Woke up at 10:00 A.M.  Yeah, I can sure get used to this late-day stuff...

Venkat was flyin' with Van this mornin', and I heard they went up to Emporia.  Turns out that the airplane had a complete electrical failure this time...all electronics went out.  I guess it happened just as they were departing to come back to Chanute, so they just stayed there and waited for Jacob (a new/old guy who came in today!) to come and pick them up via car.

As these guys are waitin' up there, I'm enjoyin' the weather back here in Chanute.  75 degrees!  It was so warm that I even considered takin' my shirt off!  It was hot!

Jyri had gone for a flight to the south this mornin', and now that the Cherokee was down and out, I was goin' to head up with him this afternoon.  We started lookin' for a place to go in Oklahoma when a couple of other airplanes landed...a very long-nosed Cessna 441...and a Beech Baron B55.  The Cessna spewed out its four passengers and then took off again.  That is one of the loudest turbo props I have ever heard.  It was deafening when it turned to taxi!

The guy in the B55 stayed in his airplane...for about 45 minutes.  None of us was sure what was goin' on.  But as Jyri and I are plannin' our flight, I am beckoned by the secretary from the FBO.  "Hey, Andy, could you come help me, please"?

I guess the pilot really didn't know how to get weather.  hmm.  That didn't make sense to me considering meteorology is one of the biggest parts of learnin' to fly.  So I pulled up some current weather readings for him.  He was comin' from Tulsa on his way up to Spencer, Iowa...flying VFR.  He said he made it as far as Kansas City but had to turn back because of the clouds.  He was flyin' over the clouds up until that point, but they finally reached him at 9500...and they looked higher up ahead.  I later found out that he had his IFR ticket back in the day, but he hadn't flown in it in a couple of years...

So I pulled up some weather forecasts and current readings and even called the Flight Service Station for him.  Here's what I found out...

IFR from northern Minnesota to western Nebraska to southern Missouri.  Chanute was the last place of beautiful weather!  Visibility under 3 miles...sometimes under 2.  Overcast clouds at 900 feet.  Sometimes 600 feet.  With nothin' lookin' too promising in the near future...for at least 12 hours.  Not to mention even Chanute's forecast was callin' for 900 feet overcast in the next couple of hours.

But he wanted to get there really bad.  So I did my best to persuade him not to go.  I showed him all the IFR on the map.  I read him what the weather briefer told me.  Ice from surface to 10,000.  Light rain.  Mist.  Ceilings under 1000 feet.  Visibility 2 miles.

But he wasn't convinced.  So he kept lookin' some more...he found some marginal VFR places and wanted to try those.  They were often VFR only because you could fly under 1200 feet AGL and be in uncontrolled airspace.  When I told him that, he had no hesitation.  When I had obvious disapproval of his desires, he said...(and this is no lie)...

"That doesn't bother me at all.  We flew well under 1,000 feet in Vietnam..."

Well, there ya go.  And so began a half-hour conversation about his time in 'Nam.  Jyri was there with us, and he both learned that this guy used to pilot helicopters in 'Nam.  Ol' Sikorsky H-34's.  Off of the USS Yorktown.  There were 18 birds.  Only 4 made it back.  He was a pretty lively individual talkin' about the war, but as he described his fellow pilots and helis exploding next to him, you could see him remember the exact sight and then get real mellow.  He described the way the blades would stop spinnin' and then the huge fireball would then engulf the entire chopper.  "No, that wasn't cool."  That's all he said for that.

But he had the most delightful of times lookin' at the old helicopters, airplanes, and even his own ship on the internet.  I guess he didn't even know pics of any of these still existed.  He kept on sayin' over and over again how excited he was that someone had kept these.  Jyri was more than happy to keep showin' him more.

Well, I eventually left the FBO, and about 30 minutes later, I saw his plane take off.  It did a 180-degree turn right after departure, headin' back south.  I think that was his best move yet...head back home and call it a canceled flight.

And that within itself was funny.  He landed on Runway 18 comin' in.  Winds out of the south.  He left on Runway 36.  Winds were now out of the north.  The front had passed through.  And in a big way.  When I walked outside from the FBO, I had a rude awakening.  65 degrees.  Hmm...it later went down to around 45.  No more shorts.

Didn't fly today because the plane was down.  It's still in Emporia.

Met Jacob and talked with him a bit.  Somehow or another he owns four airplanes here.  Three cropdusters and a little Miniature Mustang.  I guess he flies just a few months a year, then goes and spends his cash the rest of it.  Not a bad gig if ya ask me.  But I guess the days are long during those crop-dusting months.  He looks like he'll be quite a character...

Had a slow night.  I was supposed to go look at a four-wheeler, but without a truck and no way of gettin' one, I had to cancel.  By the time I got a truck, the guy had gone to work.  So I opted for a run to Wal-Mart instead.  Nothin' a lil' chips and salsa and milk can't fix, right?

Kind of a long day.  Not much doin'.

Went to bed at 12:20 A.M.