In April, two adventures occurred simultaneously. One by Steve Doll as he flew his Airborne Redback Trike and mastered new terrain and new conditions in the air and the other as a group ( Bret and Josh Shirley and William, Curtis and Matthew Pack) traversed the 7 miles of the old coal conveyor on foot to complete a long set goal. Here are their two versions.

 

A Tale of Two Travelers

 by

Curtis Pack

 

(Steve) April, 2000 - The old coal conveyor and silo (located just south of the airfield) caught my eye and aroused my sense of curiosity.  I first noticed them when I was traveling to inspect some land owned by a friend a long Tribble road.  The conveyor was draped across the land, traveling straight as an arrow, and seemingly going on forever.  At the time I wondered what it was used for and where it went.

(Curtis) Wow! Wouldn't it be neat to walk the entire beltway from end to end ?  We could Park at the far end and just walk this way. It shouldn't be too bad and we could get it done in a few hours.

(Steve) This same friend had mentioned small planes that buzz around an airport located where Tribble road and SR‑62 met.  I decided to stop at the airport on the way home where I saw the most amazing collection of small planes I had ever seen.  Once there I became attracted to ultra lights like a moth to flame.  I've got to get me one of those I thought.

(Curtis) April 2003 - It seemed like a good idea. The Old mine conveyor is 7 miles long and still mostly intact. It would be an adventure to take a few hours and walk the conveyor/beltway. A nice leisurely hike. So Saturday we ( Bret, Josh, Matthew, Mr. Pack, and myself) we drove to the far end and began our hike for the morning. Just a few hours of easy walking...................

(Steve) Curtis is walking the conveyor you say?  He mentioned he was going to do that one of these days.  I wonder if can see him from the air?  Probably not, but it will be fun to go look.

By this time I was the proud owner of an AirBorne Trike and was busy logging my flying hours and working on developing my flying skills.  There was some wind from the west, but not too bad.  Heck, I said to myself, I saw them flying in this stuff at Sun‑n‑Fun a week ago so it is clearly possible.  Besides, I need the experience in learning how to deal with it so off I went.

There was a bump, and some rocking and rolling as I turned east and headed up over the ridge near the old coal silo.  Well, this is certainly interesting.  The wind must be catching the ridge and rolling up towards me.  Maybe it will smooth out if I climb up and away from these hills.  Yea, right.

(Curtis) As we hiked through the mess left by the recent ice storm we could barely find the remnants of the belt way through the fallen trees, brush and overgrowth. We climbed in around and on top of the obstacles to make a path. Very slow going.

(Steve) I wonder where Curtis is?  I can see the conveyor alright but not a whole lot of detail from this altitude.  The thing to do here would be to fly over the conveyor at about 100', up close and personal like.  Let's call this Plan "A".  Well, I'm pointing East one minute, then NE, then SE, then up, then down.  Man this is a real roller coaster ride up here.  I'm just not in the mood to get real close to the ground right now.  What do you say we stay up here nice and high and enjoy the view.  Let's call this plan "B".

(Curtis) We are finding the going rough. Each encourages the others as we negotiate the terrain and wonder how easy it would be to just fly by and get a close look. At the half way point we see Steve flying over. It is odd he is flying this late in the day. It must really be still and calm. He looks like the eagle as we,  like turtles, are ground bound and slog through this trek. The high pass across the valleys are the neat part. Up to 125 feet high. I wonder why Steve doesn't come down and say hello. He probably sees us as ants trudging wearily along under his high wings.

(Steve) I flew the seven miles of conveyor out and back but I never did see Curtis and his friends.  I really didn't have any idea where they might be at that time of the day and I was really quite preoccupied with keeping the horizon level and the rubber side of the plane pointed towards the ground.  With all that on my mind I'm sure I wasn't really looking very closely.  Oh well, I said to myself, this is pretty good heavy air practice and it should be good experience for me.

As I came back over the ridge, with the airport clearly in view below me, I got another nice bump and a rather startling lift from below.  I though, man, I don't think it was THIS windy when I left.  Sure enough, the wind sock on the field was standing STRAIGHT out and pointing directly across the runway with the wind blowing directly from the west.  Oh great, a crosswind, and a strong one at that.  This landing should be fun.  After all, I HAD watched a video tape, I got from Randy Garret ,on crosswind landings so I had some idea as to how it should be done.  Of course, that was 3‑axis and this was a trike.