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Merrill Field Vandalized

Those security fences and keypad locks worked great. No terrorists stole any airplanes.

Pretty disgusting but it sure doesn't look like typical random vandalism. Too detailed. No damage at Lake Hood, FWIW.
 
wireweinie said:
There are cameras covering those areas. Lets hope they show who was involved.

Web
Click to expand...

poor resolution

they are in process of laying fiber now..... good cameras but they didn't have the bandwidth to utilize them

http://merrillwebcam.org/all-cameras/
 
We can imagine that punching a blade into a tail dragger's or even a nose dragger's mains could be easy enough but this guy/these guys even got the 4 little mains under a 185 amphib. That takes some effort. Like I said, detailed. Obsessive. Not lazy and not a crime of opportunity.
 
Heard they lifted wooden tire cover boxes to puncture bushwheels.

I think it is time for Judge Roy Bean.
 
Be thankful the guys that got poked didn't get fabric slashed to boot..... think of the downtime then!
 
Also before you put them in jail or string them up put them in a forced job until they pay off each owner off.
 
Sure, it's over 87. Every plane on Whiskey gravel strip got hit, including mine, check your tailwheels too, even my crappy little one on my J-3 got it. Some may be able to be patched but some had sidewalls cut. Took a lot of time to walk the field punching tires, maybe it was a group of vandals.

At least tires are relatively easy to fix, could have been much worse.
 
Yea, just think of how drug runners make it difficult for cops to retrieve stolen planes they leave behind.......

I hate to give them any ideas, just imagine a knife and a BiC (not pen).

Catch them and find an old sheep herder to use his stock knife on them.......or maybe better a pig farmer?

Throw them down in the slop before you start cutting......
 
So who has it in so bad for GA in that area? Figure that out and you have a place to start looking. Or do you think it was just a couple of meth heads? That took a lot of time and effort.
 
There are anti airport radicals that live in the area. Another example of moving into an area and demanding the locals and or the surroundings conform to your desires.
 
As bad as this was I hope the response doesn't end up being worse than the crime but I fear that is how the state and people will react. There will be even more fences and codes topped off with making it harder for people to be close to aviation. We are seeing it here as well. It used to be fun to go to the float pond in Fairbanks and hang out, now you feel like you are going through Checkpoint Charlie into Berlin. I don't know the answers either but needless actions aren't going to help. Bad people will figure out ways to do bad things. The best response I have seen was on another web site quoted loosely in response to an idea of a class action lawsuit: " Lawsuits??? This is Alaska, fix it and move on." Easy for me to say, it wasn't my plane.
 
mike mcs repair said:
poor resolution
merrillwebcam.org/all-cameras/
Click to expand...

Interesting that they pretty much hit the only place without cameras, just the gate camera nothing else. Makes you think it was someone who knew the airport. Hope they get new cameras up quick.

Big thanks to Avemco for waiving folks deductibles and to AK Bushwheels for discounting replacement tires.
 
someone asked me about tubes in one of those 31 or 35's that got damaged at merril....
got me thinking on that…
tube with valve that exits side where valve stem already is or adapts in tire to existing one.. spacer over wheel center area to push sides against rim hard to prevent slipping……. cut out original center of tubeless tire to install this…..

also,


this idea would ELIMINATE tearing the valve stem out at low pressure.. which is the main reason for that center piece, as it would have stakes & ring in the end of it so it would spin WITH TIRE if tire ever slipped and would help keep bead from rolling off rim.....


as far as valve stem, make the air valve be inside tube with a small threaded brass tube that fits through center of original have with a normal valve stem sized nut on it.. embed it in a normal replacement valve stem glue on style.


to proto type, find a large tube, install in a damaged 35" or such, would need some way to simulate a rim, yet be able to air it up... then take guts out of valve stem on side of 35 tire and poke a hole in inner tube to locate where new valve stem assembly goes.


deflate,
now cut off and patch where original valve stem on tube was.
cut hole & glue on new valve stem where you poked hole
 
This well could be a crazy environmental group thinking they can stop or slow the encroachment into there wilderness, stop hunting, stop fishing etc etc., these are twisted folks with a plan. It isn't hard for them to find where the cameras are, go to the web site for MRI presto. This isn't vandalism , by definition it's terrorism and since the FBI won't do anything how about DHS jumping in and going after this and charging them when caught, as terrorist and sending them away for a long time!
 
Geez, I wonder if any of these miscreant(s) ever REALLY consider the ramifications of being caught by an OWNER?!?! Radicalism blinds the mind, I guess.
 
I figure it is more of a gang initiation sort of thing. If the environmental folks wanted to stop folks, sugar in gas tanks would be more their speed.

Scary thought
 
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