December is a month of dreams, bright colors, and high hopes. We pilots are no different than the cute jammie-clad children we see on various TV commercials. We have a love of toys as strong if not stronger than the average seven year old kid. We just show our infatuation with our toys in different ways.
During the past year I have attended three toy extravaganzas for pilots; Sun & Fun, Oshkosh, and the NBAA convention in Atlanta. At each location I found a slightly different version of the same thing. In all three I discovered that I was walking through a holiday toy catalog of goodies and dreams.
How many of us don’t want to navigate our airplanes from outer space? When was the last time we settled for looking out the windows and following highway signs to our destination? When I owned and flew an Aeronca Champ back when I was a lot younger (and lighter) the only navigation instrument I had on board was a whisky compass. My navigational databank was a road atlas that I got for free at a gas station.
No need even for a sectional chart. Since I hardly ever got above a thousand feet in altitude, the road map worked much better than any expensive sectional ever could. Plus, my operating area for the Champ was limited to grass strips and non-towered, small airports.
Now, even the smallest of LSAs offered for sale have at least one GPS unit and some sort of moving map. I am sure that for pilots who don’t have such a thing, a moving map is right up there on their Christmas wish list.
Dear Santa: I wanna throw up
Bigger toys that you can find at fly-ins like Sun & Fun and Oshkosh are those impossibly beautiful aerobatic planes. They have enough horsepower to do a vertical climb all afternoon and can pull enough gees to make even the tightest face-lifted movie star’s jowls sag. You can see these holiday toys in action on the show line where various performers do extremely dangerous looking maneuvers while trailing smoke.
These toys lose their allure for this heavy jet pilot early in the week at both fly-ins. First, I’ve pulled enough high gees in my life to know that I’m not interested in doing that sort of thing anymore. A simple one gee aileron roll or gentle three-turn spin is just fine with me, thank you. No more internal organ crushing show-off maneuvers for this cowboy.
That kind of takes the fun and utility out of buying one of those very expensive breakfast ejectors.
All that glitters is not Gulfstream…
Do you remember how good those toys looked in the store before Christmas? They were shiny-new and exciting at every level. Then you opened the package on the big day played with the must-have toy for a while and ended up popping bubble-wrap for your jollies the rest of the day. The new toy, absent its great store display, was dull and lifeless.
I wonder how many pilots have spent the extra money on a three television screen avionics system for their airplane that on its best day could only do 100 knots only to realize that they really didn’t need all that technology to go fifty miles for a hamburger on a sunny Saturday.
I have nothing against television screened aircraft. My airline career was fraught with the things. In the latter years of my airline life I couldn’t go from Shreveport to Little Rock without first programming the magenta line and every performance variable into the little gray boxes in the MD-88s I flew. The programming for such a flight even if you were very good at it as I was could take about ten to fifteen minutes.
When I flew the ancient DC-9 with its total lack of televisions and computers we would just start the engines and point it in the direction of Little Rock and book.
The moving map displays are certainly nice and I am sure that soon they will be the only thing you can get for your cockpit’s instrument panel but a good mental picture of your location, in my never to be humble opinion is far better than the best color display.
Lindbergh used a string and a globe
In December 1968 the Apollo 8 astronauts had a visitor during their pre-mission crew breakfast. Charles Lindbergh dropped in for some steak and eggs with the guys before they blasted off for the first manned round trip to the moon.
During the breakfast conversation Lindbergh mentioned that when he planned his historic mission from New York to Paris he had used a long string and a globe to measure the distance. Using this simple measurement he also calculated how much fuel he would need. It turned out later, according to Lindbergh, that even after all the highly scientific calculations that were done by the Ryan aircraft company and him later to figure out the fuel load they came within a few pounds of what he predicted he’d need using a string.
This talk of low-tech was to have a further effect on the mission. It seems that astronaut Jim Lovell had to re-load the navigation computer by hand and in a hurry during the Apollo 8 mission. Later, on the Apollo 13 mission when he was mission commander, he had to know the “string” basics yet again to reload the computer after power-up so they could re-enter the atmosphere without burning up.
I’m bringing all of this up to remind myself and perhaps you that no matter how high-tech an aviation toy you buy yourself for Christmas or another occasion there is no substitute for basic non-electrically powered knowledge. Navigation really hasn’t changed at all over the years. Just the way it is displayed. If your TV screens go dead do you have the skills to revert back to string and globe navigation?
Inexpensive holiday fun!
Because we are all currently in love with GPS units and television screens I have a fun and inexpensive holiday activity for you to try. Instead of buying an expensive toy this Christmas like a hand-held GPS or DVD player for your back seat passengers I suggest you buy a bunch of paper aviation charts, a “whiz-wheel” flight computer, a pencil and an old-style plotter.
Imagine the delight at your next hangar confab as you watch old pilots try to remember how to draw a wind triangle on a chart with that pencil! Giggle at the hilarity that ensues when you have to do simple time-rate-distance problems with no more than a piece of paper and a writing stick!
Seriously, when was the last time you drew a course line on a chart?
You instrument fliers out there can do a variation on this game. Get out a paper approach chart and have a little fun playing with it under the Christmas tree. The big advantage to paper approach charts over electronic ones is two-fold. First, the batteries never run out on paper and second, you can write notes on paper approach charts. I’ll really miss it when the last paper Jeppessen approach plate goes the way of the dinosaur. There is nothing quite like the heft and smell of a leather Jepp binder full of coffee-stained charts.
NBAA and Willy Wonka
In the aviation world there is nothing closer to Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory than the display floor of the NBAA convention. Everybody has to wear a suit and tie, and the Christmas toys are to die for.
Mock-ups and real examples of every kind of expensive gee-gaw, VLJ, high-priced service and shiny new pilot toy is all there to see and touch. They hand out enough free stuff in the form of little took kits, mouse pads, and pens that this writer has his Christmas shopping taken care of for the next three years.
Most of the items on the NBAA floor really are toys. They don’t exist yet. Many of the most popular VLJs and new aircraft haven’t flown, been produced or even have a factory made yet to produce them. Some of the Christmas toys the people were lining up to buy are not going to come out for three or four more years. Some, like the giant executive blimp, will probably take longer.
My suggestion for a great Holiday
I am certainly not qualified to advise you on your holiday giving this year, but I do suggest that instead of buying the latest gaudy aviation toy that your take the money you would have blown on something you won’t even like much after you open the package and spend it instead on taking a youngster or your favorite relative flying. Pick a nice, calm, sunny day and show then the true meaning of the Holidays.
Remember, all the aviation toys in the world can’t out do the simple pleasure of watching the people and the buildings get smaller as you climb out.
