of it on the big screen under the stars, before the stars were slowly replaced by cumulonimbus clouds, and a bit of rain, at which point they pulled the plug, promising to show the rest of after the next night’s movie. That was a disappointment, even though a few of us have owned the DVD for about a year. Not seeing the ending because they decided to stop the movie was certainly better than not seeing the ending because lightning decided to strike me, so I didn’t complain too loudly when we caught up with Paco and company in the Hilton’s Lindbergh Lounge later that night.

I didn’t complain too loudly about the movie that is. No, my too-loud barroom complaining was reserved for things like the government, people who don’t "get it", and these kids today with their iPods and text messaging. And, maybe sometime soon, their flying cars and their JetPacks.

The lucky punks.

It was  a good day. The Flight Simulator  booth opened officially at 9:00 AM, to a disturbing lack of last minute crises. The hardware and software worked all day, nothing overheated, the 100% CoolPlus Hang ‘Em Dry Space Age Moisture Wicking technology of our new trade show shirts wicked as promised.

Speaking of shirts, here’s a tip for anyone preparing for an event like this (not that there are any): don’t go out of your way, as I unwittingly did, to make your shirts the same color with the same color embroidery as the event staff. Unless, like me, you think it’s actually an odd sort of fun to give strangers rides to and fro in a golf cart. The best part is when it finally dawns on them that I’m not event staff, that I’m just some guy from Microsoft who said yes when they asked for a lift. My favorite fares of the day were the guys that I named "the three mugs from Philly." They flagged me down, and one of them said "Yeah, where do they keep the vintage aircraft?"

The answer was "turn right and go half a mile." What I said was "Ok, just tu-" at which point Mug 1 interrupted with "Oh for cryin out loud!  You could drive us there in the time it’s gonna take you to friggin’ explain it." I took a breath, said nothing, took another breath and said "Why not?" On the drive, Mug 2 reported that he was glad to be on the trip to "geddawayfromdawife", and that when he told her he was planning to come to the show for a few days, she strongly suggested that he stay for the entire week. Mug 3 managed to earn the trip for all of them when, (at my urging), he told me that it was "wicked cool" of me to give them a lift.

As it always does, the landscape of the show morphs as more airplanes arrive, and, surprisingly, some actually leave. Boeing’s modified 747 Dreamlifter, a landscape unto itself, was the largest arrival, easing into Aeroshell square with with the steady patience of continental drift while a DC-3 called Duggy smiled nervously. At least one USMC Harrier came in, hovering on a smokey pillar of racket, as did more Mustangs, homebuilts, antiques and classics. Our friend Stephanie Allen of the Washington Pilot’s Association, along with her husband Rich, brought their ’58 Bonanza, and their ’69 Cessna 172, unquestionably the prettiest 172 in existence. Stephanie told me this evening that she actually removed the engine in order to detail it for the show. Addison Pemberton’s Boeing 40C was on display, looking nothing but pleased to be flying again after an 80 year nap, and the Tiger Moth count was increased to three.

At the booth, a gentleman came up with what ended up being the single most satisfying version of the "will this simulator software of yours run on my computer?" question I’ve ever had. When I asked him what kind of computer he had, he just said "here" and handed it to me. Even better, it was remarkably well equipped for a laptop that had been purchased by somebody who didn’t have Flight Sim in mind at the time.

It’ll run just fine, sir.

I met a nice Canadian fellow (that’s almost a redundancy, but I do know a few that are a little rough around the edges) who confessed to being a fan of the FSInsider newsletter. This was convenient for me, since I was naturally a fan of his collection of L-29 jets, and his previous career flying the magnificent Martin Mars firebombers in British Columbia.

The person I was happiest to meet, however, didn’t actually own or have access to an airplane I wanted to fly. It was a young man named Kevin Query, whom we called out briefly on FSInsider last January. Kevin, an 8th grader at the time, took it upon himself to go and visit the oncology ward at his local hospital, and brought a laptop running Flight Simulator that he started using to educate, entertain, and distract the patients, taking them on virtual flights all over the world. What began as a simple idea and a nice gesture has become a rapidly growing program that’s expanding to help bring Kevin’s idea to hospitals in other areas around the country. It was my pleasure to meet Kevin face to face, to load him with a bit of swag, and to take him shopping at the CH Products’ booth (See the picture at right: Kevin Query, seated, and Michael Sexton of CH Products). You can learn more about what Kevin and his supporters are up to at the aptly named Sky High Hope website.

Tomorrow opens with a jetpack and closes with Speed and Angels. The AirVenture continues …

So much so, that I the hotel’s wi-fi can’t get to it. The tubes are clogged! I’m using my phone to publish this, since the laptop can’t seem to get anywhere. I tried uber-geek plan B, tethering the phone to the laptop to connect, but it turns out that cell phones are popular as well – data from the phone is slow and inconsistent.

Here’s to better connectivity tomorrow, and to letting my mobile pics tell as much of the story as they can.