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RAF strip - Schafer Wilderness

Just to clarify, Schafer Meadows is a US Forest Service airstrip, located within the Great Bear Wilderness of NW Montana. The strip is open to the public. RAF and Montana Pilots Association assist in maintenance of the strip and support the Forest Service’s requests for funding for projects like this.

Schafer is a real gem, and a fantastic place to spend a few days..

MTV
 
I'll have a Schafer story for you later tonight. About three weeks ago I made my 98th landing at Schafer since 1972. Most landings have been since 2003 in my Travel Air 6000. That airplane is at home there.
 
What time is “later” Hank?
And while I’d like to go land, I’d likely appreciate watching an experienced team handler work the land even more.


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In 1972 I was the fire patrol pilot for the Forest Service flying a 182 out of Spotted Bear. Six days a week I flew a morning and an afternoon patrol around the Bob Marshall Wilderness looking for smokes. Each flight took about two hours. Flight rate was $28.95 per hour. I got ten percent of that and $600 per month! Best job I ever had.
On Tuesday mornings I flew freight into Schafer Meadow which was accessible only by air and pack train and subsequently was included in the Great Bear Wilderness. Pulaskis, barbed wire, food, and (I can admit it now) beer.
One Tuesday I had a big bottle of propane and Slim the horseshoer. Slim was a tall, thin man, hunched over from having been kicked by his clients. He smelled strongly of tobacco and horse manure. Slim had a long thin cigar in his mouth. I warned him that he couldn't light it because we had the propane on board. Fifteen minutes later we landed at Schafer Meadow. Slim had eaten the cigar!
 
In 1972 I was the fire patrol pilot for the Forest Service flying a 182 out of Spotted Bear. Six days a week I flew a morning and an afternoon patrol around the Bob Marshall Wilderness looking for smokes. Each flight took about two hours. Flight rate was $28.95 per hour. I got ten percent of that and $600 per month! Best job I ever had.
On Tuesday mornings I flew freight into Schafer Meadow which was accessible only by air and pack train and subsequently was included in the Great Bear Wilderness. Pulaskis, barbed wire, food, and (I can admit it now) beer.
One Tuesday I had a big bottle of propane and Slim the horseshoer. Slim was a tall, thin man, hunched over from having been kicked by his clients. He smelled strongly of tobacco and horse manure. Slim had a long thin cigar in his mouth. I warned him that he couldn't light it because we had the propane on board. Fifteen minutes later we landed at Schafer Meadow. Slim had eaten the cigar!

Good one, Hank! I’m sure you have a few others....

MTV
 
Schafer is special.
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I'm thinking about flying in to Schafer Meadows (8U2) next week. First time. Does anyone (especially Farmer Hank if he's still around!) have a suggested route if flying in from the East? I'm thinking about starting out at KEKS (Ennis), which is South of Bozeman, then flying North to the East of Helena, West of Great Falls and cutting in to the mountains somewhere South of Browning, maybe near Swift Reservoir then over Gateway pass.

Are there any potential problems I need to know about?
 
I tend to enter the backcountry over Gibson reservoir, then head up the north fork of the Sun and pop over the low pass into the headwaters of the Flathead. Lower terrain than your plan and your have Gates Park (closed) as an emergency option.
 
With good weather, just go direct from about Helena. Beautiful country all the way. Forecast to be hot tomorrow, so earlier is better.

The FS turns the pack stock onto the runway at night, so you may hear some rustling around. Nice campground up in the trees off east end of the runway.

Generally land to the west. That means a steep approach, but pretty easy. Landing to the east, there’s no go around, unless you are flying an F-16

MTV
 
I'm thinking about flying in to Schafer Meadows (8U2) next week. First time. Does anyone (especially Farmer Hank if he's still around!) have a suggested route if flying in from the East? I'm thinking about starting out at KEKS (Ennis), which is South of Bozeman, then flying North to the East of Helena, West of Great Falls and cutting in to the mountains somewhere South of Browning, maybe near Swift Reservoir then over Gateway pass.

Are there any potential problems I need to know about?

Wind, it gets nasty around Swift if there is any wind.


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Your route sounds good. I’ve never flown into Schafer from the east, so I am not too helpful. Everything MTV mentioned is correct. Be sure to do your flying in the early morning. If you think you can wait until evening for the temperature to go down, you will find to your great dismay that it gets really, really dark before there is any change in the temp.
 
I've been into Shafer from the east a couple of times, from both Choteau and Cut bank. From Cut Bank, take the northern approach over Marias pass (on the sectional), stay high and follow the peaks/ridge south and then descend over the field. From Choteau further south I think is better if the weather/winds are not great but Gateway pass is not as obvious if you're not prepared with the gps coordinates.

Either way, I prefer landing to the east - but I do a low approach to the west to inspect the field. The valley is wider and better suited for the setup to the west over the river. Once committed to landing east go around early or treat it as a one-way strip, which is fairly easy to do. I would land west only if the winds were favoring as you have rising terrain to the east and it's hard to get yourself down with the right airspeed to not land long on the slightly downhill.

It's a great spot. Last time I was there, the camping was awesome. Had the place all to myself except the den of wolves a couple of miles away which I could hear baying at night. One of my all time favorite fly camping experiences.
 
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Thanks for everybody's suggestions. What a great web site.

So I'm thinking something like this for the backcountry portion. Maybe flying in at 9500 feet and keeping altitude fairly high until the very end?

One of the things that seems to be missing from the great YouTube backcountry videos and RAF runway diagrams are suggestions about inbound routing over and around the mountains and hills. You never know what the landscape looks like until you get there.

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That's the route I described. If you get bumped around at that high altitude, try lower, it's not uncommon for the winds to be swirling around the ridge and peak tops around 9500 and calmer lower. Often rough crossing over Gibson Reservoir and sometimes it gets better as you head north. The north fork of the Sun River up by Gates Park is a pretty wide valley.

On your ways south consider a morning trip by the Chinese Wall and/or Meadow Creek and Spotted Bear then south up the middle fork of the Flathead that'll end taking you over a low pass by Red Mtn and into the Landers Fork of the Blackfoot and Lincoln Mt where there is great camping at the west end of the runway complete with outhouse and picnic table. Great courtesy car at midfield to go into Lincoln as well.

How long are you going to be at Schaeffer, I might head that way later this week
 
I've been into Shafer from the east a couple of times, from both Choteau and Cut bank. From Cut Bank, take the northern approach over Marias pass (on the sectional), stay high and follow the peaks/ridge south and then descend over the field. From Choteau further south I think is better if the weather/winds are not great but Gateway pass is not as obvious if you're not prepared with the gps coordinates.


Either way, I prefer landing to the east - but I do a low approach to the west to inspect the field. The valley is wider and better suited for the setup to the west over the river. Once committed to landing east go around early or treat it as a one-way strip, which is fairly easy to do. I would land west only if the winds were favoring as you have rising terrain to the east and it's hard to get yourself down with the right airspeed to not land long on the slightly downhill.

It's a great spot. Last time I was there, the camping was awesome. Had the place all to myself except the den of wolves a couple of miles away which I could hear baying at night. One of my all time favorite fly camping experiences.

Landing to the west is the preferred procedure there, and it’s not that hard to land on that runway.

MTV
 
I’ve always landed east, abeam the ranger station, unless the wind favors the west, but you pretty much need to spot land, no go around from short final.


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You folks okay with another story about Schafer? I had made one of my usual trips into that strip with a 182 and was sitting on a fence rail. A Bellanca came zooming around the corner, and I thought wow! a low pass. But he landed gear up right in front of me! The pilot was royally POed, but the passenger stepped off the wing and thought it was a normal landing. I chartered those two gentlemen back to Kalispell City for the benefit of my employer. Next day our mechanic flew in, built an A-frame, hoisted the plane up, and dropped the gear. (The Bellanca gear folds back into the wing and protruded enough to basically limit damage to the right flap.) Don’t know what damage the engine and prop suffered, but the plane was flown out.
Also flew in one day and saw a Cessna 195 upside down off the west end of the runway. Folks at the guard station said the pilot made three passes at the runway and finally forced the plane to touch down. I heard that a deHavilland Buffalo came in to pick up the wreck.
DC-3s have landed there.
I have flown in and out of Schafer for 50 years and logged 102 landings. The airplane I’ve flown for the last 20 years has no flaps, so I have to get real friendly with the trees on the east end and sometimes slip hard over the pasture on short final if I am a bit fast. The terrain at the east end slopes almost exactly at my power off glide angle. I’ve hit trees twice with my right wheel, but this year had no problem. There was some talk last year about topping a few of them, and that may have happened.
 
Oh, another thought. I bring milk, frozen pizza, and beer to the folks at the ranger station. These items don’t come in on the pack string. This year one of the guards told me that a request for watermelon was posted by someone, and more than they could eat was flown in by several pilots!
 
Several years ago there was talk that the Forest Service was going to put a limit on landings at Schafer. (Entry to Glacier Park is now limited to a certain number of vehicles, so the idea is not farfetched.) I think the idea died in the Great Recession when landings at Schafer naturally declined. The result of a limit, of course, would be Twin Otters flying in, rather than two or three 206 trips every day during the floating season. I’ll probably get crucified for saying this, but please don’t fly into Schafer just to put a notch in your belt. Come and enjoy the serenity of a gorgeous airstrip luckily grandfathered into the Great Bear Wilderness.
 
Several years ago there was talk that the Forest Service was going to put a limit on landings at Schafer. (Entry to Glacier Park is now limited to a certain number of vehicles, so the idea is not farfetched.) I think the idea died in the Great Recession when landings at Schafer naturally declined. The result of a limit, of course, would be Twin Otters flying in, rather than two or three 206 trips every day during the floating season. I’ll probably get crucified for saying this, but please don’t fly into Schafer just to put a notch in your belt. Come and enjoy the serenity of a gorgeous airstrip luckily grandfathered into the Great Bear Wilderness.

Well said, Hank! Thank you!

MTV
 
Flew in there once in early September. Had to wait for the frost to melt off the next day. Got back to Billings and it was 100 degrees.
 
According to a ForeFlight comment a few days ago…A182DFB7-AC9F-4E49-B577-FE2D7325EFA2.jpeg
 

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Here’s a bit of trivia for the historically inclined. Northwest of Schafer, maybe three miles or so, there was another airstrip along the Middle Fork of the Flathead River. Fifty years ago there were just a few small trees growing there, and the shape of the airstrip was obvious. Now you have to know exactly where to look, and even then the location is hard to discern.
Here’s a tip for departures from Schafer. When taking off to the west bear right and get close to the knob just northwest of the strip. Then turn further north directly toward the ridge. Make a left 90 close to the trees, and eighty percent of the time you will get lift off the south facing slope. Fly westbound north of Scott and Flotilla Lakes along the south facing slopes and you will be able to climb directly to Spotted Bear or points west.
 
A couple of shots from January 2022. Winter tends to make it feel more remote.

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