The February meeting will be held Saturday, February 5^th, at 6:00 PM at Pizzaria Uno near the Scott Depot exit of I-64, Exit 39. Dave Groff says it is easy to find, next to Shoney’s. They have steaks, pizza, etc. Hope to see everyone there. It will be a nice gathering, as recent lousy weather and cold temperature has kept many of us away from the field for a few weeks. The first couple of weekends in January was reasonably mild, however, and many of us took advantage and got some air time before the bitter cold of winter returned with all it’s fury (see Doc’s article on New Years day flight to follow). While New Year’s day started with a little rain, and I had to work that morning, the afternoon and evening was great for flying. Heavy rains throughout the next week brought the river over the northern end of the runway, shortening the usable length by at least one third, but of course there was still plenty of room for our light aircraft to operate. The weekend of January 8^th and 9^th was again perfect for flying, even with the reduced runway. Mickey and Gretchen Watson’s new Tbird I had made it’s appearance at the airport a couple of days earlier, for final assembly and prop pitching, with taxi testing and a few ground hops on Saturday. On Sunday, it made it’s first ‘real’ flights, as Mickey first took it up for it’s shakedown and evaluation flight of around 20 minutes. After that, Mickey and Gretchen kept it in the sky most of the day, only finally giving it a rest when darkness fell. They seem to be very pleased with its performance and flight characteristics, and it certainly is a fine looking piece of hardware. Also, with this one, Gretchen doesn’t need a pillow to reach the pedals.

President Ron

    Ron Rife is serving as president of his flying club in Florida (sorry, can't remember the club name) while he lives there for the winter months. His vice president will take over when he returns north, just after Sun-n-Fun. Hopefully, their club members and area residents are recovering from the devastating hurricanes of last year, which caused untold millions of dollars worth of damage, including total destruction of numerous aircraft at the area airports.

Newsletter Contributions

    Many thanks to Curtis ‘Doc’ Pack for his article on the New Years Day flying, and to Dave Groff for his ‘What’s in a Name’ article. As always, all contributions and suggestions for the newsletter are greatly appreciated.

What’s In A Name?

by Dave Groff

    Are you superstitious? Do you believe in good or bad omens? If so, you may want to pay attention to your plane’s name.

    While you may have to stretch a little to find rain in “Skyranger”, I can’t think of any other plane that I have flown into rain as often.

    I like the Sparrow. The bible tells us that God watches over the Sparrow.

    Isn’t it funny how we name airplanes after creatures that do not fly. Examples are Kitten, Kitfox, Tiger, Beaver, Mustang, and Panther. Most of these seem to work out ok. I can only think of one that didn’t. Captain Rogers bought a Rotec Panther 2. It didn’t fly very well until I spent many hours making changes on it. E. J. Wilson, bless his heart, mistakenly called it a Planter. Although it was a good name for the plane, I had to correct him. After all, who would want to fly a plane called a Planter.

    I once flew an aircraft named Kasper Wing. It reminded me of Casper, the friendly ghost. Although there were moments, the plane didn’t make a ghost out of me.

    There is a company making kits, Murphy Aviation. I don’t think I want to tackle any of those. Can you imagine? Building one would be harder than it looks and things would probably go wrong just because they could. Then, when you have it together, you have to fly the darned thing.

    Titans are usually something big. Our Titan is the smallest plane on the strip. Sometimes we name our planes after things that we would never want to encounter. Examples are Typhoon, Hurricane, and Tornado.

    Pterodactyls and Teratorns are named appropriately. These are flying creatures that are extinct. Need I say more?

    Mini Max doesn’t really make sense. Mini is small, Max is the largest or most. However, if we apply mini to the plane and max to the pilot, it works ok for one particular aircraft that I know about.

    Weedhopper was another properly named ultra light. That was about all they were good for with the Chotia engine. I had a friend who had one. After he got tired of wrecking, he put a Rotax engine on it. When he asked me what I thought he ought to do with the old engine, I asked him if he had a boat. He said, “I guess I could make an air boat.” I said, “Wrong, I meant you should use it for an anchor.”

    Piper named their airplanes after native Americans. This was before the days of political correctness when everybody didn’t have such thin skin. Could they get by with it today?

    I don’t like to see our little planes named after military jets. It may sound prestigious to say, “I fly a Tomcat” or “I fly a Phantom”. But when people actually see your plane, they are going to say “R-i-g-h-t”.

    I like the names that come from mythology, such as Phoenix, Pegasis, and Icarus. The really great names are birds of prey, such as Eagle, Hawk, and Falcon. Additions to these, such as Skyhawk are ok. Even Chickenhawk would be ok if you didn’t belong to the WVFF.

    Some planes have really stupid names. Remember the Snoop? Even if that plane had been a good one, it would have failed because of the name. Quicksilver is another one. It is slang for mercury. Mercury doesn’t hold form, so you can’t make a plane from it. Even if you could, it would be too heavy to fly. The name has a nice ring anyway.

    There used to be an ultra light named P-38. Other than the twin tail booms, the only thing it had in common with a real P-38 was that it had wings. Not good!

    If I ever produce a plane, I might steal Cardinal from Cessna. After all, it is the WV state bird. I think I will stay away from Raincrow and water foul names.

    Does your planes name fit? Maybe you would rather not think about it and just keep flying. Have fun and fly safe.

First Flight of the Year!

by Curtis Pack

A few in the air included a Challenger, 4 Trikes,  Pterodactyl , Quicksilver, Minimax, Sky Ranger, T-Bird, Infinity  Powered Parachute, Zenith CH701.

So who flew the first fight at Leon Airport for 2005.  It was ….(drum roll)…….Darian Fields, in his Infinity Powered Parachute ! Darian took to the skies early in a light rain to stir the air in the New Year. Perhaps next year we will get up early enough to beat Darian to the punch. Anyone have an alarm clock set for 2006 ? 

Don’t Forget………..