Glorious Action

I work in the Gulf Coast Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) liaison's office on Texas A&M campus. The current liaison is Dr. Louise Hose. She has her pilot's license. She has her own plane. Do you see where this is going?

I was able to engage today in one hour of life filled with glorious action. Louise took me flying! It was grand. She told me she had a little plane. I thought I can do little. I did little when I skydived. Her plane is really little. As we were walking on the tarmac to where the private planes were parked, there was a somewhat uniform type of plane except for one that looked like it was something you'd fly by remote control. That was her plane. I wish I had gotten a picture of her plane against some of the other ones for size comparison. Anyway, we did the pre-flight inspection, I climbed in, and off we went, into the wild blue yonder!

Louise did a very thorough inspection before we took off. I learned some plane terminology and technology. One thing that was cool about her plane, and you can see in the photo above, is that the third wheel is in the back. All the other planes around hers had the "tricycle" type wheels, where the three wheels are under the main body/wings of the plane.

You really can fit two people, side-by-side, in there.

We flew around campus a couple times before heading farther northeast. It was a bit cloudy and rather smoggy but the view and the feeling of freedom was grand. Above is a picture of Kyle Field and the sports training complex (white roofs).

I even got to try my hand at flying. (Notice the broken sunglasses that I balance on my right ear.) It was a very sensitive plane. Louise said it is the type that is often used for stunts, and that her plane was capable of stunts. She had me try to maneuver a 180 degree turn while maintaining altitude, and once hitting 180, fly straight at altitude. It was really hard! There were a lot of dials and gages to watch all at once and took serious concentration.

I did get slightly queasy as we headed back to the airport, but it passed. In all, it was a glorious hour of life!