April 23, 2013 Sun 'n Fun

The Liberty Gazette

April 23, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: Just back from Lakeland, Florida, where Sun ‘n Fun, the world’s second-largest fly-in logged another year of fun with airplanes. Last year I joined ForeFlight, maker of the best-selling aviation app ever. This was my first major airshow/fly-in to attend as a team member of this premier aviation company, and I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Of course, with airplanes and aviation fanatics all around what’s not to enjoy? But representing a winner added another dimension to attending an already exciting event.

The six-day long fly-in is a place where air shows happen day and night and many sellers and manufacturers announce new products and features, and pilots fly in to find a good deal, a "show special" price on something they’re thinking of buying.

Hanging out in Hangar C next to us was the world’s largest pilot supply shop, Sporty’s, of Batavia, Ohio and a simulator company on the other side. David Clark headsets and NFlight Cam/Go Pro sat across from us and Aero Shell just another booth over. Any one of these companies attracts a large crowd, and the ForeFlight team spent an incredibly busy six days showing how our great app works on iPads and iPhones.

Some customers were young students who had told their parents about ForeFlight and how it would help them with their flying lessons, and so the parents came to see what it was all about. Once I demonstrated how much the app could do, pre-flight planning, getting a weather briefing and filing a flight plan, en-route information for communication, weather, winds aloft, traffic, fuel availability and prices, important phone numbers, and so much more, parents, each and every time, would turn to their child and say, "We are getting this for you!"

Many existing customers – airline pilots, military pilots, corporate and freight pilots, leisure pilots and student pilots – came by just to say hello, and "I love your product!" Often they just wanted to shake a hand and see the people behind the thing that has, as I heard so often last week, "changed the way we fly."

Speaking of winners, Mike and I had just raced the first Sport Air Racing League race of the 2013 season two days before I left for Sun ‘n Fun. Kevin Eldredge, who races the famous NXT race plane, "Relentless" well over 300 mph at the Reno Air Races, raced with us that weekend and was heading to Florida when he had an engine failure and put the airplane down safely in a farmer’s field in Louisiana. I saw the emails asking if anyone could stop and give Kevin a ride to Lakeland. Three days later Kevin walked through the doorway of Hangar C asking, "Did you hear what happened?" I said yes and gave him a big hug, happy to see him.

In the air or on the ground, it’s rewarding to be part of a winning team. Working with the best and brightest in the industry, brilliant people and cutting edge technology, has been a major switch for me in this mid-life career change from the corporate paralegal profession. Now I can say the sky’s the limit.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

April 16, 2013 Million Dollar View

The Liberty Gazette

April 16, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: Sitting at his desk our friend Jerry interrupts his telephone conversation, his eyes following a German ME-262 as it makes a low pass down the runway. As the WWII jet fighter disappears from sight he apologizes to the person on the other end of the line for his momentary distraction. What Jerry sees out the big picture windows of his office that overlook the ramp and runways of Ellington Field is what I call the "million dollar view" and every day brings something new that would jazz any pilot or airplane enthusiast.

Each airport has its own viewing value for the aviation spectator and depending on location that setting might be worth $20 thousand or $20 million, yet one doesn’t need to spend a fortune for an office on an airport to enjoy such scenery.

At Houston Hobby airport for instance, the city has set up observation areas adjacent to the approach end of the runways on the northwest and southeast sides of the airport. I often see people parked, eating lunch as airplanes come and go. Similar observation areas have been created at airports around the country. Ft. Lauderdale International and Ft. Lauderdale Executive airports in Florida offer picnic tables, and the radio conversations between the tower controllers and the pilots are piped through a public address system. An inexpensive scanner-type radio from RadioShack could provide the same opportunity to listen in.

While Ellington offers almost a constant stream of military and NASA aircraft, Galveston has a patio area near the ramp where people can watch the oil rig helicopters come and go, and planes from the Lone Star Flight Museum take flight. David Wayne Hooks airport in Tomball has a café with windows facing the ramp and runways and a park with a lake where the ducks will happily take your food scraps. Liberty may not have the traffic volume these other airports do but the beauty of this is that each airport is different; imagine sitting at a picnic table, sipping on a soda as a bright yellow J-3 Cub makes its way around the pattern practicing takeoffs and landings.

In Phoenix I used to ride my bike out to the ramp at the Williams Gateway Airport. The view there was breathtaking, not unlike Ellington where a lot of military traffic performed impromptu airshows, but with the Superstition Mountain Wilderness all around, an almost vertical red and brown mastiff topped by a strange wind-blown rock formation called the Hoodoos. In Eagle, Colorado I’d sit by the fireplace in the lobby of the Vail Valley Jet Center watching aircraft landing against the backdrop of Rocky Mountain peaks alighted in Aspens regaled in full fall colors, and patches of snow here and there. In the Caribbean I’ve munched on fries at a small beachfront restaurant next to an airstrip while boats lazily drift along in turquoise waters of a half-moon shaped bay surrounded by white sandy beaches.

All of these are wonderful experiences but the greatest views I have had the privilege to behold are looks on the faces of little kids experiencing the thrill and wonder of flight for the first time as they look out those cockpit windows at the far horizon and imagining what lies just beyond. For a great example, search on the Internet for a video called Lainey’s First Airplane Ride, and you’ll see what I mean. It’s priceless.

　www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

  

April 9, 2013 Airplanes in the Movies

The Liberty Gazette

April 9, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: Inside the cockpit occupants are jostled about as the aircraft rocks and rolls and flashes of lightning surround it …and the thunder, oh the thunder. The young girl in the seat covers her eyes in fear. We see their faces clearly as if it were daylight, though this is supposed to be a night scene, and for some reason no rain streaks across windows to obscure the view of the their faces. The hero of this show is at the controls and will save the day once again. The film industry has come a long way in imagery and technology since those episodes of Sky King were filmed.

For scenes such as this which were filmed in a studio the "aircraft" was set upon a movable base and rocked and rotated by stagehands tugging on ropes. The background was a projection on a screen behind the prop (pun intended) to show motion. Linda and I will often watch the old children’s TV show, Sky King, just to laugh at obvious mistakes and some pretty bad acting. Technical accuracy wasn’t a high priority in the motion picture industry then and we suspect that is still true today, especially when aviation is depicted in film.

Linda: The movie and aviation industries have grown up together. The Great Train Robbery, the first motion picture that "told a story" was produced by Thomas Edison in 1903, the same year the Wright Brothers flew at Kitty Hawk. The airplane – that magnificent flying machine – would become a staple in the growing film industry; and those courageously crazy stunt pilots would become legendary.

Greenville, Texas native Ormer Locklear was one of the early motion picture pilots. Ormer performed stunts in cars when he was just a kid in high school, so it’s only natural that the daredevil in him would take to the new world of aeronautics, building a glider being one of his early endeavors. Then, as though it was not enough to train U.S. Army Air Service pilots to become heroic aviators of WWI, nor enough that he performed barnstorming acts to recruit young men for military service, Locklear became a wing walker so he could do "in-flight repairs" to the wings of aircraft. If you’ve watched old movies of wing walkers, now you know where the idea originated.

Over time stunt flying in the movies became a cottage industry even more difficult to break into than a career with the airlines or the Astronaut program. Movie producers looked for the most unique acts, and because of that preference pilots vying for those coveted roles became inventors with new, one-of-a-kind airplanes, or special features such as aircraft filming platforms.

Today’s fraternity of stunt pilots is still small in number but the aerial sequences they perform have been inspiring many people to learn to fly for over a century.

As great inventions and discoveries have led to gigantic leaps in the capabilities of the modern world’s aeronautical fleet, so too has technology in the Silicon Valley drastically changed the film industry. Computer generated imaging (CGI) has replaced a lot of the more dangerous stunts performed by pilots. While the acting in our beloved Sky King shows wasn’t the greatest, and simulated flight wasn’t too believable, when it comes to airplanes in the movies I’ll take that over CGI any day. And none of these will ever compare to actually being there.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

April 2, 2013 Sequester Prep, or, How Aviation Can Handle Stupid Politician Tricks

The Liberty Gazette

April 2, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: Lots of folks are asking these days whether airplanes can land at airports where a control tower has been closed, and if so, how that works. We’re happy to explain, but first understand that closed towers do not cause airplanes to fall out of the sky. There’s that thing about lift that keeps airplanes in the air and it doesn’t depend upon air traffic control towers, not one little bit.

That reminds me of a saying in aviation: If you’re making an emergency landing remember Bernoulli, not Marconi. Daniel Bernoulli and Giovanni Venturi taught us about fluid dynamics and how low pressure creates lift – flight. If you move your focus to the great invention of Guglielmo Marconi, radio calls to someone on the ground won’t get you there safely. First, one must fly the plane.

21-year-old Sarah Rovner did that only three months after receiving her private pilot license. The engine in the Cessna she was flying quit and she made headlines last year with her safe landing on Davis Street in Conroe. That’s because she kept her attention on flying the plane. Communication at that point was secondary, which brings us back to air traffic control towers and their role in safe air travel.

Sarah was planning to land at the Conroe airport when she had no choice but to land the airplane on Davis Street. She did a fine job and there were no injuries. If she had been able to make it to the runway she would have received a clearance to land that would have sounded something like this: "Cessna One-Two-Three-Four-Five, wind one-seven-zero at four knots, cleared to land Runway One-Niner." But if the tower had been closed (which it does nightly at 10:00 pm.) Sarah would have followed traffic rules that apply when landing at an airport with no tower, such as Liberty’s.

Mike: The standard traffic pattern is a well laid plan which provides for predictable behavior for all airplanes approaching a given airfield.

First, a pilot plans to land into the wind as close as possible. Since the wind doesn’t always line up perfectly with runways sometimes there’s a cross wind, but the goal is to pick the direction for landing that puts the airplane as much into the wind as possible. Determining that direction will dictate how to enter the traffic pattern. Imagine a rectangle, the runway being one of the long sides. The other long side is called the "downwind" side. To enter a standard pattern one would fly at a 45-degree angle to the downwind leg and then reaching about half a mile from the runway would turn exactly parallel to the runway in the opposite direction they will be facing when landing. The airplane would then fly a rectangle-shaped pattern so that when turning final there is enough room to finish descending to the runway, into the wind.

Standards let people know what to expect. Obviously knowing the wind direction is essential to picking the right runway. For that reason, airliners flying into airports without control towers (which they already do), must be able to receive weather reports from that airport. And while radios are optional at most airports, they are certainly a good idea so that other pilots in a traffic pattern can be heard making position announcements.

While air travel may slow during this political insanity, airplanes can still land at non-towered airports. It’s done every day right here in Liberty.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

March 26, 2013 Who's Up First?

The Liberty Gazette

March 26, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: The aviation world has been dealt some strange cards this past week and one of them may require a change in history books.

Considered the foremost authority on aviation history, Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft has been published annually in England since November 1909. We turn to Jane’s for detailed descriptions of every type, make and model airplane produced. The publication has historically supported the Wright brothers as having been the first to fly. But now in their 100-year anniversary issue to be published this year (three years were missed during both World Wars) they have changed their tune. Jane’s editors and researchers now say there is ample evidence to refute the Wright’s claim in favor of Gustave Albin Whitehead who flew his aircraft once in 1901 and again in 1902 – before the Wright Brothers flew at Kitty Hawk in December 1903.

Linda: The key to this is that the flight be both powered and controlled.

Around the end of the 19^{th century the Wright brothers were locked in a race against Samuel Pierpont Langley, then Secretary of the Smithsonian Museum, to be the first to fly. Langley’s "Aerodrome" was launched twice by catapult from a houseboat on the Potomac River, in October and December of 1903. The launches failed, the aircraft falling "like a sack of mortar" according to one witness. The last attempt was just nine days before the Wright Flyer lifted from the sandy dunes at Kitty Hawk under its own power and flew 120 feet.}

Mike: Langley was backed by Army grants while the Wrights had to find their own funding. Langley sought the limelight, fame and fortune; the Wrights hid from it. During development of their flying machine the Wrights sought information from the Smithsonian’s archives – their requests denied by Langley. After Langley died a close friend became Secretary of the museum and continued the rivalry for two more decades by refusing to acknowledge the Wrights’ achievements. Glenn Curtiss, who was in a patent war with the Wrights, was hired to "fix" Langley’s Aerodrome. Curtiss finally made it fly in 1914 so the Smithsonian claimed the original Aerodrome design was a success and shunned the Wrights.

Orville donated the Wright Flyer to a London museum in 1925, and there it stayed until the Smithsonian finally came clean on the real story in 1943. At Orville’s direction the Wright Flyer was shipped to the Smithsonian where it now hangs from the ceiling in the main gallery.

And what about Gustave Albin Whitehead? If Langley was set on keeping the Wrights’ names from the record books it stands to reason he would treat any competitor that way. I wasn’t an eyewitness but it could have happened just that way.

Of course, the official response from the Smithsonian at this time is that Mr. Whitehead’s claims don’t fly. Knowing this history though wouldn’t you think it needs a closer, less biased look? The experts at Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft seems to think so. Stay tuned, history lovers, there will be more to this story as the fight for first flight continues a hundred years later.

^{www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com}

March 19, 2013 In search of... astral power

The Liberty Gazette

March 19, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: "Let’s go catch a comet," Linda said to me last week. At first I thought she was kidding, but her friend Sarah was going to take off from the West Houston Airport and fly west until she saw the Pan-STAARS comet. It was to appear shortly after sunset just below and to the left of the small sliver of a crescent moon. So I packed up the GPS and met Linda at the hangar where she already had completed her pre-flight, fueled the airplane and was ready to go.

Hangar neighbor, Jeff, had just returned from a flight in his Bonanza and asked, "Where you off to," so we told him about the comet. A NASA guy, Jeff thought of joining us. He was curious where we’d go for the search and what altitude would be best for aerial comet viewing; Linda, on the other hand, would only respond with a claim that we were going to catch that comet and capture its supersonic astral power for racing fuel. After deciding to pack it in for the night, Jeff hollered over his shoulder, "If you get any extra comet juice bring some back for me." Linda of course had a price in mind, but was also prompted to broadcast that message and taunt our fellow air racers via a group email about how they’d wish they had comet juice in their tanks too, and perhaps they’d like to buy some.

Linda: What can I say? It’s good for competition.

Because of airline traffic at Bush and Hobby airports we took a route to the south of Houston’s busy air space but doing so requires careful attention to stay clear of a small airport called B & B Airpark where people intentionally jump out of perfectly good airplanes – especially on nice clear days – and the last jumps of the day were taking place from 15,000 feet. As we cleared the outskirts and city lights the sun was scooching down, tucking itself comfortably in to the horizon. It would be under cover shortly but its radiance would continue to overpower any trace of a comet for several minutes. Eventually we spied the sliver of moon, looking like the faint grin of a Cheshire cat saying, "Can you see me now?" From there we began searching for the comet and about that time radio traffic lit up as Sarah was climbing westbound in a Cessna and asked if we’d found the comet yet. Then a third aircraft arrived on the frequency, checking in with his position report, and now three intrepid airplanes flew their occupants trying to catch a glimpse of something that was only discovered eighteen months ago with an new astronomical tool called the Pan-STARRS telescope system.

Maximum sunset enjoyment registered as hues went from gold to orange to red to lavender to light blue to dark blue and finally to black. Taking our time we loitered about just west of Wharton, turning to and fro always keeping an eye on the moon and looking for the slightest sign of a feathery tail near it, but saw none.

Stood up by a comet, that’s a first. Still, the hunt got us out for a nice sunset flight, even if I do have to eat my taunting words later about that astral power fuel.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

March 12, 2013 Still guiding his town

The Liberty Gazette

March 12, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike:　Streaming lines of landing lights and strobes funnel in from all directions especially noticeable if you’re driving back to Liberty from Humble after dark on a Sunday, commercial air travel rush-hour, when airlines are landing to the west on any of Bush Intercontinental Airport’s three east-west runways.

Airplanes are marshaled through a system of arrivals that merge into approaches with precise procedures created for safety, efficiency, and orderliness. These "roads in the sky" have waypoints, sort of like signs except that you can only see them on certain navigation equipment in the cockpit, and all these procedures and waypoints have names, many of which reflect the locale over which they stand watch.

One such special waypoint is close to us here in Liberty. Where airplanes coming from the northwest make a turn almost due west they are at an intersection of radio frequencies emitting from transmitters on the ground. That particular intersection, which has also become a GPS satellite waypoint of the same name, is the marker that indicates where to turn for the final approach to Intercontinental’s middle runway, 26 Left, and where a descent may be made from 7,000’ to 5,000’.

Linda:　Why is this waypoint so significant? Because it is named after a very important man: Dr. Haden McKay. "MKAYE Intersection" honors the man who served decades as the town doctor and mayor of the City of Humble, until he retired from politics (but not medicine) at age 87. It was on that occasion in 1995 when then Congressman Jack Fields said that Dr. McKay, more　than any other single individual, was responsible for bringing about the city’s transformation from a small town with board walks and dirt streets to a modern community.　An avid supporter of the airport, he understood the great benefits it would bring to his town and was instrumental in making it happen.

Dr. Haden McKay joined his father’s medical practice in Humble when he returned from serving our country in the Army Medical Corps. The elder Dr. McKay used to see patients in Dayton and Liberty and would have to traverse the sometimes swelling waters of Lake Houston via a "low water crossing". The bridge you cross today to reach Atascocita, Humble, and beyond bears his name because where he saw a need he found a way to fill it. His son likewise discovered numerous ways to help his community, which is why you travel McKay Drive to reach the hospitals in Humble.

But for a more personal glimpse, my pop-in-law remembers Dr. McKay as "one for common people." He had concern for his patients, was stern but respectful, addressing others as "Mr." or "Mrs." Even my Mamaw-in-law, his nurse for 35 years, he called "Mrs. Street." Of the 4,000 babies he delivered one very special one he ushered into the world 47 years and four days ago today was my (late) husband, Mycol Street.

Dr. McKay loved helping people, hunting and fishing, and politics, but when someone from Washington paid him three visits to convince him to serve in Congress he declined, saying he was a small town doctor and that was where he would stay. It is only fitting then that a waypoint in the sky directing those who fly the big iron that bring thousands to Humble every day carry his name. From the love for his town, through MKAYE Intersection the good doctor-mayor still guides Humble daily.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

March 5, 2013 Life is....

The Liberty Gazette

March 5, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Linda: Funny, life is sometimes. Many years ago when one of my now grown children was a toddler she had some pretty extensive surgery and was in a body cast for two months. Nothing life-threatening, but crippling and definitely a challenge to deal with daily. Some of the ladies in our church got together and filled a basket with small wrapped gifts so that my precious little casted daughter could have something to look forward to, opening a new present every day she was immobilized. That was about 1985. I wasn’t flying then and didn’t really have any interest in airplanes. Being a mommy took all of my time and interest. I have some great friends like that who are devoted to their parental roles, for instance, a friend I’ll call Lisa (that's not her real name and I’ve changed all the names in this story for privacy).

We first met Lisa and her family when they brought their oldest child to a Young Eagles event, one in which Mike and I had joined with other pilots to take children for airplane rides. This happened to be a group of Boy Scouts and we all met at an airport south of Houston. Mike and I took turns taking kids up in our airplane while other pilots did likewise in theirs for this very popular and established program offered by the Experimental Aircraft Association.

While little Johnny was flying with Mike, Lisa and I struck up a conversation and have been friends ever since. She’s an attentive and creative, loving mother and I enjoy keeping up with her life through social networks. That’s how I learned her youngest child had taken a nasty fall. Her sweet little angel – I’ll just call her Angel – got out of their sight for only a moment while visiting grandpa in a hospital out of town. The flight from second to first floor was quick and it resulted in a broken leg. Apparently the doctors needed to set it in such a way that put her in a half body cast, from the waist fully down one leg and half way down the other.

I thought of my own experience with a toddler in a body cast and remembered the thoughtfulness of my sweet friends so many years ago. Several of Lisa’s friends quickly filled a basket with wrapped gifts so the little Angel would have something to open every day she’s in the cast, and supplemented that with a special gift bag for Mommy – one filled with encouraging verses, each rolled in a scroll – to help her take this one day at a time.

Back on the day of that Young Eagles event this little Angel wasn’t even a glint in her father’s eye, yet a connection was made through a great program that not only benefited all the kids who flew that day, but provided an opportunity to pass on a blessing. I hadn’t seen little Johnny since the day he and his Scout group came to fly with us. When we arrived at their house to deliver the gifts I asked him if he remembered flying in an airplane and when I explained it was my husband with whom he had flown, he gasped, the memory of that experience lit up his face as he recalled his first time to fly.

Funny, life is sometimes.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com]

February 26, 2013 Skunk Works

The Liberty Gazette

February 26, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely

Mike: One foggy Friday evening after landing and offloading my cargo of bank mail and cancelled checks I was sitting in the Piper Lance completing the last of my paperwork, parked facing the final approach for runway 8 at Burbank airport. Out of the murkiness loomed a mass of lights reminiscent of the eerie scene in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind when the huge space ship arrives. The mammoth Lockheed C-5A Galaxy arrived at Burbank every third Friday about 11 o’clock p.m. It landed and taxied up the other runway because there was no taxiway big enough to handle the giant airplane, and departed 30 minutes later. All the lights would dim to conceal the covert activity. Whatever it carried was not public knowledge. They had business with the Skunk Works.

When someone says "skunk works" people often think of engineers brainstorming in research and development operations under the cloak of secrecy. Such was the case at Lockheed’s Advanced Development Project which adopted "Skunk Works" as their official alias, a play on Al Capp’s 1940’s comic strip Li’l Abner where the "Skonk Works" was a dilapidated factory in a remote location with its "inside man" producing skunk oil. One day, according to the memoirs of Lockheed employee Ben Rich, an engineer came to work wearing a gas mask as a joke referencing the smell and secrecy surrounding a project there. When fellow engineer, Irving Culvert, carried the gag further by answering the phone with, "Skonk Works, inside man Culvert," project leader and engineering genius Clarence "Kelly" Johnson was not amused. Culvert later said that when Johnson heard about the way he answered the phone, he fired him but that, "it really didn’t matter since he was firing me about twice a day anyways." The name stuck but on request of the comic strip copyright holders Lockheed changed the name to Skunk Works.

This top secret factory at the Lockheed Air Terminal in Burbank was moved to their Palmdale plant in the 1990’s, but during WWII the airport was covered with netting replicating houses, camouflaging it while they built airplanes for the war, such as the P-38 Lightning, the fast twin boom tailed fighter that was so successful in the Pacific theater. It’s also the origin of the United States’ first operational jet fighter, the P-80 Shooting Star, a project so secret that for flight testing the P-80 was fitted with an artificial propeller so that if anyone saw it they would think it’s just another airplane. By the way, chief test pilot Tony LeVier was flying the P-80 when its jet engine blew up and knocked off the tail. He escaped and later test-flew other aircraft like the F-104 Star Fighter.

That factory birthed some incredible flying machines, engineering marvels, including the iconic SR-71 Blackbird and the U-2 Black Lady spy planes. The SR-71 has been retired but U-2s, the most difficult plane to fly in the Air Force’s arsenal, are still being flown.

On that Friday evening back in 1985 I later learned that C-5A was picking up F-117 Stealth Fighters, transporting them to a Nevada Test Range. Guess I did have a close encounter of some kind.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com

February 19, 2013 FAA

The Liberty Gazette

February 19, 2013

Ely Air Lines
By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely
　
Linda:　I subscribe to way too many aviation publications, even some that are government-produced. But grant me forgiveness if you will because those government publications I’ve seen as somewhat of a necessity, at least before Liberty had a full time airport manager with presumably appropriate authority. The FAA publishes advisory circulars on airport-related topics and one can sign up to receive notices on a vast array of aviation subjects. One such is the immediate notification each time someone files a request to invade the airspace with a dangerous obstacle. I’ve been receiving these notices for years now, always watching out for anything proposed that might be too close to the Liberty Airport. Our airport cannot and should not have to afford another obstacle sticking up in its protected zone. Yes, there is a protected zone. It’s called a Height Hazard Zone and it fans out sort of like stadium seats around the airport. The purpose is to protect both pilot and passenger in the airplane as well as people on the ground. Fortunately, there’s an approval process for such spears that reduce safety in the sky, however compromising it may be. The market for cell phones is big enough to carry some political clout, which means those of us who break the bonds of gravity must adjust to thousands of more-than-annoying aerial swords.

And then there are the frequently delivered notices of civil penalties levied against aviation companies for some alleged violation. This one has me very curious. Don’t you wonder where your money goes when it leaves you by law? When the self-aggrandizing Washington elites take your hard-earned dollars before you even get to touch them, and squander that money on who-knows-what (now much worse than measly $5,000 hammers) don’t you wonder what it is you helped pay for by getting up so early and going to work the first four months of the year? Well, I wonder that too, and I also wonder about the destination of the money paid in FAA fines, often by airlines and aviation parts companies. I typically see announcements of fines levied anywhere from $200,000 to well over a million dollars. I highly suspect, it being government and all, that much of this is political, and that not all of it is actually paid. So how much is paid, and where does it end up? Do these "revenues" go into the general fund, the FAA’s budget or some other dark hole? I’m an American citizen so I should be able to find that out, right? Well, keep barking, Sparky – so far, no luck. I haven’t submitted a Freedom of Information request yet but when I’ve asked the FAA I’ve been given the run-around. Responses that pass the buck and eventually try the "who are you and why are you asking" game that end up with "you’ll have to ask our government lawyers," are all they seem to be able to muster. So it leaves me wondering all the more, what have they to hide?

If these people who scheme and squander would spend that energy on honesty and productive work I doubt the fines would be much to question. Then I’d have to find something else to read when we’re not flying.

www.ElyAirLines.blogspot.com