LOE 2008

 

 

There were weather issues for LOE08 that held attendance down to around half the normal number of airplanes. Depending on the direction one came in from there were forecasts of severe thunderstorms and strong winds, including strong direct crosswinds at Santa Teresa. As it turned out, although I believe it rained every day, all the rain was brief and weather wasn't really a factor except for some folk's trips home. The photo above shows Paul Dye, shortly after arrival on Friday, displaying the capabilities of the new GRT synthetic vision system as Paul flew by El Capitan, in the Guadalupe Mountains.



Cookie lady Tanya Card greeted many of the early arrivals with gifts. Good cookies and a choice of kinds.

 
 

 

We all have our crosses to bear. We know that if a local RV buddy offers to loan a car that it may be just about anything, including something British.

This RV-8 garnered a lot of interest
 
I called it the Green RV-8. The thing is there are are details all over the airplane that make it interesting. One of the most intricate paintjobs you will ever see was just one factor.



 


 

 

 

The front of the War Eagles Museum is a gathering spot
 

 

Friday Night Sunset

 

Doug Reeves has said that this is the fly-in about nothing, but I think it is really the fly-in about talking

 

Rosie holding court

 


 

V8 engine in the Fieseler Storch

 



 

The women RV pilots that I knew of that were in the area at the time. We missed regular attendees Judy and Trish. Left to right, the elite of the elite: Bonnie, Katie, Louise, Claudia, Mercedes and Tanya.

 

 

On Saturday a bunch of us visited Kilbourne Hole, a volcanic crater. Last year we tried to go here but ended at the nearby Hunt's Hole. Kilbourne is impressively deeper and larger.

 
 

Ejected volcanic rock imbedded in ash beds

 


Look close and you can see Jay Pratt, in white, way down in the bottom. He was the only one who went all the way down.
  

 

 


A Red-tailed hawk was taking advantage of the only relief in the area, the crater rim, to ridge soar back and forth.

 

You may notice that the Kilbourne Hole area is a bit desolate. It is a lot of miles on rough dirt and sand roads to get here from Santa Teresa airport.


Accordingly, we were taken aback to find that the keys to the rental jeep had been locked in the vehicle. The thing is that these RV folks have lots of skills, some picked up on the job and some picked up during a misspent youth. Not sure which was more applicable here.

We made a tool inventory. No one had didly squat; no Leatherman, no pliers, no adjustable wrench, nothing. The remaining rental car did have the tire tools so first an attempt was made to loosen the radio antenna using the hole in one of the tools. The hole WAS THE RIGHT SIZE amazingly, but there was no clearance to turn it because the hole was in the middle of the tool.

A couple of us drove over to where we had seen a pickup parked on the crater rim. We found a very nice young couple from the area. OK, a local pickup,  has to be some tools there, right? The pickup bed did have some tools along with a bunch of rock samples. There was a sledge hammer and a rock pick and not another tool in the vehicle. Turns out the guy was a geologist; shows where his priorities were.

The woman rummaged around in the vehicle and came out with a couple of wires with the little red flag on the end, like you would use to mark something on the ground.

The little flag stake along with a tire iron were sufficient for our experts to accomplish the break-in. Whew!



 

Please let it work, please let it work!

 

During social hour before the Saturday banquet, a thunderstorm cell approached

 


 

Thunderstorm cell before the Saturday banquet

 

 

 

 

A factory airplane double fatality accident just before the banquet put a damper on things but we all still need to carry on. I think these moments make us all reflect and one of the things I think about is that we need to use every day and live. We also need to do our best to make good decisions. There is an element of danger in speed and in doing the unusual. Whether that is justified or not is a personal choice. I am very sorry for the families.

 

DC-3 in the War Eagles Museum

 

Hard to find a better setting for a banquet than this, the finest stained glass can't compete

 

 

Red addressing the congregation



The money raised by the raffle was almost the same as the years when there was a lot more attendance. Part of that must be the efforts of Paul Rosales to accomodate those who didn't attend but who wanted to buy tickets. Way to go Rosey!

I think another part was that those attending tried to make up the difference by buying more tickets. There were some multiple winners, probably because of the number of tickets they bought.

I was lucky to win a prize this year after winning one last year, and I don't buy that many tickets.

It was nice to have some of the kids present who are benefited by the raffle and they seemed to enjoy the tee shirts from the running of the Pauls.





Sunset from the banquet site on Saturday

 

 


Some people had some trouble getting home on Sunday, but the moisture made for pretty flying.

 
 
The two photos above are of parts of the Cornudas Mountains, between El Paso and the Guadalupe Mountains. They are similar to Devil's Tower in that they are igneous intrusions that were uncovered by erosion. There are a bunch of these west of Dell City.

 

The trick going east out of El Paso was to get around the weather while staying clear of the restricted areas to the north and Mexico to the south. This is a case where XM weather was showing less than was actually there. The rain extended quite a bit further than was shown.

 


The ceiling around El Paso was very high, maybe around 13,000 feet so I thought I might be able to fly straight home over the Guadalupe Mountains. As you can see, the mountains were obscured, although a bit of El Capitan was showing. I had to fly through Guadalupe Pass, which had plenty of clearance.

 


As I flew along the south escarpment of the Guadalupe Mountains there were beautiful upslope clouds. This is the Double Canyon area of Carlsbad Caverns National Park.

At this point I was minutes from home and saying good-by to RV friends that I hope to see again at LOE 09.


Larry Pardue

Carlsbad, NM

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