CloudDancer
Registered User
L. Ronstadt - J. Ingram Duet
EPILOGUE
The next four days were a fuzzy blur; a seemingly endless, two-cycle, self-flagellating period of internal examination.
Conveniently, Nome’s bars were only closed from 5 a.m. through 7 a.m., leaving twenty-two hours a day for me to sit morosely staring into glass after glass of Bacardi and Coke. Yet as hard as I stared and consumed the contents, time after time, the answers I sought within never came to me. Hour after hour I drank, until either fatigue overcame me, or the majority of bars refused me further service.
Then I would stagger back to my room at the Polar where, if I had the energy and coordination remained, I might remove my snowboots before flopping on the bed. Soon, after anywhere from four, to no more than seven hours of restless, dream-filled sleep, my eyes would suddenly pop open.
Splashing two handfuls of cold water on my face only made my awareness of my hangover that much more acute. So, I’d stumble back out onto Front Street and head for the closest barstool and a couple of Bloody Mary’s to make the pain go away, before switching back to my usual. And, two years before Tom Wolfe would make the term famous, I would then resume my inner search for “the Right Stuff”. For indeed, that’s what this was all about.
How could this have happened? Other guys crash. Not me. I’m too good
Correction. I was too good. Obviously I could no longer say that about myself. But, how? What did I do wrong? I could not, in my relative youth and inexperience at that stage. Recognize that the answers would not come overnight, nor from another glass of rum ‘n coke.
Friends and fellow pilots occasionally anchored up at an adjoining barstool for brief visits during which they would offer genuine warm congratulations on my survival and ask for a recounting of events. Then, sensing my inner conflict, they would discretely excuse themselves and go on their way. I guess I couldn’t even fake being jolly, and having a good time.
Somewhere late in the evening of the second day, Boyuk, having heard reports of my behavior went bar to bar until discovering me sitting in the Polar bar. He ordered a cup of coffee and we talked for quite some time, discussing......gee. I can’t even remember. We must’ve talked about the accident and the plane, I’m sure. And knowing him as I do, I know he must’ve been very generous in his comments. But mostly I remember he came to get me and take me back to Unalakleet, as he was about to depart for home in his Cessna 310.
Stating that I was too far gone (sobriety-wise, that is) I begged off. I do remember promising him, I’d get the first plane back after a good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast in the morning. I know I meant it when I said it. I don’t know if he believed me or not, but, characteristically of him, he took me at my word.
Probably the most important self-revelation of the entire period came on day three of my ashes-and-sackcloth sojourn.
I was walking along the north side of Front Street westbound on the sidewalk. As I approached a “T’ intersection a car was pulling up from my left hand side to the stop sign facing it just a few yards ahead of me. We arrived at the intersection at the same time and I looked to see if the driver was going to yield to me. There, sitting at the wheel of his El Camino was my old boss Dick Galleher who, along with his wife Joyce, seated in the right seat, owned Munz Northern Airlines.
I had left his employ only two years earlier and I’m pretty sure it was one of those “I QUIT ”, “You can’t QUIT I FIRE You ” deals. I had been his Kotzebue station manager and we had come to loggerheads over operational issues. Being as how he owned the airline, I felt I had no choice I guess, than to fall on my sword. We had not spoken a word since.
But, airline issues aside, I thought Dick was one hell of a great and honorable human being. And I’d been the guest at his family dinner table more times than I could remember. And each one of those evenings was special to me, having to family of my own anywhere within 3,000 miles. Essentially, Dick and Joyce were so wonderful to me, I almost considered them as surrogate parents for a time. I didn’t ever want to fly airplanes for the old bastige again, but I was grateful for all he’d taught me, and the time we had shared.
All these thoughts and more passed through my mind as I stepped off the curb and crossed in front of his car, the front grill and bumper no more than two feet from my left leg. I looked back and forth from Dick’s eye’s to Joyce’s, and back again, as they too looked into mine. My head swivelled, as did theirs, until I was past and turned to look straight ahead.
No doubt, they were both well aware of my recent aerial mishap. I wondered what they thought when they looked at me. I wondered what Dick thought of me. And then....BANG It hit me.
“I bet Dick and Joyce think I am pissed at them. I bet they think I don’t like them anymore Holy SHIT If I had died three days ago, that might be what they think of me for the their rest of their lives. ”, I thought. I couldn’t let that be. I had walked no more than five or six steps beyond the car as those thoughts raced through my mind.
Spinning on my heels I was surprised to see that, not only had the car not moved, but that Dick and Joyce’s gaze still remained fixed on me. I stumbled the three or four paces directly toward Dick’s closed window, relieved to se it rolling downward as I arrived.
I pawed at my right gloved hand with my left, as I leaned down toward the car. Finally I extracted a bare and sweaty handy to offer to Dick whose own right hand had left the steering wheel and headed across the front of his chest to meet mine. Still lowering my face to get closer and so that Joyce could see me, my cheeks began stinging as they met the rush of warm air coming out the open left window.
Dick, being pretty much a non-drinker, recoiled only the slightest as my rum, coke, sweat soaked, and malodorous breath blasted almost into his face “Ha-Hiya Dick ? How’rya
Joyce.” Dick replied “We’re doing pretty good Cloudy. Joyce and I just both want you to know that we are glad you’re alive and relatively uninjured.” And then I blurted out to them all that I had in my thoughts in the just the last few moments. “I just realized I’ve been given a chance to make sure something important wasn’t left undone and I wanted you both to know that.” I ended.
I watched some of the wary tenseness ease from Dick face muscles as I spoke, and then when I finished, instead of saying anything to me, he turned and spoke instead to Joyce in a low voice I couldn’t hear. Joyce nodded her head up and down and said “Yes, of course.” befor Dick turned back to me.
“Cloudy when was the last time you ate anything?” Dick asked, suspecting the truth. And ashamed and embarrassed now being more fully aware of my appearance, I looked at the ground and mumbled “Well....” “Where are you staying?” Dick now asked. When I told him I “had a room”, he responded with “Well. Why don’t you GO to that room and clean yourself up. Then be over at the house at five-thirty for dinner. Let’s knock the boozing off get the train back on the tracks son. You hearing me?” I looked at his face, and then at Joyce’s. The rebuke was ended. No recrimination, no self-righteousness, just a statement of fact and a offer of a steady hand of support. Typical Galleher. “Okay Dick” I met his eyes again. “Summa’ Joyce’s home cooking is just the ticket for me now, I think. I’ll see you in a couple.”
But, wise old pelican that he was, even Dick’s post-dinner counseling could not put my anxieties and self-doubt to rest. By 9 p.m. I was back looking for revelations in a bottle.
Somewhere on the fourth day my friend and employer decided that both he and I had had enough. He of waiting for my return to active duty, and I, of alcohol and self-pity. Boyuk showed up on the next barstool, and clapped me on the back announcing his arrival saying “Drink UP You’re outta’ here with me now ”
Realizing that the time was indeed overdue that I face the world again, I allowed him to march me to my hotel room to gather my things. Then it was non-stop to the airport and I collapsed unceremoniously into the rear seat of the 402 for the ride back to Unalakleet. I was dead to the world for thirty-five minutes, awakening only as the landing gear “thunked” into it’s down and locked position on short final for a straight-in landing to runway eight.
The spinning of the airplane on the ground at the end of the landing roll to turn around and head toward the ramp and office served to increase the turmoil of motion already present in both my head and my stomach. And, as we deplaned, Boyuk turned to me and spoke as he swatted my shoulder with the pair of gloves he held in his hand. “Go home ” Rest. Eat. And then rest some more. Get healthy tomorrow. You’re flying day after. Now get.”
And so it was I showed back up at the hangar almost 40 hours later. I was sober and rested, and while still not my normal old self; I was able to “put on” a fairly positive face at least, if not a happy one. Although I was genuinely happy to learn I’d been assigned a trip to return a family I knew to their village up in the Kobuk Valley, my old stomping grounds.
Less than an hour later I was airborne in the Ryan Air Cessna 206 heading up the coastline toward Shaktoolik and beyond. We were stuffed to the gills, including the belly pod. But the Cessna 206, with the same engine and wing, so out-performs it’s larger sibling (the 207) that you generally can count on an extra ten to twelve knots of cruise speed when the weights of the two airplanes are identical. I loved flying the 206
The clouds above me were not too low, about 1500 feet above the ground. And recent pilot reports from the twin -engines traveling between Nome and Unalakleet gave the tops-of-the-clouds reports as only forty-five hundred feet or so, but with very light mixed icing conditions and accumulation. Nothing I wanted to get into with passengers anyway, so I planned to fly underneath all the way into the Lower Kobuk Valley.
Things got interesting not too long after passing Koyuk. Snowshowers abounded, but with enough space between so that I could find my way, missing all the hills to my west until passing the Bear Creek area and picking up the West Fork of the Buckland River. From there it was just a few more twists and turns dodging several large snowshowers until Selawik lake’s south shore came into view.
I deposited my passengers and all their “stuffs” in the ramp area at the west end of Selawik’s lone dirt runway and restarted my engine preparing for the slightly longer ride home due to the southwesterly winds.
Upon announcing my departure intentions on the radio, I was pleased to hear a response from an old and trusted friend who, at that moment, was descending into the Selawik area from the west, having come from Kotzebue. I elected to wait until he “popped out” of the bottom of the clouds and was “visual” again before starting my departure. I knew I would have missed him taking off to the east and then turning right to climb upward, as I was considering doing. Of course, I would have needed to get a reasonably recent and local cloud tops report before doing so. Thus I was happy he reported that the tops in the vicinity of Selawik were only about 5,000 feet, an altitude my empty and relatively powerful Cessna 206 could reach in under seven minutes.
He did also report that there was “light icing” on the descent.
Okay. No passengers, only my ass at stake here. Good reasonable current tops report. I’ll check Unalakleet weather and forecast as soon as I can raise Kotzebue Flight Service after takeoff. I can save a few minutes and gas by getting on top and driving a straight shot back home to Unalakleet. If anything goes wrong, I can head for either Nome or Kotzebue, both having good weather and forecasts, which I’ll also update.
I see my buddy from Kotzebue, now a black speck against the gray sky in the distant west and feed in some throttle while pushing down on the right rudder pedal. My Cessna 206 spins to the right out of the parking lot onto the centerline of the runway as I feed in more throttle and now, some left rudder pedal, to straighten the airplane out and track the center of the narrow fifty-foot wide dirt strip. I was airborne about the time the throttle hit the full stop. After the flaps were retracted and I rolled out of the right bank that pointed me at Unalakleet, this baby was climbing like a homesick angel. As I had dozens, if not hundreds of times before, I willingly plunged my aircraft into the murk overhead.
Tuning Kotzebue’s F.A. A. Fight Service Frequency, I was “welcome(d) aboard ” by another old friend who also proceeded to congratulate me for my performance earlier in the week bore starting his weather briefing.
As listened to the comfortingly familiar voice I was watching the ice build v-e-r-y slowly on the windshield and forward facing portions of the airframe. With my healthy rate of climb, this was a no-brainer, even if we didn’t top out until hitting 6,000 feet.
So why....why were my palms sweating? And not just a little bit; I notice, as we are passing four thousand feet and I’ve never. Well. This is freakin’ ridiculous. I mean....what’s happening My palms are sweatin’ like a guilty man about to be strapped to a lie detector.
Boom All at once the clouds give way to brilliant blue skies and a full orange sun blazing away almost overhead. And the sweat in my palm dries immediately and ceases. We are just passing 4,600 feet and Unalakleet’s weather is reported workable and forecast to remain that way for a nice instrument approach on my arrival. I level at six thousand five hundred feet ant immediately the friction from the increased cruising speed along with my windshield defroster start melting away the less than an eighth of an inch of ice I accumulated on the climbout.
In little more than an hour I am back over Unalakleet and the town’s two runways lying thousands of feet below me. I call Anchorage Center and in short order have received a clearance for an approach to the airport, indicating I own the surrounding airspace until I report on the ground. I plunge my Cessna 206 into a thousand foot per minute descent entering the clouds almost immediately upon leaving 6,500 feet. With cloud bases reported by both the weather observer as well as my company at approximately fifteen hundred feet I and five or six miles visibility in snow I have no reason to worry and expect an easy, and routine approach and landing.
I am shocked to se that, as the ice again starts to form all over the airplane, my sweat glands open up and I get a weird feeling in my gut. “Come on man This is too easy ”, I told myself . But my psyche wasn’t listening apparently. I became even more anxious. I increased the descent rate to 1200 feet per minute, about all my ears could stand in the way of pressure change. The ice was accumulating a little quicker than on climbout and I had about a quarter of an inch on me passing through 2500 feet. But still. This was no big deal I’m in an empty 206, within a few short miles from my intended runway.
The sweat continued to pour from my palms and as I reached for the throttle I detected the slightest shaking of my right hand.
And then we were out of it. As advertised, at almost exactly 1500 feet the whole world came into view, at least for six miles in any direction. And four minutes later. I wheel my aircraft in line with her designated parking space and shut down the engine. Again I wipe my hands on the legs of my snowsuit. They come up, and stay, dry. I hold my right hand out toward the throttle. Almost steady as a rock. Hell, I’m never completely steady.
Looking out the window, I see only between a quarter and a half inch of ice on the wing’s leading edge. This is no big deal I tell myself. This is what we do. I did it just the way I was supposed to today. This flight was a well though out, carefully calculated, and safe operation with adequate backdoor “escape” routes throughout, if needed. The approach was textbook. So. Why was my stomach churning?
Fortunately there was no other trip for me immediately and it was lunchtime. I called Boyuk and asked if I could come over to his house for lunch. I told him I needed to talk. And over lunch I told him what had happened. In detail. I ended by saying that I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what was wrong, but I did know one thing for sure.
I was not, at least today, 100% myself. And I know that all my passengers deserve and are well entitled to 100% of my talent and skill at all times. I concluded by saying that maybe I better take a couple of more days off and see if I could figure it out.
My friend and employer listened well, and told me to go ahead and take the rest of the day off. Then, unbeknownst to me for the moment, Boyuk rightfully consulted with the other family member who were corporate officers of the company as well. All being immediate family, they had spent their entire lives as well around pilots and arctic aviation.
As did I, they knew that they too had an obligation to each and every passenger who placed their lives in the hands of a Ryan Air pilot. Given our many years acquaintance, given our friendship that had built over the months flying for them in a community as small as Unalakleet, their decision was personally painful for them. But the choice was not a difficult one. And so it was with deep regret and sorrow that my friend Boyuk Ryan came to me and said, “Cloudy. I’m sorry. But I think we’ll let you go take all the time you need. It’s the decision of the majority that you won’t be able to fly for us any more. I’m really sorry.”
“No problem Boyuk”, I responded sadly. And he said “I tried to...” and I interrupted
“Hey man. Don’t worry about it. I understand. You’ll always be my friends.”
But would I ever understand me again? Would I ever fly again
CloudDancer
The next four days were a fuzzy blur; a seemingly endless, two-cycle, self-flagellating period of internal examination.
Conveniently, Nome’s bars were only closed from 5 a.m. through 7 a.m., leaving twenty-two hours a day for me to sit morosely staring into glass after glass of Bacardi and Coke. Yet as hard as I stared and consumed the contents, time after time, the answers I sought within never came to me. Hour after hour I drank, until either fatigue overcame me, or the majority of bars refused me further service.
Then I would stagger back to my room at the Polar where, if I had the energy and coordination remained, I might remove my snowboots before flopping on the bed. Soon, after anywhere from four, to no more than seven hours of restless, dream-filled sleep, my eyes would suddenly pop open.
Splashing two handfuls of cold water on my face only made my awareness of my hangover that much more acute. So, I’d stumble back out onto Front Street and head for the closest barstool and a couple of Bloody Mary’s to make the pain go away, before switching back to my usual. And, two years before Tom Wolfe would make the term famous, I would then resume my inner search for “the Right Stuff”. For indeed, that’s what this was all about.
How could this have happened? Other guys crash. Not me. I’m too good
Correction. I was too good. Obviously I could no longer say that about myself. But, how? What did I do wrong? I could not, in my relative youth and inexperience at that stage. Recognize that the answers would not come overnight, nor from another glass of rum ‘n coke.
Friends and fellow pilots occasionally anchored up at an adjoining barstool for brief visits during which they would offer genuine warm congratulations on my survival and ask for a recounting of events. Then, sensing my inner conflict, they would discretely excuse themselves and go on their way. I guess I couldn’t even fake being jolly, and having a good time.
Somewhere late in the evening of the second day, Boyuk, having heard reports of my behavior went bar to bar until discovering me sitting in the Polar bar. He ordered a cup of coffee and we talked for quite some time, discussing......gee. I can’t even remember. We must’ve talked about the accident and the plane, I’m sure. And knowing him as I do, I know he must’ve been very generous in his comments. But mostly I remember he came to get me and take me back to Unalakleet, as he was about to depart for home in his Cessna 310.
Stating that I was too far gone (sobriety-wise, that is) I begged off. I do remember promising him, I’d get the first plane back after a good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast in the morning. I know I meant it when I said it. I don’t know if he believed me or not, but, characteristically of him, he took me at my word.
Probably the most important self-revelation of the entire period came on day three of my ashes-and-sackcloth sojourn.
I was walking along the north side of Front Street westbound on the sidewalk. As I approached a “T’ intersection a car was pulling up from my left hand side to the stop sign facing it just a few yards ahead of me. We arrived at the intersection at the same time and I looked to see if the driver was going to yield to me. There, sitting at the wheel of his El Camino was my old boss Dick Galleher who, along with his wife Joyce, seated in the right seat, owned Munz Northern Airlines.
I had left his employ only two years earlier and I’m pretty sure it was one of those “I QUIT ”, “You can’t QUIT I FIRE You ” deals. I had been his Kotzebue station manager and we had come to loggerheads over operational issues. Being as how he owned the airline, I felt I had no choice I guess, than to fall on my sword. We had not spoken a word since.
But, airline issues aside, I thought Dick was one hell of a great and honorable human being. And I’d been the guest at his family dinner table more times than I could remember. And each one of those evenings was special to me, having to family of my own anywhere within 3,000 miles. Essentially, Dick and Joyce were so wonderful to me, I almost considered them as surrogate parents for a time. I didn’t ever want to fly airplanes for the old bastige again, but I was grateful for all he’d taught me, and the time we had shared.
All these thoughts and more passed through my mind as I stepped off the curb and crossed in front of his car, the front grill and bumper no more than two feet from my left leg. I looked back and forth from Dick’s eye’s to Joyce’s, and back again, as they too looked into mine. My head swivelled, as did theirs, until I was past and turned to look straight ahead.
No doubt, they were both well aware of my recent aerial mishap. I wondered what they thought when they looked at me. I wondered what Dick thought of me. And then....BANG It hit me.
“I bet Dick and Joyce think I am pissed at them. I bet they think I don’t like them anymore Holy SHIT If I had died three days ago, that might be what they think of me for the their rest of their lives. ”, I thought. I couldn’t let that be. I had walked no more than five or six steps beyond the car as those thoughts raced through my mind.
Spinning on my heels I was surprised to see that, not only had the car not moved, but that Dick and Joyce’s gaze still remained fixed on me. I stumbled the three or four paces directly toward Dick’s closed window, relieved to se it rolling downward as I arrived.
I pawed at my right gloved hand with my left, as I leaned down toward the car. Finally I extracted a bare and sweaty handy to offer to Dick whose own right hand had left the steering wheel and headed across the front of his chest to meet mine. Still lowering my face to get closer and so that Joyce could see me, my cheeks began stinging as they met the rush of warm air coming out the open left window.
Dick, being pretty much a non-drinker, recoiled only the slightest as my rum, coke, sweat soaked, and malodorous breath blasted almost into his face “Ha-Hiya Dick ? How’rya
Joyce.” Dick replied “We’re doing pretty good Cloudy. Joyce and I just both want you to know that we are glad you’re alive and relatively uninjured.” And then I blurted out to them all that I had in my thoughts in the just the last few moments. “I just realized I’ve been given a chance to make sure something important wasn’t left undone and I wanted you both to know that.” I ended.
I watched some of the wary tenseness ease from Dick face muscles as I spoke, and then when I finished, instead of saying anything to me, he turned and spoke instead to Joyce in a low voice I couldn’t hear. Joyce nodded her head up and down and said “Yes, of course.” befor Dick turned back to me.
“Cloudy when was the last time you ate anything?” Dick asked, suspecting the truth. And ashamed and embarrassed now being more fully aware of my appearance, I looked at the ground and mumbled “Well....” “Where are you staying?” Dick now asked. When I told him I “had a room”, he responded with “Well. Why don’t you GO to that room and clean yourself up. Then be over at the house at five-thirty for dinner. Let’s knock the boozing off get the train back on the tracks son. You hearing me?” I looked at his face, and then at Joyce’s. The rebuke was ended. No recrimination, no self-righteousness, just a statement of fact and a offer of a steady hand of support. Typical Galleher. “Okay Dick” I met his eyes again. “Summa’ Joyce’s home cooking is just the ticket for me now, I think. I’ll see you in a couple.”
But, wise old pelican that he was, even Dick’s post-dinner counseling could not put my anxieties and self-doubt to rest. By 9 p.m. I was back looking for revelations in a bottle.
Somewhere on the fourth day my friend and employer decided that both he and I had had enough. He of waiting for my return to active duty, and I, of alcohol and self-pity. Boyuk showed up on the next barstool, and clapped me on the back announcing his arrival saying “Drink UP You’re outta’ here with me now ”
Realizing that the time was indeed overdue that I face the world again, I allowed him to march me to my hotel room to gather my things. Then it was non-stop to the airport and I collapsed unceremoniously into the rear seat of the 402 for the ride back to Unalakleet. I was dead to the world for thirty-five minutes, awakening only as the landing gear “thunked” into it’s down and locked position on short final for a straight-in landing to runway eight.
The spinning of the airplane on the ground at the end of the landing roll to turn around and head toward the ramp and office served to increase the turmoil of motion already present in both my head and my stomach. And, as we deplaned, Boyuk turned to me and spoke as he swatted my shoulder with the pair of gloves he held in his hand. “Go home ” Rest. Eat. And then rest some more. Get healthy tomorrow. You’re flying day after. Now get.”
And so it was I showed back up at the hangar almost 40 hours later. I was sober and rested, and while still not my normal old self; I was able to “put on” a fairly positive face at least, if not a happy one. Although I was genuinely happy to learn I’d been assigned a trip to return a family I knew to their village up in the Kobuk Valley, my old stomping grounds.
Less than an hour later I was airborne in the Ryan Air Cessna 206 heading up the coastline toward Shaktoolik and beyond. We were stuffed to the gills, including the belly pod. But the Cessna 206, with the same engine and wing, so out-performs it’s larger sibling (the 207) that you generally can count on an extra ten to twelve knots of cruise speed when the weights of the two airplanes are identical. I loved flying the 206
The clouds above me were not too low, about 1500 feet above the ground. And recent pilot reports from the twin -engines traveling between Nome and Unalakleet gave the tops-of-the-clouds reports as only forty-five hundred feet or so, but with very light mixed icing conditions and accumulation. Nothing I wanted to get into with passengers anyway, so I planned to fly underneath all the way into the Lower Kobuk Valley.
Things got interesting not too long after passing Koyuk. Snowshowers abounded, but with enough space between so that I could find my way, missing all the hills to my west until passing the Bear Creek area and picking up the West Fork of the Buckland River. From there it was just a few more twists and turns dodging several large snowshowers until Selawik lake’s south shore came into view.
I deposited my passengers and all their “stuffs” in the ramp area at the west end of Selawik’s lone dirt runway and restarted my engine preparing for the slightly longer ride home due to the southwesterly winds.
Upon announcing my departure intentions on the radio, I was pleased to hear a response from an old and trusted friend who, at that moment, was descending into the Selawik area from the west, having come from Kotzebue. I elected to wait until he “popped out” of the bottom of the clouds and was “visual” again before starting my departure. I knew I would have missed him taking off to the east and then turning right to climb upward, as I was considering doing. Of course, I would have needed to get a reasonably recent and local cloud tops report before doing so. Thus I was happy he reported that the tops in the vicinity of Selawik were only about 5,000 feet, an altitude my empty and relatively powerful Cessna 206 could reach in under seven minutes.
He did also report that there was “light icing” on the descent.
Okay. No passengers, only my ass at stake here. Good reasonable current tops report. I’ll check Unalakleet weather and forecast as soon as I can raise Kotzebue Flight Service after takeoff. I can save a few minutes and gas by getting on top and driving a straight shot back home to Unalakleet. If anything goes wrong, I can head for either Nome or Kotzebue, both having good weather and forecasts, which I’ll also update.
I see my buddy from Kotzebue, now a black speck against the gray sky in the distant west and feed in some throttle while pushing down on the right rudder pedal. My Cessna 206 spins to the right out of the parking lot onto the centerline of the runway as I feed in more throttle and now, some left rudder pedal, to straighten the airplane out and track the center of the narrow fifty-foot wide dirt strip. I was airborne about the time the throttle hit the full stop. After the flaps were retracted and I rolled out of the right bank that pointed me at Unalakleet, this baby was climbing like a homesick angel. As I had dozens, if not hundreds of times before, I willingly plunged my aircraft into the murk overhead.
Tuning Kotzebue’s F.A. A. Fight Service Frequency, I was “welcome(d) aboard ” by another old friend who also proceeded to congratulate me for my performance earlier in the week bore starting his weather briefing.
As listened to the comfortingly familiar voice I was watching the ice build v-e-r-y slowly on the windshield and forward facing portions of the airframe. With my healthy rate of climb, this was a no-brainer, even if we didn’t top out until hitting 6,000 feet.
So why....why were my palms sweating? And not just a little bit; I notice, as we are passing four thousand feet and I’ve never. Well. This is freakin’ ridiculous. I mean....what’s happening My palms are sweatin’ like a guilty man about to be strapped to a lie detector.
Boom All at once the clouds give way to brilliant blue skies and a full orange sun blazing away almost overhead. And the sweat in my palm dries immediately and ceases. We are just passing 4,600 feet and Unalakleet’s weather is reported workable and forecast to remain that way for a nice instrument approach on my arrival. I level at six thousand five hundred feet ant immediately the friction from the increased cruising speed along with my windshield defroster start melting away the less than an eighth of an inch of ice I accumulated on the climbout.
In little more than an hour I am back over Unalakleet and the town’s two runways lying thousands of feet below me. I call Anchorage Center and in short order have received a clearance for an approach to the airport, indicating I own the surrounding airspace until I report on the ground. I plunge my Cessna 206 into a thousand foot per minute descent entering the clouds almost immediately upon leaving 6,500 feet. With cloud bases reported by both the weather observer as well as my company at approximately fifteen hundred feet I and five or six miles visibility in snow I have no reason to worry and expect an easy, and routine approach and landing.
I am shocked to se that, as the ice again starts to form all over the airplane, my sweat glands open up and I get a weird feeling in my gut. “Come on man This is too easy ”, I told myself . But my psyche wasn’t listening apparently. I became even more anxious. I increased the descent rate to 1200 feet per minute, about all my ears could stand in the way of pressure change. The ice was accumulating a little quicker than on climbout and I had about a quarter of an inch on me passing through 2500 feet. But still. This was no big deal I’m in an empty 206, within a few short miles from my intended runway.
The sweat continued to pour from my palms and as I reached for the throttle I detected the slightest shaking of my right hand.
And then we were out of it. As advertised, at almost exactly 1500 feet the whole world came into view, at least for six miles in any direction. And four minutes later. I wheel my aircraft in line with her designated parking space and shut down the engine. Again I wipe my hands on the legs of my snowsuit. They come up, and stay, dry. I hold my right hand out toward the throttle. Almost steady as a rock. Hell, I’m never completely steady.
Looking out the window, I see only between a quarter and a half inch of ice on the wing’s leading edge. This is no big deal I tell myself. This is what we do. I did it just the way I was supposed to today. This flight was a well though out, carefully calculated, and safe operation with adequate backdoor “escape” routes throughout, if needed. The approach was textbook. So. Why was my stomach churning?
Fortunately there was no other trip for me immediately and it was lunchtime. I called Boyuk and asked if I could come over to his house for lunch. I told him I needed to talk. And over lunch I told him what had happened. In detail. I ended by saying that I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what was wrong, but I did know one thing for sure.
I was not, at least today, 100% myself. And I know that all my passengers deserve and are well entitled to 100% of my talent and skill at all times. I concluded by saying that maybe I better take a couple of more days off and see if I could figure it out.
My friend and employer listened well, and told me to go ahead and take the rest of the day off. Then, unbeknownst to me for the moment, Boyuk rightfully consulted with the other family member who were corporate officers of the company as well. All being immediate family, they had spent their entire lives as well around pilots and arctic aviation.
As did I, they knew that they too had an obligation to each and every passenger who placed their lives in the hands of a Ryan Air pilot. Given our many years acquaintance, given our friendship that had built over the months flying for them in a community as small as Unalakleet, their decision was personally painful for them. But the choice was not a difficult one. And so it was with deep regret and sorrow that my friend Boyuk Ryan came to me and said, “Cloudy. I’m sorry. But I think we’ll let you go take all the time you need. It’s the decision of the majority that you won’t be able to fly for us any more. I’m really sorry.”
“No problem Boyuk”, I responded sadly. And he said “I tried to...” and I interrupted
“Hey man. Don’t worry about it. I understand. You’ll always be my friends.”
But would I ever understand me again? Would I ever fly again
CloudDancer
