Alaska Adventure: Part 1

I was sitting there eating a peanut butter sandwich when the phone rang.

"Dale, this be Shoemacher."

"Yes, boss what’s up?"

"How would you like to go to Alaska?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Well, it being the first of September, our season is over so I thought you might be interested in a different sort of flying job."

"Can you supply more specifics?"

"Oh, heck yes, I am full of specifics," he chortled. "The person they wants has to be around 6 feet tall, weigh about 175 pounds, have good sanitary habits and steely nerves, be fearless, brave, and good looking, and also (by the way) he needs to know how to fly."

"Well, them specifics fit me to a tee, I reckon. Especially the good-looking part. What does it pay?" I asked.

"The figure they gave me was that the feller would need a tow-sack in which to carry the money home."

That got my undivided attention.

After I got all the (real) specifics I packed my ole travel-weary suitcase and next day took a commercial airline flight to Sea-Tac airport in Seattle Washington. From there I took another flight to Anchorage Alaska. There I met a young feller I will call Sourdough John, who represented a company called New Era Reclamation. These folks were under contract with a consortium of pipeline building companies that were in the process of building a pipeline from Valdez to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. This company had been wrangling with the EPA for years and finally received permission to proceed.

But to gain this permission the EPA had specifics to be met. The most important one was that after the pipeline was installed, all the terrain had to be put back to its original condition. That is what New Era Reclamation was contracted to do.

Well Sourdough John and I took a commercial flight to Fairbanks, Alaska which is where I was to pick up the ag-plane that I was going to fly - a Cessna Agwagon. The Agwagon was an airplane built specifically for ag-flying work: dusting, spraying, etc.

Upon reaching Fairbanks I was introduced to several men employed by New Era Reclamation and was given a more detailed explanation of what was underway and what was expected of me. They gave me a history to date on the overall plan.

It was something like this: The first step was to build camps for workers along the proposed route of the pipeline. These were placed at intervals of about 75 miles and each camp was to accommodate around 300 to 400 workers. Keep in mind that there was no road or railway along the route. The building supplies had to be hauled in on huge trucks during the winter months when the ground was frozen solid enough to support them without damaging the tundra. 

They called the route the "Winter Trail."  At most of the camps there was a fairly good landing strip for aircraft.

The problem arose when spring came and the Winter Trail began to thaw. The cargo trucks should have stopped, but some continued up the trail and in a few places the tundra was damaged. To reclaim these damaged places New Era Reclamation hired me to fly arctic grass seed and then come back over the places with fertilizer. That brought me up to date.

I started at the Yukon River and worked my way northward. I used the newly graveled roadways as my landing strips. The seed and fertilizer had been stockpiled along the way at strategic points. My loading crew was Eskimo and Indians. They thought the whole thing was a joke and took far too much time loading the plane. Back in the lower 48 states a two-man crew could load the plane in about 5-10 minutes. These four-man turkeys took at least 35-40 minutes and sometimes longer.

It was a very interesting experience. I was not the only plane in the area. There were large two- and four-engine planes flying in and out of the camp strips carrying freight, passengers and mail. 

I had radio contact with the ground stations as well as the planes. It was funny sometimes - I could hear the conversation between the ground station and say, a large freight hauling plane. The ground station would caution the large plane to be aware of an EGGWAGON working the area roads. This usually caused a gabble of conversation amongst them. Or a response like, "What the heck is he doing down there?" 

I would usually pipe up and say, "I am flinging fertilizer on the road in places that you despoilers have messed up. I do this so the EPA won’t shut you down again." 

This usually brought a response like, "Carry on, buddy." I do believe I was the first ag-pilot to ply my trade this far north.

I'll write some more of my Alaska adventures in my next blog. 

Dale and his (slow) loading crew

We Speaka Da Spanish... Sorta

I have been often asked, "What do you do in the off season, when the crops are harvested and the bugs are on vacation?"

Well, one of the things I did to occupy my time and get my mind off of chasing bugs was to ferry aero-planes from one place to another. Say for instance, from a lil ole village in Nebraska to the out-back in the jungles of Panama in Central America.

I happened to be acquainted with a missionary pilot type name Lee German. Lee had been a missionary pilot in the Philippine Islands for some twenty years. He wife became ill and he had to move back to his home in Nebraska. So he was asked by the missionary organization to head up a aviation department. 

Lee immediately went to work on this and established a home base where he collected aircraft of one sort and another, did some repair work on them, and trained young fellows in this type of flying and ferrying airplanes from the base to where ever they were needed. 

He called me about the time my ag-flying season ended in Idaho one day and asked me to accompany him on a trip to deliver a Cessna 185 to a missionary pilot in Panama. The missionary pilot down there with the help of the natives had just completed a new airstrip deep in the heart of the jungles of Panama near the border with Columbia. I decided this would be a useful way to spend my time in the off-season. 

I packed my battered bag and took a flight on the airline down to a commercial airport near Lee’s home base. I had worked with Lee in the construction of his home hangers, etc., and we flew some together so he knew I was a reasonably experienced pilot.

When I arrived Lee laid out his route that we would follow including gas stops, hotel, border crossing stops, and so on. He made sure my passport and visa papers were in order. The Cessna had a belly pod strapped under the fuselage for extra baggage and freight. We filled the plane full of a lot of stuff that the missionary needed but couldn’t get down there in Panama. Then we cast off one fine morning and headed south. 

We got to the Brownsville port of entry too late to clear customs so we had to spend the night and take care of customs the next morning.

Then we pretty much followed the Gulf side coast line all the way to Veracruz, Mexico. Lee had asked me if I could speak Spanish and I told him a little bit. He said he could speak a little too. When we got to Veracruz I called the tower in English. No answer. So I tried out my Spanish. The conversation went something like this:

ME: Torre de Veracruz, es Cessna 5432, 10 millas al norte. Solicitar permiso para entrar en patron de trafico. (Veracruz tower, this is Cessna 5432, 10 miles north. Request permission to enter traffic pattern.)

The tower came back at me with, "Bla de bla de bla de bla, Estan habilitados para entrar entra en trafico."  All I got was that I was cleared to enter traffic pattern.

I fell in line with the other traffic. Lee said, “Did you understand all that?”

“Heck no, but I’m pretty sure we are cleared to enter the pattern.”

We made the downwind leg and turned to the base leg. I heard my number called by the tower and something like, "Blab blab blab, se borran a la tierra, blab blab blab." I was fairly certain he meant, "You are cleared to land."

I made the final turn and Lee said, "I hope they aren’t sending the Federales out to meet us!"

I landed without incident and taxied up to the parking area and a gas truck came out to meet us. I guess no one was interested in my semi-Spanish. The young boy who ran the gas truck looked at our Cessna with the bulging belly pod and said, “Et looks likey et is goin’ to have some sons.” Lee laughed and told him it was definitely pregnant.

We got something to eat and cleared customs. Lee called the tower on the telephone and tried to explain that we had very little Español. I guess one of the tower persons understood a bit of English. Lee said his reply was a mix of the two languages - but mostly it seemed that they were all laughing at us. 

I asked for permission to depart. “Blab blab blab blab, número cuatro, blab blab."

I took that to mean we were number four to take off. We pulled into line and when I heard, "Número 5432 Cessna, se borran para salir (you are cleared to take off)," I poured the coal to it and we took off headed southwest across Mexico to the Pacific coast. Next stop Guatemala City.

As we flew along Lee said, "Roberts, your Spanish is about as sorry as I have ever heard."  

I retorted, "Well it got us in and out of Mexico without being shot or arrested. And by Montezuma’s whiskers, yours is worse than mine."

"Naw, naw, mine is fluent compared to yours," he insisted.

"The heck it is! I heard your so-called Spanish when you talked to the tower on the phone. You said, 'We no speaka de Spanish mucho good.' Ha!"

Shenanigans in the Air

Surprise In A Fishing Boat

Sometimes the urge to play while flying is irresistible, especially on a beautiful day when one is young and feeling frisky. 

Joe Carter and I were flying our Pawnees over the croplands of central Washington around the town of Royal City.  We were spraying potatoes for evil little bugs intent on destroying this good farmer’s crop. We had covered the field with insecticide and were returning with empty hoppers to our airstrip. 

It so happened we had to fly near a lake of very blue water. Mean fellow that he was, Joe flew up close and pointed to the lake and with strange hand signals motioned for me to follow. I knew he was up to some mischief which might prove interesting. I tacked on his left wing and played along.  He flew lower and lower until his wheels were actually touching the smooth surface of the lake.  I had never attempted this but figured if the water would support his airplane it should do the same for mine. 

I was surprised to find the water smooth and solid.  We were actually water skiing along as nice as you please. Fun fun fun! We went sailing by the point of a small peninsula which protruded out into the lake. This bit of land was covered in large trees. As we hurtled by this projection I suddenly realized there was a boat on the opposite side. In the boat were two men who were obviously fishing. Our sudden appearance no doubt was quite startling to these sportsmen.  

One of them made the quick but wrong decision to leap to his feet.  In one hand was his fishing rod, in the other was a bottle; quite possibly an alcoholic beverage.  As he leaped up the boat rocked to the left and then to the right at which time he lost his balance and fell into the water.  The other fellow didn’t jump up but dropped his pole and quickly made a grab for it, coming very near capsizing the boat. Joe and I laughed like to evil little kids. I was glad that we departed as quickly as we appeared.  I am sure there was some foul and abusive language drifting across the waters of the lake.

Sad Ending

That reminds me of my former boss, a big German named Don Schumacher. He came upon a similar situation, but with a very tragic ending. A small pond, two fellows fishing.  Don wasn’t buzzing them, just flying by. 

He noticed of them one had fallen in the water and was thrashing around. Schumacher suddenly realized the man was drowning. He hastily surveyed the situation and decided to land in a nearby alfalfa field. As quickly as possible he put the plane down and made a run for the lake as he shed his shirt and shoes. He dived in to the water but the man was already under water. 

He dragged him out and desperately applied artificial respiration. Don was an ex-marine, a strong swimmer and knew the drill.  But in spite of his best efforts the man was dead. The other man in the boat was an older fellow who did not know how to swim.  Foolishly, they had no floatation gear.  When I landed a bit later, Don was quite beside himself because he failed to save the man. 

The Super Safe Pilot

One other tale.  One of my fellow pilots, whom I will call Jim had attended a state wide ag-pilots meeting. While there, he was awarded a certificate and a impressive medal for his safe flying record.  He had flown some 15 years, if I remember correctly, without an accident.  

Jim loved to laugh and kid folks and he never missed an opportunity to more or less rub it in that now he had a safe flying medal and I had none: neener-neener-neener!

A short time later Jim spayed a field of wheat and somehow struck a fence along the boundary as he entered the field for the last pass. One wing was ripped off. The plane rolled over and hit the ground upside down, skidded along and came to rest inverted.  

Jim wasn’t hurt much but this was one time he was not wearing his crash- helmet. He had on a “gimme” cap so he could pin his safe-flying metal on the front of it. This is the gospel truth. That small pin had cut a little trench across his forehead,starting just above his eyebrows and on up into his hairline.

Needless to say I heard no more about his award. Of course, I couldn't help smirking and kidding him just a wee bit. Heh heh heh.

High Wind

There are times when an agricultural pilot must make instant decisions. Sometimes he makes the right decision and sometimes it is definitely the wrong decision. These quick wrong choices can result in bad stuff happening. Here is an example of a quick wrong decision.

I was working for an ag-operator in the state of Washington. The owner, whom I will call Watkins, was a pilot himself. He would take a hired hand with him in his Cub-type aircraft and fly out to a field that was to be fertilized. He would land in the field if it was not muddy and they would then walk to each end and commence to flag for the planes that were sprinkling the dry fertilizer pellets on the field.

The terrain was not at all level but more like rolling hills and swales. Watkins had parked his plane on top of one of these smooth rolling hills. He walked about 150 yards to his end of the field and began waving his flag. While this operation was going on as planned, suddenly a weather frontal boundary struck. The wind switched to the north and began to blow with increasing velocity. 

Watkins could see his Cub on the next small hill as the wind rocked it, making it bounce rather more than was safe. Watkins dropped his flag and began making tracks to his plane. He was a short man, maybe five foot five or six and a little on the beefy side in weight. As he was running and puffing toward the plane, the wind was rapidly increasing. When he finally reached it, the ship was actually leaving the ground with each big puff. He had set the parking brake before he left so he quickly set the throttle and went to the front of the plane to swing the propeller to start the engine.

The engine started on the first swing and he ran around to the right side of the Cub to climb in. Just as he was climbing in, the wind made a mighty blast and the little plane left the ground. He was half in and half out when he made the quick decision to grab the throttle and open it, hoping it would help stabilize the airborne machine. 

The reverse happened. With the high wind and the thrust of the engine the plane rose straight up vertically and then suddenly fell over on it’s back - kerblam! 

Watkins was thrown out on the wing which was now lying upside down on the ground. Somehow he landed on his feet. Both feet burst through the fabric covering.

When the other pilots doing the fertilizer flew over and saw he wasn’t injured, they burst out in gales of wild laughter. Watkins stood there knee deep in his upside down airplane, shaking his fist at them. He couldn’t hear the laughter but he could see the grins on their faces.

The Thunder God

As a commercial pilot, I've encountered some peculiar happenings that aren’t likely to be experienced by the ground bound. For instance, being caught in stormy weather in an open cockpit.

Once I was flying cross country en route form my maintenance base in Oklahoma to my home base in East Texas. I was caught in a tremendous line of heavy thunder storms. My Stearman was not equipped for flying by instruments. I was strictly VFR (visual flight rules) with only a magnet compass, and that very untrustworthy. I was navigating by landmarks, having flown the route a number of times before. 

As the sky darkened I was forced to fly quite low to stay clear of lowering stormy looking clouds. It began to rain and lightning began to flash. Thunder claps were loud enough that I could hear them over the roar of my Pratt Whitney engine. The rain became heavy to the point that my forward visibility was limited to about a half mile or less. I was a bit worried and was reminded of a poem I had written some years back.

THE THUNDER GOD

The thunder god rears his awesome head
And rumbles his warning dark and dread.
No prudent airman dares to tread
Too near this angered giant.

On convective energy he mounts the sky
‘Till his anvil head is five miles high
With an electric flickering in his evil eye
He mutters and rumbles and threatens - Defiant.

His approach is announced by ominous sound
With throaty booms that shiver the ground.
Menacingly he gathers his storm all ‘round
And the air grows sultry and still.

Scowling and growling, his fury grows.
The heavens darken and creation knows
With malevolent intent he glowers at those
Who would dare to resist his will.

There he sits astride my path,
A meteorological tower of rage and wrath
Nature’s cumulo-psychopath,
Maddened because I’ve invaded his sacred sky

I’m cautious and careful and it has served me well
So I change course and it seems I can tell
As I circumnavigate this flickering hell
Of all men, he hates most those that can fly.

So I am threading my way underneath these angry giants, hunkered down behind the small windshield, hoping to stay dry. It’s a losing battle though - soon I’m sopping wet. The giants are hurling thunderbolts at me but so far they have missed. 

The rain gets heavier with small hail mixed in. If the hail gets larger, I will be forced to land some place like a pasture or a country road. After about an hour I can see my home town and then my home base runway. I put the wheels down ever so gently. Actually I am water skiing until the ship slows down and the tires touch the ground. Sheets of water are sent out each side. I slow down and turn off the runway and taxi into the hanger. My boots are full of water and I am soaked to the bone.

My brother, also a pilot, is in the hanger to greet me. I climb out and he gives me a look of disgust and says, "Brother Dale, I would have thought you had better sense than to be flying in weather like this."

I agreed with him. It was foolish but at least I was home.

Stealth Cropdusters

Many years ago I was employed by an ag-flying company or as some would call it, an agricultural-air application company, based in Oklahoma called "American Dusting Company."  It was quite a large company with dozens of planes and pilots, one of the largest in the U.S. The company divided its planes and pilots up into units of two, three, or more. Each unit had a manager and these units were scattered all over the southwest. The main base and maintenance shop was in Chickasaw, Oklahoma. I became acquainted with many of the pilots during the three years that I flew for American.

Of course all pilots have flying stories: Some true, some true but "embellished," and some out-right LIES. One of the true ones I shall pass along because I thought it very interesting. This story I believe to be authentic because it came to me from several different sources and they all told the same tale.

Back in the middle 20th century there was an outbreak of a certain kind of beetle that infested very large areas of forests of the northeastern states of the U.S. A group of companies got their heads together and made plans to gather up as many ag-planes and pilots as they could lay hands on and get them organized and attack the devilish little creatures that were doing great damage to the forests.

The word went out all across the fruited plains of agricultural America that there was much money to be made by this armada of bug-fighting flyers. American Dusting Company was contacted and agreed to send six of their choice birdmen to join this effort. This detachment was to be led by one of the owners, Mr. Bob Smith (not his real name), who was a former Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Air Force and was still a member of the reserve.

The planes to be sent were PT 17 Stearmans converted to ag-plane configuration, including a 450 hp Pratt Whitney engine. I might also add that none were equipped with a full panel of flight instruments, just the bare bones of a primary panel which had a magnetic compass, an altimeter, an airspeed indicator and engine instruments such as RPM gauge, manifold pressure gauge, oil pressure gauge and possibly a engine temperature gauge. If you were lucky some of these still worked. At cruise speed the Pratt Whitney burned around 20 gallons an hour and the gas tank held 46 gallons, which gave approximately two hours of safe flying between refills.

Plans were made, routes were selected, bags were packed, and one fine morning the intrepid gaggle of beetle battlers left Chickasaw for the great state of Maine. Oh, did I mention - the planes had no radios for communication. All would be following their fearless leader Mr. Bob. Oh, and did I also mention - the planes had no running lights or any other kind of lights either.

Of course many fuel stops were made along the way which made for slow progress across the country. Nevertheless they made their way without mishap to the state of Maine where weather began to be a factor. It was getting late in the day and the overcast was getting lower and lower. Their next gas stop was a small town airport. The pilots began to get uneasy because dark was fast approaching. Eventually the only way they could see each other was by keeping in sight of the long blue blaze of flame from the exhaust pipe. Of course they were over strange country and one could not even see their maps. They were just following Mr. Bob, who was reading his map by flash light.

Then when it seemed that disaster was steadily gaining on them they saw some very strong lights on the horizon. As they got nearer they could make out that it was runway lights at an airport. Each pilot was thinking, "I don’t care what Mr. Bob or any of the other pilots do, I am going to land at this airport, come hell or high water."

And so they did.

One by one, Mr. Bob and all the pilots landed on the big, wide, long runway and breathed a sigh of relief as they taxied into a tie-down area on one side of the field. It seemed there was a airport terminal on one side and what appeared to be a military base on the other side. Anyway, they all got out of their planes and were laughing and congratulating themselves on their good fortune as they strolled inside the terminal building.

When they entered the building the clerks behind the desk looked at them in surprise and then all hell broke loose, as one pilot told me later. A clerk picked up a telephone and they noticed he was wearing an Air Force uniform. 

Within minutes a military vehicle pulled up to the door and half a dozen soldiers with submachine guns came charging into the room. They were quickly hustled into an adjoining room, searched and told to stand against a wall. Of course this was all a big surprise and they could not imagine what was going on. Mr. Bob approached the officer in charge of the soldiers and demanded an explanation. When the officer heard that Mr. Bob was a reserve officer in Air Force his attitude immediately changed.

The officer explained that this was a SAC (Strategic Air Command) base and on this night they were on a practice high alert. Suddenly it all came clear. This group of cropdusters had inadvertently stumbled in to a bad situation. The base was on alert and yet six low-flying aircraft with no lights had managed to land unseen on the base. They were flying too low for the radar to pick them up. They had taxied in the dark to a tie-down area, parked their planes and entered the terminal - all totally unseen until the a clerk saw them and wondered what the sam hill was going on.

The men at the base knew that General Curtis Lemay, who was the overall commander of the Strategic Air Command, many times did such things as this to test the base’s security operations. They were sure this was another of those tests.

It took a lot of explaining but finally the officer in charge of security became convinced that it was just a weird happenstance. However, he knew that if the story got out that a flight of six airplanes had snuck into his base without detection, his job would be on the line. His main aim was to prevent this. 

Consequently he had the unlucky cropdusters placed in a military truck and escorted under guard to a hotel where they spent the night. No one was allowed to talk to them. The next morning they were returned to the airbase and their planes were fueled. The officer in charge said, "Now, you boys get in your planes and get the h--- out of here and DO NOT SAY A WORD ABOUT THIS TO ANYONE OR I WILL HAVE YOU UP ON MORE CHARGES THAN YOU CAN POSSIBLY IMAGINE."

The American Dusting company pilots did as ordered and that was pretty much the end of the story, as far as the Air Force was concerned. The pilots proceeded on to New Brunswick and fought blister rust beetles until the outbreak was under control.

But there's no way a story like that can be kept completely secret. One of the pilots in this group was a friend I knew well and he was the first to tell me, under a request of secrecy of course. I've honored his request and changed the names to protect the "guilty."

Wires

When aerial crop dusting and spraying first began to be widely accepted by farmers, there were no airplanes designed for this purpose. Consequently the earlier cropdusting airplanes were highly modified planes designed for other purposes such as passenger ships, cargo ships, training planes, mail carriers, and military planes etc.

Prior to the Second World War there was very little aerial application of dust and chemicals to crops. A cropduster pilot had the whole sky pretty much to himself since all other aircraft were scarce and flying high above the earth. His greatest concerns were to keep his ship on an even keel on the proper heading, maintaining his altitude of a few feet above the crop, keeping his propeller turning in the right directions and being careful not to collide with obstacles on the ground. 

These obstacles came in all shapes and sizes: trees, posts, buildings, farm equipment, towers of various kinds, vehicles, and last but not least, telephone and electrical lines and poles. In the earlier days these power and telephone lines were not so plentiful, so were of little concern. As time passed, the cropdusting planes became bigger and better and more numerous and so did the power lines. That is the subject of my present dissertation.

Wire Hazards
By the time I entered the scene these blasted lines were everywhere. Along the roads, highways, railroads, canals and fields of croplands. Some fields were bordered on all sides with these wires and many times they ran across the field at various angles. 

The size or thickness of these wires varied - a thin telephone wire the diameter of a pencil lead to huge cables with a diameter of an inch or more. Also there were brace-cables often called guy wires attached to the power line poles and towers. The size or thickness of these was usually about a half inch or so - strong enough lift a truck or tractor.

I believe that lines were the ag pilot’s most pervasive headache. One of the first things a new ag pilot had to learn was how to fly along, around, amongst and under these devilish and sometime lethal wires. A field that had multiple wires across was generally referred to by ag pilots as a wire-orchard. No matter how large an overhead cable might be, ag pilots called them “wires.”

I lost several friends and a brother because of an encounter with these wretched wires. My first mishap involving a wire happened in a cotton field in East Texas. I was still young but had two seasons under my belt and up to now had no wire problems. So I felt I was a fine ag pilot. 

I was flying a newly rebuilt Stearman with a 450 hp. Pratt-Whitney up front. It had been a long day beginning at first light and now the sun had dropped below the horizon. I was spraying bug control chemical on a field of cotton, making my runs across the field going north and south, back and forth. A power line ran across the south end of the field leaving me just enough space to fly under it. Beginning on the east side I worked my way, swath by swath across the field until I only lacked about five or six more swath to finish the field. It was getting close to dusky-dark and I was hurrying to finish the field before it got too dark to see.

I was flying south and approaching the power line that I had been flying under with no problem. When I reached a point too close to pull up and go over the line I suddenly spotted ahead of me -directly in my flight path - two old fence post protruding about two feet above the cotton. It was too late to pull up and go over the line but I didn’t want to hit those sturdy looking posts. I had a split second to make up my mind. I lifted the plane up about two feet above the posts and Wham! My upper wing struck the lower power line. 

In a flash the line broke first at the nearest pole on my right and the loose end in a fraction of a second wrapped itself around the N strut between the upper and lower wings on the right side - and hung on. It stretched the line on the left side till it too broke. That end of the broken wire on the left side then whipped completely around the rear of the plane and then came forward striking the back of my crash-helmet. Sounding like a rifle shot, it whipped on forward smashing my windshield. 

All that happened in the blink of an eye. I pulled up quickly. Looking the plane over I saw nothing was damaged except the shattered windshield. I was carrying a length of wire tied fast to the right-hand N strut and draped over the rear of the fuselage just ahead of the vertical rudder fin. 

I headed for the base and landed in the dim light just before dark. It had been a long hard day with a hair raising ending. I pulled into the hanger and shut the Pratt-Whitney down. Leaning back with a sigh I finally relaxed. I thanked the Lord for his protection. If that wire had struck my helmet three inches lower it would have taken my head off.

My boss, Mr. Weldon Briscoe, walked out and saw the prop spinner was messed up and a long piece of power line draped around the plane. I figured I was about to get a real chewing out because after all it was a new airplane. He looked at me and then the windshield and made a sort of whistling sound through his teeth. I could tell he wasn’t all that pleased but all he said was, "Son, you cut it pretty darn close. Just don’t make a habit of it. Next time you may not be so lucky."

During my 35 years of chasing the bugs I tore down enough wire that one of my employers said with a worried look on his face. "Roberts I do believe you are going to run the power companies out of wire if you don’t hang yourself first."

The Never-Fail Turbo-Prop

Aircraft engines made a radical change with the advent of the turbo-prop engine. The old engines were classified as reciprocating engines, similar to what we have in automobiles. The turbo-prop engine worked completely differently. It had a small turbine as the power generating source, similar to a jet engine, except the turbine turned a propeller. These new engines were smaller, lighter, had more horsepower and were supposedly much more reliable.

We ag-pilots were anxious to try one of these new-fangled engines because with the light weight and extra power we could increase the "payload" and thereby do more work in a given time. Plus we liked that the engines were said to be much less likely to fail.

My first opportunity to fly an ag-plane with this type of power plant came when I hired out to an ag-operator located in the Gulf Coast. It was in rice growing country near the small town of Katy, Texas.  

Before I was cleared to aviate with a turbo-prop at the pointy end of the airplane, the insurance company insisted that I be sent to school so as to know how to handle this here highly complicated and tremenjusly complex apparatus. Even though I had years and years of experience and thousands and thousands of hours flying back and forth over the vegetables, it made no difference to them. 

So they sent me to Hartford, Connecticuty, where the Pratt-Whitney Aircraft Co. had a school for beginners to be learnt about these jet fuel burning engines. I spent a week in classrooms listening to some young, self-important individual spout off, displaying his vast knowledge of turbo-prop aircraft engine. Mostly his talk was giving high praise of the reliability of the PT6-E turbo-prop engine. He assured us that our days of engine failure were over. THIS ENGINE DOES NOT FAIL. IT WILL GO 6000 HRS BETWEEN OVERHAULS. THIS ENGINE DOES NOT FAIL.

I came back to Katy with about the same amount of knowledge that I left with, except I knew that the turbo-prop engine DID NOT FAIL. Yeah, I had that phrase ringing in my ears. Me and my partner went to work and I was enjoying flying with the comforting new knowledge that there would be no more flight interruptions due to engine failure. I had launched myself into the future of ag-aviation feeling safe and secure. 

About the third week and somewhere around 80 hours on the new engine, I was working off a dirt strip surrounded by rice fields - some dry, some flooded. I had a hopper full of liquid fertilizer, about 300 gallons as I recall. I had just broken ground when I noticed that a couple of puffs of smoke came out the exhaust pipe on the left side. 

At the next instant I noted that my engine rpm was decreasing and I could feel the loss of power. I reached the end of the strip and slapped the dump gate lever open and the load was dumped instantaneously. Lighter of wing, I swung the Ag-Cat out to the right with the intention of making a 180-degree turn to the left and landing back on my landing strip. Nothing around me looked favorable for an emergency landing.

The engine continued to lose power (a new word - "unspooling" it was called). About half-way around the turn I realized I wasn’t going to make it. I leveled the wings and prepared to make contact with a newly plowed rice field. I sat it down as smoothly as possible and held the stick back so hard that the tail wheel touched first. As soon as the weight of the Ag-Cat settled on to the main landing gear, the wheels quickly sank into the soft powdery dirt of the recently plowed field. Up came the tail and down went the new engine into the soft dirt and over the plane went on its back. I slammed down hard upside down. Thankfully, the Ag-Cat being a bi-plane, the upper wing held the fuselage off the ground high enough that the cockpit enclosure wasn’t crushed.

It is very disconcerting to find oneself upside down even though strapped securely in the seat. Believe it or not the danged engine was still running. Of course the prop was not turning. The blades were bent back at a 90 degree angle. But since in this particular type engine there was no mechanical connection between the power section and the propeller, the turbine was still going. How strange. 

I had to shut it down. I unbuckled my seat harness and as I had done at other times, fell on my head. I managed to open the exit window/door and wiggle out on to the powdery earth. I wasn’t injured in any way, but my poor engine didn’t fare so well. Black smoke began to issue forth because the oil in the engine was draining into the hot combustion chamber. There wasn’t much chance of a fire,but it did put up a nice plume of black smoke. I had to hand it to the Pratt-Whitney person who said the engine didn’t fail. Even after it had quit producing power, it was still running!

To make a long involved story shorter, the Pratt-Whitney Co. sent a tech-rep out to collect the engine and take it back to some place in Canada where they analyzed it and pronounced the cause of the engine failure was fuel contamination. Sure, sure. Fuel contamination is the only thing that wasn’t covered in the warranty.

Whatever the cause, it ruined my day and demolished my confidence in turbo-prop engines. My conclusion was that any mechanical contraption can fail PERIOD! 

Someone who saw the plane go down and start smoking called the fire department who then called for ambulances. And along the way a crowd collected of (I'm guessing) newscasters, TV reporters, environmentalists, save-the-whales folks, vegetarians, a couple of couple of local preachers, a pair of politicians, and the county sheriff.

Fortunately, there was a farmhouse nearby. I walked over there and even though I was a bit dirty, they welcomed me in, gave me a cup of coffee and a piece of fresh baked pie, and promised not to tell a soul where I was. I managed to hide out until my boss came looking for me. How he found me, I don’t know. 

Here is a picture of my dead AG-Cat lying on its back with its feet in the air... but as you will notice, I am not in it.

Fast Money

In the cropdusting field, military surplus planes eventually began to be replaced with newly manufactured aircraft that were designed especially for ag-flying. Piper came out with the Pawnee, Cessna Aircraft Co. started producing the Ag-Wagon, Grumman got into the action with its Ag-Cat. The Leland Snow Company developed the Snow Aircraft, later to be called the Thrush. These planes were much more efficient and productive than the old converted military types, but they were expensive and not necessarily as tough as the old military trainer. We still had engine failures from time to time.

I was proud to be sitting in the middle of a brand new Cessna Ag-Wagon one day and it was noon. I usually carried a lunch bag with me and ate in the plane so I didn’t have to stop. This particular day I had eaten my peanut butter and jelly sandwich and was chomping on an apple as I took off of a muddy strip with a load of dry fertilizer to be spread over a wheat field.

I climbed up to about two-hundred feet or so and as I leveled off there was a sudden silence. The only noise I heard was me chomping on the apple. The engine had shut down as if I had turned the switch off. 

I quickly turned to the right toward an open field and at the same time hit the dump lever and pulled full flaps, preparing to land in the mud. It had rained the night before. The field I had chosen was a wheat field that lay up the side of a hill. I hardly got the flaps down when I touch down and my wheels were sinking in the mud. 

Fortunately, I landed going uphill and the hill was steep enough that it kept the plane from going over on its back. But the wheels were hub-cap deep in the mud and I went up the small hill plowing deep tracks. I arrived at the top of the hill and there was a fence. I stomped on the left brake and full left rudder and the plane slewed around just shy of the fence and stopped. 

I was so rattled that I forgot I had opened the dump gate to get rid of the load of fertilizer. The problem was dry fertilizer does not dump out as quickly as a liquid. The stuff was still pouring out of the hopper and when I climbed out of the plane, I saw I had a huge pile of fertilizer beneath the belly. Oh well, at least the plane didn’t end up lying on its back.

My boss had taken off right behind me in another plane and had seen the whole thing. He landed, got in his pickup, and drove up to get me. It turned out that my practically-new engine had shut down because a small shaft in the air intake had broken and fallen out, closing off the engine. Cessna soon changed the design after we filed a Malfunction & Defects report with the FAA.

As I climbed into the boss's pickup truck, he stuffed a hundred dollar bill in my shirt pocket. Surprised I looked questions at him. "That’s for not bending my new airplane," he said. The thought went through my mind, "Hmmm, that’s the fastest money I ever earned... but I don’t believe I want to do it again!"

Three Mistakes and You're Out - Almost

While flying for the Forest Service, I had another "adventure."

In order to be at the airport one morning, I had to arise before daylight and drive for an hour and a half. I was assigned a different airplane to fly this particular morning. As I recall, it was a Cessna 180, one that I had not flown before. Each airplane, like a car, has its own set of peculiarities. I had flown this type many times, but I checked this airplane over as usual, including a careful "walk around inspection."

After being given my day's assignment, I was introduced to my Forest Service observer partner whom I'll call Ted (name changed to protect the stupid). We climbed aboard. I cranked the engine and taxied out to the active runway. At this point I realized that in my rush to get going that morning I had forgotten my watch. I mentioned it to Ted as I started to return to the hanger. He said, "No problem, I have a very good watch and I’ll keep track of our time."  Reluctantly I agreed, "Well, OK."

Mistake #1.

We took off and headed out over the forest to look for smokes or anything that might indicate a fire. We checked with each lookout tower as we passed. It seemed each one had seen a suspicious looking plume of smoke which turned out to be false alarms such as a patch of lingering fog or dust thrown up by a truck on a logging road. Checking these out, we slowly made our usual route over the dense woods, deep canyons, and high peaks. Altogether, it was a normal, boring day of forest service surveillance.

 We were cruising at a relatively slow airspeed of some 110-120 mph. As the day wore on, I occasionally glanced at the electric fuel gauges and noted we didn’t seem to be burning up the fuel as much as I expected. Oh well, it was probably because of the lower power setting I was using. I casually mentioned this to Ted.  He looked at his watch and said, "Don't worry, we have plenty of time left." I went along with his assessment.

Mistake #2.

He hardly got the words out of his mouth when I spotted a fairly large plume of smoke. I pointed it out to Ted. He said, "Let’s take a look." We were flying at about 7000 above sea level. As I turned toward the smoke, I noticed we were over a large high mountain valley shaped like a big bowl. The smoke was near the middle of it. As we came over the smoke I could see flames flickering at the base of it.

Ted became very busy plotting the position of the fire. He had me circle the fire as he plotted - around and around and around. I again looked at my fuel gauges. We had emptied one tank and were now working on the other one. I said, "It seems to me we have been out here quite awhile." He again quickly looked at his watch and replied, "We got lots of time yet." I went along with his call.

Mistake #3.

He then said, "I need for you to fly lower in order for me to get an intensity reading on the fire." They do this so they can tell the dispatcher how many smoke jumpers to send out.

I throttled back and descended to about five- or six-hundred feet above the forest tree tops, continuing to circle. He then asked, "Can’t you take us down lower?"

I pulled the flaps down and we quickly began to lose altitude. At about the same time the engine of the aircraft went silent.

Then it caught and ran for a moment or two, then went silent again. Needless to say, I was startled and alarmed!  I quickly scanned the panel, including the fuel gauge. It registered that we had about a third of a tank of fuel. So my mind quickly dismissed the thought of fuel starvation and figured it was something else. This took only seconds, during which time the engine continued to burp and quit and burp and quit. I raised the flaps. Suddenly I had full power again for a minute or two. Each time it quit I would rock the wings back and forth and it would run for a bit. This proved to me that I did have a fuel starvation problem. 

During the couple of minutes this happened I did two things. First, I headed for lower ground which was a wide draw in the bottom of the bowl. This draw emptied into a shallow canyon and this canyon emptied into a much deeper canyon. At the same time I was practically yelling at Ted to give the dispatcher our location and tell him we are having engine trouble and could go into the trees at any time. Instead of doing this, he quickly shoved his boom mike up over his forehead and grabbed at the glove box for a barf bag into which he proceeded to empty the contents of his stomach.

By now my mind is racing in near panic. I thought, "This is just perfect. We are going into the trees and no one will know where to look for us and this joker is too busy filling up barf bags to tell them."

I was still getting little bursts of power so even though we were losing altitude it wasn’t as fast as with a completely dead engine. I flew out of the draw into the shallow canyon and on out into a very deep canyon which gave me a couple of thousand feet of altitude to work with.

Finally Ted got himself together and called the dispatcher in Grangeville and gave him to understand our emergency. The dispatcher laconically replied, "Well, tell him to land at Moose Creek."

I thought, "You idiot, that is 20 miles away! I’ll be very lucky if I can keep this machine in the air for five miles."

I knew that the canyon I was in emptied into the Selway River canyon and suddenly I remembered that two or three days before I had been flying over the Selway River in this area and had spotted an old abandoned Forest Service landing strip alongside the river. I remembered thinking sometime or other I might need to land on this strip and so I had gone in and landed there just to check it out. (The Lord sure looks out for idiots!)

Very shortly I sailed out into the big, wide Selway canyon, still steadily losing altitude. But by rocking the wings I was getting a short burst of power to extend my glide. I wasn’t exactly sure which way to turn to get to the strip, but was pretty sure it was to my left so turned in that direction. I came around a bend in the river and there it lay--abandoned, overgrown with weeds and small brush, but believe me it was beautiful.

It was one of those one-way strips which meant I had to go down stream past the strip and make a 180 degree turn and land going up stream. I was down to about 400 feet above the river and knew it was going to be close. I nursed my altitude like a miser nurses his money and prayed that I would have enough. As I came abreast of the strip going down stream, my engine fired its last shot. It was dead stick from here on in.

I made the 180 degree turn as carefully as I could and as I rolled out of the turn I remembered there was a small knob of a hill directly at the near end of the strip. At this point I could not see my strip because of this knob-like shoulder off the canyon wall. I wasn’t at all sure I would be able to clear it.

I was flying at half flaps and when I got within a hundred feet of the knob, I grabbed the flap lever and pulled full flaps. This had a slight ballooning effect and lifted me over the knob and there was the beautiful strip directly in front of me. I managed to set down with very little trouble from the weeds and low brush. We rolled to a stop and I sat there for a few moments thanking God for the help.

I looked at Ted and he didn’t seem the least bit excited as if he did this every day of his life. He was talking on the radio to our dispatcher saying, "Yeah, we landed at the old Shearer strip on the Selway. No problem. Yeah the engine quit for some reason, but we made it down OK." He then turned to me and said nonchalantly "What do you suppose is wrong with the engine?"

I dawned on me this clown didn’t have the least clue that we had run out of fuel. Realizing my stupidity could cost our company the Forest Service contract, I muttered, "I don’t know - might be fuel pump."

The word was passed along to my company boss, Frank, back in Grangeville and he said he would be in to pick up Ted and then we would see about getting the plane out. My boss soon appeared coming up the canyon in another plane. He landed, but rolled to a stop at the opposite end of the runway and got out and messed around the plane for a few minutes, making me wonder what he was doing. Finally, he climbed back in his plane and taxied up to where we were and got out.

Frank was not a talkative man. He said a few words to Ted and told him to go head and get into his airplane and he would take him home. Ted did so. As soon as he was out of ear shot, Frank turned to me and growled, "You [expletive deleted], you ran it out of gas. Does the observer know that?"

"I don’t think he has a clue," I replied.

"Good! I am going to take him out of here. I have left some five-gallon cans of gas down at the other end of the strip. After we are gone you can walk down there and get them. If you have any more trouble, call me on our frequency and I will bring a mechanic back with me."

Without further adieu he took off. I managed to pour one of the cans of gas into my ship, then I cranked it up and taxied down to where the other cans were hidden in the weeds. I poured the four remaining cans into my plane and flew home.

Frank never told the Forest Service honchos that one of his pilots was dumb enough to run a plane out of gas over the back country. It would have likely caused him to lose his contract with them.

Because of Frank and my good buddy Buck Erickson I became "famous" for this little episode. (Not a good kind of fame either!)

Like Buck said, "Roberts, only you and God know how you managed to stay out over the forests of Idaho well beyond the length of time it takes to use up the fuel, land dead stick on an abandoned strip, and never scratch the paint on the plane - WITH a passenger on board as a witness!"

Forest Fire Flying

The Northwestern part of the U.S. has thousands upon thousands of acres of forest lands that are managed and cared for by the U.S. Forest Service. This is timber-covered country whose mountains reach to ten thousand feet or more in elevation.

In my day, the Forest Service relied heavily on various types of aircraft to service these great forests lands. Though they actually owned few planes of their own, they contracted with privately owned air-service companies to furnish planes and qualified pilots to do their flying. This type of back country flying included fire-suppression tanker planes, fire patrol planes, utility and cargo planes, and planes suited for dropping fire fighters by parachute (which are better known as smoke-jumpers).

The Forest Service has created and maintained numerous landing strips scattered over this huge section of the Northwest. Many of these strips were located in deep canyons along streams, creeks and rivers. They were usually short, sometimes rough, and often were what was called “one way strips,” meaning you had to land in one direction only and no going around for a second shot if you missed the first one. It was well known that over the years quite a number of pilots and their passengers had been injured or killed trying to use these strips. Most of the strips required pilots with mountain flying experience to safely negotiate them.

My first experience with this type of flying with the Forest Service was as a fire patrol plane pilot for an air-service operator in Grangeville Idaho. On a typical patrol, I would report into the office in the early morning and be assigned a plane to fly, usually a Cessna 180 or 185 or a Cessna 206. I would be given a briefing on the route I would fly and introduced to a Forest Service person who would accompany me as an observer and radio operator. The observer was a man familiar with the route and he would occupy the right front seat beside me. In his lap he would have large map grid of the area with the route and all the lookout towers depicted on it. He would have ear phones and a boom mike on his head for easy and continuous communication with the dispatch office at the home base. Also he would be contacting each of the lookout towers along our route as we flew by them.

This particular season I was hired to fly a Cessna 206, which was a six-place machine. The 4 rear seats were removed and a few modifications installed. I would be flying patrol but with two smoke jumpers and a jump-master on board. Each jumper also had a fire pack to be dropped separately. These contained most of his necessary equipment, a sleeping bag, food supplies, etc. If a fire was spotted, the jumpers were deployed so as to land in a nearby clearing if possible.

As soon as they hit the ground I would make a low pass over them and the jump-master would shove the fire-packs out. This was a bit tricky. Each pack had its own small parachute. As I made the low pass I had to signal the jump-master the exact moment to shove them out so as to land in the clearing where the fellows on the ground were. As a general rule I managed to drop them on the spot or very close. I had done this many times.

It was late in the season. The nights were getting cold in the high elevations and the packs were important to the men I had just dropped. On the first low pass I yelled, "Let ‘er go!" and the jump-master shoved out pack number one. I pulled up in a tight turn so I could observe where the little chute and pack would land. There was one lone, very tall pine tree in the middle of the clearing and... you guessed it.

The blasted chute settled directly over the tip top of the tree. I made the second pass and again at the right instant yelled, "Let ‘er go!" As I pulled up and turned to watch, the second little chute was caught up in some sort of wind gust and started floating slowly away from the clearing. On and on...and on... it went on down the canyon. I don’t know where it landed, but it definitely was not in the reach of the poor jumpers on the ground. There was nothing else I could do so I headed home, knowing that those men were going to spend a long cold night and maybe several days without sleeping bags, blankets, tools and food.

About five days later I was out at the airport servicing my plane when two very large men walked up to me. I recognized the biggest of the two was one of the jumpers I had marooned up in the mountains. He walked straight up to me with a serious look on his face, reached out with his huge hand and grasped the front of my shirt. He pulled me up close and in a low controlled growl said, "Dale, I want to explain to you what it's like to spend two days and three nights at about eight thousand feet in these here mountains without anything to eat but some candy bars. No sleeping bags, no saw, no ax, no nothing. I OUGHT TO WRING YORE NECK."

What could I say but, "Yes sir, yes sir, no sir, yes sir." He then let go of my shirt and stomped off. Whew. I was very happy that the boss had told me that the season was over and I could go home for the winter. I sure didn’t want to have that dude in my care again!

Barnyard Landing

One day I left the landing strip with a full load on board this old battered and beat-up Stearman. I was flying about the average ferry altitude of a couple of hundred feet, headed out to spray a field of cotton. The tired old engine made a muffled cough, backfired and quit cold. 

 Now a loaded Stearman without power has a glide angle like a brick with a feather tied to it. Within 10 or 12 seconds I was on the ground. I didn’t even have time to turn parallel with the furrows. I hit the hard dry dirt doing about 85 mph across the furrows of a newly harvested maize field. Bumpity, bumpity bumptiy, enough to rattle your teeth. It seems that the engine had decided it didn’t like the impure fuel we were using.

Not all my flight interruptions were caused by engine problems though. Sometimes there were other causes. About four days later while flying for the same operator near small town of Brownfield, Texas I took off at dawn and headed for my assigned field when I noticed the tips of my propeller was making little contrail rings. 

It was early fall. We had had a cool air mass move in the night before and this was a warning that temperature and dew-point were getting too close together, but I figured I would at least have time to get my load out. 

I arrived at my field and made several passes across it when fog began to form around me. I thought, "Uh-oh, I had better get this bag of rags on the ground pretty soon."  I pulled up and headed back to the strip, but before I got there I found fog banks closing in on me all around. 

I saw a newly mowed alfalfa field directly in front of me. I quickly decided to put the plane on the ground - and just in time. Before I could bring her to a stop I entered a thick fog bank. I rolled to a stop and I kicked the tail around.

As I peered into the mist I discovered that I had stopped about 15 feet from a small barn or tool shed. I shut the engine down and just as I did so a back door on the shed flew open and a Mexican hired hand stepped out. When he saw me his eyes bugged out and he threw the hoe he was carrying up in the air and lit out like the devil was after him. I had to laugh but can’t say as I blamed him. Who would expect to step out of the barn and suddenly see this big biplane rolling toward you out of the fog?

I was very pleased to be on the ground. Eventually I was able to hitch a ride with a passing farmer and he took me back to my base. 

When I walked in, my bosses eyes got as big as the Mexican’s and he said, "Roberts, this is the second time within week you have returned without you airplane." He was vastly relieved to learn that his plane wasn’t damaged and admitted, "I’m pleased though that you are on the ground and not on top of this pea soup milling around up there looking for some place to land."

Blowing A Jug in Midair

Several of my emergency landings were the result of engine failure. In my early years of ag-flying, we were flying mostly military surplus airplanes. Some of them were not in good shape to begin with and received very poor maintenance as well. The same went for the engines.

Not only that, but we were running them at well over what was called "METO power" all day long. (METO is short for Maximum Except Take Off.) We also ran them with heavy loads and high manifold pressures and high temperatures all day long. Needless to say the engines didn’t last long. 

They were never designed to be used like that. However, the owners/operators didn’t care because they were cheap and plentiful. When complaining to my employer one day about this engine abuse he nonchalantly growled, “Well don’t hurt yourself.” In other words, “Don’t tell me your troubles, I got troubles of my own.” I found that most owners/operators in that day were not that concerned for the pilot’s safety. In his mind, we were just overpaid farm hands with more guts than brains.

Consequently, from time to time my engine would have a cast-iron fit and fling parts here and there and cease to internally combust. The prop ceased to propel, resulting in a flight interruption which often ruined my day. 

Sometimes there was a warning, sometimes not. 

One day I was spraying rice on the edge of the Gulf of Mexico and the engine went pow-bang-cough-cough and made other vulgar noises. I was pretty certain that I had blown a jug. ("Jug" was slang for a cylinder, so called because of its resemblance to an old-fashioned jug.) I was on my last pass so finished it, pulled up and headed for a county dirt road which I had passed on the way out. I was steadily losing altitude, which I didn’t have an abundance of to begin with. I soon decide I was not going to make the road and would have to put it down in a rice field that was lying fallow. Just to make it interesting and tax my landing skills, the field was muddy and had several levees (some call them terraces) running across my intended landing path.

This was not the first time and I had learned the hard way that I should make a three point landing and hold the stick hard back in my lap, keeping the tail wheel firmly on the muddy ground. Otherwise I would once again find myself dangling from my seat belt/harness in a upside down configuration. 

I touched down at about 60 mph. I was hoping the engine would continue to run until I got it on the ground but when I reduced the throttle, the old Pratt Whitney wheezed and the engine died. Even then it would have been relatively easy, except each time I crossed a levee the plane would jump back up in the air a few feet and the tail would go higher than the previous crossing, then slam down pretty hard. Since I had no power I could not blow the tail down. I repeated this maneuver at each levee. The last one I crossed, the plane had slowed considerably and I was sure that the main gear would sink in the mud. Then the tail would go up and over we would go.

Sure enough the main gear hit the levee, jumped a bit and plowed into mud on the other side of the levee. Up came the tail almost to the point where the prop would strike the ground. It stopped there and remained there a few seconds while I was screeching "NO, NO, NO!"  

It slowly fell back to earth, Kersplat in the mud. Lucky me. 

I climbed out and looked at the engine. My guess was right. The head had popped off a cylinder.

Flagman Folly, Flying Folly

Back in the wohgie days, "aerial applicators" (a more dignified name for cropdusters) required flagmen. You see, when an ag-pilot made a swath across a field it was necessary to mark that pass so when he turned around at the end of the field to come back, he would know where to lay the next swath. The accepted method was to place a man (or woman) with a flag at each end of the field. The pilot would line up on the flags and know exactly where the next swath should be placed.

The flag-person had a few simple rules that he was required to follow.

Rule number 1. Both flagmen were to begin by standing at each end of the field to be sprayed and on the same side of the field. As an example, if the pilot intended to make his spray passes going north and south he would need a flagman on the north end of the field and another on the south end. Or, both flagmen would need to start on the east side of the field and walk toward the west side, or start on the west side and walk toward the east - whichever way the pilot had instructed them. Above all, they should both be starting on the same side and walking parallel to each other in the same direction. Most pilots liked to start on the down side of the field and fly cross-wind. This would keep the spray off of the flagmen and also off of the plane.

Rule number 2. Wave the flag until the pilot had time to line up on them for his pass. If the field to be sprayed was over a half mile in length it was necessary for the flagman to wave the flag quite vigorously so as to be quickly sighted by the pilot after making his turnaround and lining up for the next pass. This was especially necessary if there was no breeze to open the flag.

Rule number 3. As soon as it appeared that the plane was lined up, the flagman were instructed to take a given number of steps perpendicular to the flight path of the plane so as to be ready for the next pass. For example, if the known width of the plane’s swath was 48 feet, the average steps of a flagman for each pass would be sixteen steps. Simple right?

O.K. Now you know the rules.

Foolish Flagmen

On this particular morning I was assigned the field to be sprayed. The field was located some 20 miles away from our base. This was a bit unusual. We didn’t often work fields that far away from a landing strip. I was given instructions as to where the field was. My plane was fueled. A full load of the necessary chemical was pumped into the Stearman’s 180 gallon hopper, and I was told that my flagmen were already on their way to the field.

I buckled myself in, taxied out to the airstrip, and poured the coals to the Pratt & Whitney. After using up most of the runway, I finally pried the old girl loose from planet earth. The air was plenty warm in East Texas. It had rained the night before so it was also quite humid. Warm, humid air isn’t the best for producing aircraft lift. I had on a full load of fuel and a full load of spray so the old girl was needing some high manifold pressure to maintain our flight altitude of about a hundred feet.

I found the field which lay alongside a state highway. The flaggin’ wagon had just arrived and the flagmen were trudging across the field to take their positions. Well, just guess what……….bet you can see where I’m going with this. One flagman ended up on the south side of the field at the east end with the obvious intention of walking north, and the other idiot…excuse me…I mean flagman…perched on the north side of the field at the west end with the obvious intentions of walking south! The field had a hump in the middle so they could not see each other.

Now how in blue blazes was I supposed to line up on these two half-asleep klutzes? I had no radio in the airplane and it wouldn’t have helped anyway because they were out of their vehicle and I couldn’t have contacted them if I had a radio.

I flew by each one several times and made motions with my arms trying to make them understand that they were not where they should have been. They just stared at me like a couple of idiots. One of them grinned and waved, supposing I was just being friendly. If he could have read lips, he would certainly know I was NOT being friendly!

After circling a number of times I came to the conclusion that they were hopeless. In a fit of frustration and anger I decided I would land on the nice, wide, good ole Texas highway and go over and scorch their ears with some well-chosen verbiage.

Bad choice.

The highway ran east and west. There was a distinct cross-wind from the north. However, this was not the first time I landed on a highway or a dirt road even. I looked both ways for traffic and saw none. I set her down as gently as I could, knowing that I was pushing the envelope. What I had not counted on was the fact that the baffles in the chemical tank had been removed for some unknown reason.

As soon as the upwind wheel touched the pavement, that 180 gallons of chemical in the tank came alive! It began to slosh and the ole girl got the bit in her teeth and into the left side ditch we went. Oh yeah - it had rained the night before so the ditch contained a lot of water and mud in the bottom. We hit the ditch at an angle, went through the ditch issuing a spray of water from both sides, careened up the outer embankment, then off to the right, back to the ditch again flinging more water and mud, and then back out on to the paved highway where I managed to regain control and brought her to a stop.

Where he came from I do not know, but I looked behind me and there sat a farmer with wide eyes and startled look on his face. He never uttered a word. Didn’t leave his pickup, but slowly eased around me and hightailed it on down the road probably thinking "Them dang fool cropdusters is at it again!"

I sat there thanking God that the Texas highway department designed wide, gently sloping ditches, or else I would surely have made a wheels-up landing.

Dale Roberts crop dusting in the 1960s

When my brain-dead flagmen saw the near-disaster taking place, they jumped in their truck and raced over to see why I had landed. I was so shaken and thankful that I had not wrecked my plane that I forgot how furious I was and gently explained why I landed. HA! NOT!!

Lesson: Don’t let your emotions fool you into believing you are not subject to the laws of physics.

Runaway Aircraft

Back in the woahgie days, most small aeroplanes did not have electric starters.  The onliest way to start the engine to internally combust was to spin the propeller by hand.   Early on several techniques were developed to do this little chore safely.

The most common method required at least two people - one to sit in the cockpit and handle the controls, and the other to spin the propeller.  The routine went something like this.  The man at the propeller called, "Switch off, throttle set, and prime." The cockpit man called back, "The switch is off, throttle is set, a couple shots of prime."  Whereupon, the propeller man would grab the propeller and pull it through several blades in the proper direction, thereby filling the cylinders with fuel-laden air ready to be ignited.  Then the prop man called, "Make it hot."  That meant the cockpit man was to turn the magneto switch to the "on" position. The cockpit man called back "Switch is on."

The man at the prop carefully took the upward slanting blade in hand, swung his left leg forward and up, then heaved his body and leg downward and back as he pulled the prop blade through a revolution.  This maneuver hopefully cranked the engine as it also took the prop man safely clear of the spinning blade.  Sometimes this had to be repeated several times before the engine came alive and started running.

Now, ya got the picture?

I have observed several incidents where one or more of these parts of the above mentioned procedure were not carefully observed or were somewhat modified with - shall we say - interesting results. There were times when one had to crank the engine with no one else around to help. The procedure then was slightly changed. The airplane was securely tied down to the ground with ropes or straps, usually to a concrete block with a metal loop on top to receive the tie-down rope.
 
In one instance that I recall, the tail-wheel tie-down was not fastened and the right wing tie-down came loose.  When the lone individual cranked the engine by the prop, the plane launched a quick circle around the left wing tie-down and struck the twin-engine aircraft tied down next to it, and chopped the twin nearly in half.   Hope the pilot had liability insurance!

Another occasion that I witnessed, the plane was prop-started with no tie-downs at all.  The throttle had been set about half open.  The plane was completely out of control and loose!  It cut three or four quick circles with several men chasing it.  If it wasn't so serious, it would have been highly comical.  The men were chasing the plane and then whoops! The plane, after a sharp change of direction, was chasing the men!  This chaotic scenario was repeated several times until the wayward Aeronca Champ slammed into the side of a hanger.  Ouch!  What a mess!

George (name changed to protect the guilty) and I were spraying brush out in West Texas.  We were using a landing strip out on a ranch which sloped downward to a small lake on the south end.   We were flying Piper Cub-type aircraft, neither of which had an electric starter.  I was tall enough to stand on the right side of the engine cowling behind the propeller and with my right hand-prop my plane.  I could set the throttle at a low setting and when the engine started, I could quickly reach into the cockpit with my left hand and reduce the RPM.  No problem.

George was a small fellow and could not do this so I usually did the honors while he sat in the cockpit.  For some reason this particular morning he decided to set the parking brake on his ship and went round in front of the plane and cranked it by propping it himself.  He had set the throttle a leetle too high.  The brake didn't hold.  The plane began to move forward. Being very agile, George quickly jumped to the side and then made a leap for the cockpit.  He didn't make it.  Instead he tripped on the wing strut and tumbled over and landed on his back just in time for the tail wing (stabilizer) to pass over him.

He did manage to grab the tail-wheel strut as it passed by.  The plane dragged him quite a ways as he struggle to regain his feet.  The little Cub seemed bent on taking a dip in the lake at the end of the runway.  George hung on and, after clawing his way up the length of the fuselage, scrambled to the cockpit and closed the throttle.  The plane rolled to a stop about fifteen feet from the lake.

About that time the boss-man came driving up to find me lying on the ground laughing my head off.  He wasn't laughing.  It was a wonder he didn't fire the both of us.

Over the years I witnessed a number of these runaways. With the advent of electric starters, this excitement seldom happens anymore. These incidents were very serious, of course. But almost always hilarious...as long as it wasn't my plane!   

Cotton Chopping with a Ryan PT 22

As you may have noticed, in the banner picture I have my hand on the propeller of a Ryan PT 22 which was the military version of the Ryan ST.  After the war there were many, many trainer types of aircraft that were termed "surplus" and sold to private companies and individuals.  They were usually very cheap and some were in practically new condition.

As you see in the picture, I was admiring this beautifully restored little tail-dragger plane and it reminded me of an incident that made me smile. I went to work as a cropduster in 1960 and as the years went by, I had many little encounters with these surplus aircraft. 

On this particular occasion I was employed by an ag-flying company in West Texas.  My boss and company manager was a non-pilot, but had somehow acquired one of these surplus planes - a Ryan PT 22.  I flew it quite a number of times off of our cropdusting runway which was nothing more than a sandy strip in the middle of a cotton field.  The width of the strip was not much more than the wing span of the planes that were using it. It was a fun little plane to fly - fully aerobatic. A nice toy to play with.

My boss decided one day that he needed to learn to fly the thing.  It just looked so easy and like so much fun.  Being a flight instructor for some years, I agreed to teach him the wonderful and exhilarating skills of flying in my spare time.  After a couple of hours of dual instruction, he informed me he was ready to solo.  The poor guy had never even made a take-off or landing, but was convinced that he could do it.  He had watched his pilots for a number of years and was very sure it wasn't all that complicated.

I did my best to talk him out of this hair-brained idea, but to no avail.  Finally, in desperation I said, "Boss, if you can taxi this little plane down to the end of the strip and go just fast enough to raise the tail wheel off the ground, then chop the power and come to a stop, then turn it around and do the same thing back up the strip to where we are standing, I think you may change your mind."  I knew that like all tail-draggers this little aircraft needed an experienced hand when on the ground.

He quickly put on helmet and goggles and climbed in, muttering more or less to himself, "Piece of cake." He strapped himself in, grabbed the throttle and pointed her down the strip. 

As the tail wheel lifted from the sandy strip, the plane made a quick swerve to the left out into the cotton, which was about thirty inches high.  He was chopping cotton with the prop and throwing it into the air.  He cut the power and quickly came to a stop in the soft sandy soil. 

Then using lots of throttle he managed to get the Ryan turned around and back on the strip, where he repeated the same crazy scenario. Only this time he careened to the right of the strip, chopping cotton to beat the band. 

Back to the strip again. He lined up and pushed the throttle in for more power. The tail came up much faster and he did a full-fledged ground-loop to the left, crossed the runway again, and went ripping out into the cotton on the left side again. 

By this time, with the extra power he had raised a cloud of dust.  Yessir, it was quite a sight!  The air was full of good ole Texas sand, well mixed with cotton bolls and stalks and leaves. 

When he finally wrestled it onto the strip again, he headed back up to the point of departure very slowly so as not to raise the tail wheel. The plane was covered with cotton leaves and stalks and the prop was green with juice.

He climbed out, his face covered with sweat and dirt, and was spewing forth all the cuss words that he could muster.  By this time he had collected quite an audience of ground crewmen and other pilots who were enjoying the show. He seemed to think the whole debacle was entirely my fault and gave me a good cussing too. He stomped into the office swearing and muttering all the way and I heard him say, "I didn't want to fly the ##%@$**& miserable, wretched piece of sky junk anyway!"

Shortly after that, he sold it.