November 29, 2022 Legacies

The Liberty Gazette

November 29, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: I was reading about Google’s private airport terminal at San Jose Airport near their headquarters. They have their own entrance, white-glove service, private security, and direct access to their airplanes. No need to shuffle among the rest of us; they’re special. If you’ve read our column for very long, you know how unimpressed I am with big egos. These self-proclaimed “giants” have done their good deeds and have chosen their rewards. What a legacy. In contrast, I asked Mike to share his memories of his grandfather. Enjoy a breath of fresh air.

Mike: My grandfather often sat on the patio with a glass of iced tea as he gazed to the southeastern sky through our tall backyard trees. He loved watching airplanes pass overhead every few minutes. They were on approach for landing at Los Angeles International. He always had the company of our family dogs when they weren’t out exploring the rest of the yard, and the desert tortoise was close by during the summer months. 

Grampa wasn’t tall, topping out at just five feet. It’s been nearly thirty years since he passed, but I can still picture him driving up the street in his 1973 Chevy Malibu with only the top of his mostly-bald head barely visible through the steering wheel. He attached a manilla folder to the visor to block the sun further down. He may have been short, but to many, my grandad was a giant. It the way he treated others. 

Grampa was a doctor. A general practitioner. During the Great Depression, he would accept chickens or eggs or some handyman work as payment for medical services, because most people then wouldn’t take something without giving something in exchange. But he was a firm believer in the Hippocratic oath, so no matter if he got paid or not, he never turned anyone away. Most didn’t have health insurance. Somehow, they survived, even without the government’s “assistance.” Mostly because people were generally other-centered rather than self-centered. 

Grampa served as a military doctor during WWII at a hospital in Hawaii for most of the conflict. He returned home to California and his family after VJ Day. His daily routine was to have breakfast with the family, walk five houses down to his office on Sunset Boulevard, and see patients until noon. Then he’d have lunch at home and see patients either at his office or the hospital into the evening. He also delivered my older brother, my sister and me. 

Grampa supported my dreams of flying. Not financially, but with the kind of support and interest only a grandparent can show. He did help me find specialists when I needed some extra tests for my medical certification. But mostly, he was just interested in what I was doing, where I was going, who I was becoming.

My grandfather never thought he stood head and shoulders above anyone, but I always knew he did because he loved helping people get well. That was his life’s work. That is his legacy.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

November 22, 2022 Grid Down Power Up

The Liberty Gazette

November 22, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

When Bob was in high school, he wanted to be a star college football player. He wasn’t looking for a party school, so he enrolled at The Citadel, the military college in South Carolina founded in 1842. But an injury prevented further participation in his dream sport. He earned a degree in electrical engineering, and after graduation, he entered the Air Force with every intention of being a big-time fighter pilot. But his vision wasn’t 20/20. He prayed and believed God had him right where he should be, and that’s when the military moved him to California. He became a systems engineer on the Minuteman Missile at Norton AFB during the Cold War. He was sworn to secrecy and could not divulge his knowledge about the threats of electromagnetic pulses, how they could take down our country’s electrical grids and kill lots of people. 

But after working many years in aerospace, and with an active prayer life, he realized that he must do more to put his knowledge to work for the good of humanity. How Bob Hall is doing that today is by serving in the Texas Senate, authoring critical bills such as nonpartisan SB-1606, relating to the resilience of the electric grid, to protect it (and us) from attacks by our enemies who would like us dead or enslaved. 

Senator Hall has authored this bill before. Four times. Every time, it dies in the State Affairs committee, where Will Metcalf of Conroe has been the chair. Who does Will Metcalf think he is? Why would Will Metcalf block a bill and prevent Texans from protecting our grid? Is he anti-Texan? Anti-American? Who would vote for someone who hates us and loves Russian, Chinese, and Iranian hackers? Please, tell your friends in Conroe and the 16th District about this.

Now, how this article came about is that Senator Hall took the time to travel to Dayton last week and present information about the threat to our grid and what must be done. Watch the documentary, “Grid Down Power Up,” at https://griddownpowerup.com, as if your life depends on it, because it does. 

Then contact your State Representative. In Liberty, that’s Ernest Bailes. 512-463-0570. Numbers for this Metcalf character are (512) 463-0726 or (936) 539-0068.

Tell your Representative that this is critical, and you’ll accept nothing short of a promise to get the Senate and House bills on grid protection passed in the House. We must make it clear that their jobs depend on it.

For those in Liberty, let the Liberty City Council know that you want our electrical grid protected. The technology is available. They’re already doing it in San Antonio. There are no excuses not to.

By the way, Senator Hall didn’t give up on his dream of flying. He flies his Mooney M20J all over Texas and beyond. It gets him to meetings faster with much less hassle than driving or flying commercially. And as you can see, the work he is doing is significant and important.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

November 15, 2022 Tool Schools

The Liberty Gazette

November 15, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

These days, there’s a lot of talk about the labor shortage. Before “the great resignation” began, there was already a pilot shortage. But that’s not the only career in aviation that has been starving to fill seats. Aircraft mechanics have been in short supply for a long time, too. 

For those who love being around airplanes and helicopters but for one reason or another don’t plan to fly for a living, turning wrenches is a fabulous option. The jobs pay well, all the airlines are hiring mechanics, as are non-airline companies, such as charter and private companies. Mechanics can also work independently, which suits some folks quite well. 

To earn FAA certification as an airframe and powerplant mechanic (hereinafter referred to as an “A&P”), a candidate may either complete a course offered by an authorized school, or work for three years under an A&P who has an advanced certification called “Inspector Authorization (“IA”). The candidate in that case would log the hours and have the IA sign them off to take the exams. For those wishing to specialize, certification to work on one or the other, airframes or powerplants, may be earned individually. However, candidates will still take a general written exam that applies to both certificates and then an airframe and/or powerplant specific written, oral, and practical exam. 

A few reasons one may choose to work as an A&P rather than a pilot are the cost of the education, the lack of age limits on professional work (in the U.S., airline pilots are forced to retire at age 65), and the fact that a mechanic doesn’t have to rely on passing a medical exam every year or taking check rides every six months to stay employed. It’s understandable that we want as much guarantee as possible that our commercial pilots are healthy and proficient, and it follows that one could argue that living in the nuts and bolts of the industry may be less stressful than dancing with the clouds. 

The A&P profession is an admirable one. Granted, there are some people who manage to become both pilot and mechanic, like Jed Keck of Dayton, whose illustrious career has taken him all over the world. Jed can fly them and fix them, both airplanes and helicopters. But if you wanted to pick just one, fixing aircraft is a skill that will always be in demand, even when the (God forbid) autonomous flight decks take over and all the pilots fly passengers around on drones (shudder) while seated at a desk, staring at a monitor.

There are three A&P schools in Houston: one at Houston Intercontinental Airport (MIAT), one at Hobby (Aviation Institute of Maintenance), and one at Ellington (Northrop Rice). For the kids in Dr. Abshire’s “Tool School” who want to advance from the sweet Beech 18 he has sitting on a corner lot along San Jacinto Street to professional training, we’re fortunate to be so close to these facilities to crank out the next aircraft mechanic generation.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

November 8, 2022 Air & Earth

The Liberty Gazette

November 8, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: Two of my greatest passions are flying and hiking. Carving out some time to get away from the ordinary business of life, I bask in both when we fly up to Amarillo. 

The propeller on our Grumman Cheetah pulls us through the atmosphere, that invisible mixture of gases that surrounds the earth. Our wings lift us to the altitude that gives us the best tailwind. The big Texas sky looks infinite. It’s the way air scatters the sun’s light; blue light scatters easily, so we don’t see the other colors unless light strikes water droplets in the air at a certain angle, producing a multi-colored arc. We saw no rainbows on our most recent trip to Palo Duro Canyon; the cloudless sky was a brilliant blue. 

Linda: The flight up there was Mike’s turn to captain the ship, and the decision on where to land was his. It’s typically pretty windy in Amarillo, but we have our choice of airports with different options for runway directions. At the big commercial airport, the runways form an X on the ground. This day, the wind was coming from the south at 18 knots gusting to 26, and the runway that is northwest-to-southeast was closed. That left the best option as runway 22, with a hefty left crosswind, rather strong for the light-weight Cheetah, which made Mike work to keep from overshooting his turn to final. But he had no trouble dipping the left wing and touching down on only the left main wheel until the Elyminator slowed enough to let the right wheel down. It was a beautiful, skilled landing with experience at the controls.

Mike: We settled in at a guest house with an expansive stone and wood patio. The koi pond was the feature attraction, and among the several seating areas, our favorite was the “street scene,” a bench under a short, vintage streetlamp replica. This serene spot contributes to relaxation and invites contemplation. 

The next day, we hiked the Lighthouse trail, rated as a “moderate” level for the average hiker. It’s the state park’s most popular trail, the one often seen on postcards. It was nearly six miles round trip and over 600 feet of climbing to get to the plateau where the rock formation that gives the trail its name resides. The last two tenths of a mile are quite an upward scramble. 

Linda: Exposed geologic formations give the canyon its stunning natural beauty. Stratified layers of sedimentary rock present geologists with natural “pages” to research and interpret. For the rest of us, the awe-inspiring aspect is enough. We savor the views flying over the canyon on the way to the airport and then hiking down in the depths. 

For our second day’s trek, we started on the Comanche Trail until it intersected the challenging Rock Garden Trail and then continued climbing steeply to the canyon rim. We’ve checked four out of 15 pedestrian trails off the list now. There’s more flying and hiking to do.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

November 1, 2022 Speedy Ways

The Liberty Gazette

November 1, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: On our way to the Stone Mountain Highland Games in Georgia, we flew by Birmingham, Alabama, and it reminded me of a time several years ago when we were delayed there due to lousy weather. 

We had left the airport in search of lunch, and as the rain poured, we noticed a conga-line of worms squiggling their way across the puddly parking lot. They looked like airliners lining up, following one another to land at Bush Intercontinental. The arrivals into Bush are especially busy on Sunday nights. It’s hard to miss the string of landing lights coming from the east over Liberty County in a nice, neat line. The worms looked just like that, nose-to-tail, so to speak, so we had a good laugh and dubbed it the “WORM ONE” arrival because all special routes, like departures, arrivals, and approaches have names. For instance, one of the routes to Bush is called the “DRLLR FIVE,” and another the “GUSHR THREE” arrival, hat-tips to the significance of the oil industry here.

But back to the Stone Mountain trip. From Birmingham, our flight took us directly over the Talladega Superspeedway. Our first inclination that we would get a birds-eye view of the famous NASCAR track was when we saw the GPS waypoint, DEGAA. Like routes, intersections in the sky have names. In the U.S., we use five-letter words which must be pronounceable as names for intersection waypoints, and as they tend to be christened with local flavor, I knew DEGAA must be near the Talladega speedway. Within spittin’ distance is the Talladega Municipal Airport.

There are other airports near speedways. I went to watch an old family friend race a few years back. All I had to do was fly south about 30 minutes from the county airport near Mom’s house to the Salem Municipal Airport and walk next door to the speedway. No excuse to miss one of the race drivers who had been a good friend of my dad’s since I was a little kid.

Mike: Ontario International was another one. The airport wasn’t difficult to identify once I spied the speedway just north of it. On race days, race driver Bobby Allison used to land his Aerostar there. 

Bobby started something when he learned to fly. He discovered the efficiency of personal air travel. Being the character that he is, he would land on a track if there wasn’t an airport nearby. Other racing teams took notice and started flying too. Such was the beginning of what is known as the “NASCAR Air Force.” They transport their drivers, mechanics, sponsors, pit crew, and families. One team has several 50-seat jets they fill up for each race, and they get their folks back home the same day. 

These days, most NASCAR teams hire professional pilots who undergo the same rigorous regular training as airline pilots. I’ve trained many of the pilots flying for these teams, and they all appreciate airports located next to speedways.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

October 25, 2022 Hey there, laddie, toss me a caber!

The Liberty Gazette

October 25, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: If every month could be October! Cooler weather, harvest time, fall flavors and colors, and festivals! We’ve been to the Texas Renaissance Festival, but this year, we experienced our first real Scottish Highland Games. 

Our Friday morning flight to Stone Mountain, Georgia, in the Elyminator required one fuel stop. We picked Meridian, Mississippi, as they usually have comparatively low fuel prices. It’s a naval aviation training base, and the FBO caters to military customers and civilians alike with free popcorn and ice cream as well as large and luxurious pilot accommodations. But we just wanted the “cheap” fuel. 

Mike flew the first leg, so leaving Meridian was mine. I happened to tell the tower I was ready to taxi just moments ahead of a swarm of T-45 jet trainers, heading out together for a practice party in the sky. As I pulled up to the hold-short line, which is just before turning onto the runway, I turned around and looked behind us to see the little group of jets following close behind. Having spent so much of the last three weeks at home with three rescue dogs who are always at my heels, it almost felt as though we hadn’t dropped everyone off at the sitter’s. 

The Stone Mountain Highland Games did not disappoint. Pro and amateur athletic competitions drew some awesomely strong men and women competing separately in sheaf throwing and caber toss as well as throwing heavy stones (like the shot put). 

Falconers brought their hawks, and Carol Anne Bailey from Red Creek Farm in South Carolina let her border collies show how smart they are, herding sheep and ducks through obstacle courses. 

We walked the paths through the forest to see 91 Scottish clans representing their heritage at tent stations. Throughout the park, we could hear several Pipe and Drum bands as they marched and played familiar tunes. I particularly loved the fiddle tent, where we found a relaxed and intimate atmosphere to hang out and tap to the beat of great fiddle music. Since I can never get enough of it, we also bought tickets to the Saturday night Ceilidh (pronounced kay-lee), a traditional Scottish shindig that includes Scottish country dancing, which is a little like square dancing, but without a caller. 

And the kids – oh, the kids! Highland dancers amaze me. They are athletic and graceful and so much fun to watch.

I was especially grateful for the Sunday morning worship service, and the name of Jesus being proclaimed at this public event. Truly beautiful.

Of course, there was whisky and so many men in kilts. Whether or not Mike wore one may remain a secret. All I can say is I don’t have pictures.

The weather was pretty bad here Monday morning when we left the Atlanta area, but fortunately cleared up before we arrived. I do love my Scottish heritage and the Renaissance era. The only thing they didn’t have then was airplanes. The rest of today’s world I could do without.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

October 18, 2022 Our Muscles Remember

The Liberty Gazette

October 18, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: One time I was sitting “in the back” of an airliner – where passengers sit – perusing the latest Hammacher Schlemmer catalog, when I happened upon a thumbnail image under a title that got my attention. The picture was small, so I put my thumb and forefinger on it and tried to expand it. Yes, I did. Muscle memory. When we do something routine, we tend to almost do it, even if it’s not in the right situation. 

When I was training for my instrument rating, I thought I was the only one obsessed with focusing on speed limit signs when driving, to be at the exact speed posted when I was abeam a new speed limit sign. I learned that this type of thing is not so uncommon among pilots. That is, we tend to encounter the memories embedded in our muscles, which can be amusing when driving a car.

For example, when driving home after work, a pilot who works for a skydiving company routinely fights the muscle memory to pull the lever for the flaps every time she approaches a roundabout. The roundabout triggers a similar feeling, where her mind is programmed that this is the time to pull up the flaps.

I have wished I could kick the rudder and lower the aileron in a strong crosswind while driving. Especially on a high bridge, like the Fred Hartman. Did you know that if you could make your car take off while driving toward Houston on the Fred Hartman, that you would end up right over the LaPorte airport? It points right to it.

And you boaters will appreciate the thought of “trimming.” Air behaves like water, so it’s no surprise that aviation has much in common with, and much derived from nautical protocols. To improve performance and fuel economy, you trim your boat, raising or lowering the bow, to make the boat more efficient in the water. Likewise, we move the trim wheel on an airplane to adjust the aerodynamic forces on the wings and elevators (the smaller “wings” at the rear of the airplane), which helps us maintain level flight without additional effort. Moving that trim wheel is something we do often during flight, so it can be hard to set that aside once we hop in the car. 

Entering an interstate brings that idea to another level. Increasing speed so that I’m merging smoothly with the traffic makes the pilot mind think of “V1, rotate.” V1 is the speed at which you make a decision in a multi-engine airplane. Traveling fast down the runway, about to lift off, once you surpass a certain speed, if you lose an engine, you have to know whether you would be better off continuing or aborting the take-off. It depends on many factors, one being the amount of runway still in front of you for landing. The decision must be quick, and muscle memory is critical – more important than trying to expand an image on paper.

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

October 11, 2022 Pilot Life

The Liberty Gazette

October 11, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: We’re on a roll from last week’s reflections on the language and lifestyle of pilots. One of the cool benefits of flying commercially is having a job that allows you to dine in Europe and be back the next day–and be paid to do it! Recreational flyers not to be outdone can boast about taxiing up to an airport restaurant for lunch. We just jump out and go in to eat. Loads of fun, especially when we take non-pilot friends. 

Mike: Another occurrence typical of this field is running into friends at airports across the country or across the globe. I crossed paths with a pilot I hadn’t seen in years while walking into the customs office at Toronto’s Peterson International Airport. Ironically, I had just been telling my co-pilot about this pilot on the flight there. We pointed at each other and shouted to our respective crew, “That’s the guy I was talking about!” Turns out, he too related our exploits to his co-pilot while flying across Africa the week before.

 

Linda: Here’s a fun one: “chocks out.” When on an airliner, or waiting to board, have you ever watched the line crew? They’re the ones wearing orange safety vests and headphones, buzzing around the jets. Standing in front of the airplane, looking up at the pilots, they hold their fists together, pinkie-sides touching, thumbs pointing out, then they pull their fists away in the direction their thumbs are pointing. They are confirming the pilot’s same gesture, which is the instruction that they’re ready for the ground crew to pull out the chocks. Chocks are like small parking curbs. They’re placed in front and behind the airplane’s tires to keep it from rolling. Funny story I heard from an airline couple. When not working, if they were in a noisy bar, when they were ready to leave, they signaled “chocks out.” An easy way to confirm that it’s time to blow that popsicle stand. 

Here's another one. I sleep quite well through turbulence (when I’m not the one piloting the aircraft). However, when it comes to sleep, here’s the other side of it. I have had dreams about taking off and having to dodge powerlines or taxiing through narrow streets or tunnels without scraping the wingtips. This is pretty common among pilots. 

Another difference is the public’s perception of women pilots. For those of us in the industry, it’s a normal, everyday thing, but we aren’t allowed to forget for very long how different the world is outside ours. When I participate in non-aviation social events or meet people in settings other than flying, women usually respond with excitement, like how cool is that that you fly airplanes? But there have actually been some men that exclaim, “No way!” Even in today’s world. That, I cannot understand. My father wasn’t like that. I bite my tongue and refrain from asking if they reside in a town called Bedrock and are fond of the phrase, “Yabba Dabba Do!” 

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com