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It wasn’t a bad week for flying, as long as you got up early and flew high enough to beat the heat. Afternoon thermals boosted moisture aloft to give fair-weather cumulus by late morning. Then one sat out the thunderstorm threat if a frontal disturbance was nearby.
I’ve found it interesting to read the “Forecast Discussions” written by National Weather Service meteorologists, found on the aviationweather.gov website’s “products” menu. Each NWS office writes an opinion of the day’s weather prospects; just click on the map outlines. You can learn a lot about how likely the prognostication is to work out.
Traffic moving through Butler this week included a nice 1968 Cessna Cardinal, up from Dothan, Alabama for the weekend. Also in were a Cessna Skyhawk from ATP Flight Training in Kansas City and a Piper Warrior from competitor ATD school. Locally, BCS AirTractors were on the job spraying crops, several students were up in the Cessna 150s, Gerald Bauer flew the club Skyhawk and Roy Conley was out flying his rotary-wing gyrocopter. The Fliars Club did not depart on the Saturday breakfast flyout, due to a convective Sigmet just south of us.
Nationally, it appears that we’ll finally have an FAA Administrator one of these days; nominee Bryan Bedford, CEO of Republic Airways, has passed Commerce committee grilling and his appointment as head of the FAA will be subject to a vote of the full Senate, likely a formality. This despite a company bio that calls him a “commercial pilot,” which he ain’t. He’s only a Private Pilot, having failed to finish his commercial ticket training while climbing the corporate ladder. He didn’t write the puff-piece, but as the boss he should have read it for veracity.
Early last month, the pilot and passenger in a 75-year Stinson died in a runway-excursion accident at Farmington, North Carolina airport. It was probably precipitated by a turtle on the runway, about which the pilot was warned by radio, and he reportedly lifted one wheel to avoid the reptile, losing control. Better to hit intruding wildlife than wreck the plane off the runway, if forced to choose.
In left-over business from the previous Trump administration, Boeing is supposed to be supplying a pair of Boeing 747-400’s for new Air Force One VC-25B VIP airplanes. Typically, the program is years behind schedule and losing money for Boeing, so it has hired a former executive from Northrup-Grumman to ram-rod the work. The new plan to finally have the planes ready by 2027, replacing the jumbo jets that have been in service for over 30 years.
Our last week’s question was about the designation given to the Air Force’s Globemaster II cargo transport, since we had just reported on the C-17 Globemaster III jet. Its predecessor was the big piston-powered C-124 that flew out of Richards-Gebaur AFB at Grandview. For next time, what airplane was built in the Fairfax car plant in Kansas City during the early 1950s? You can send your answers to kochhaus1@gmail.com.
