Terminus

Day two and three of the race went pretty smoothly. From Hot Springs, AR we flew to Cameron, MO, did a flyby without landing and on to Illinois. Illinois was great with lots of food, music and the American Red Cross. We waited a couple of hours for weather to pass and then were off to Indiana where we planned to spend the night.

Our fly by in Indiana went well and we circled out to the right to cool down and prepare to land. At this particular airport the flyby was in one direction 200 feet over the runway and landing was on the same runway, but in the opposite direction. We were cleared to land, on short final with gear and flaps extended and the airspeed nice and slow when tower instructed us to do a 360 to the right to avoid the next airplane on the flyby. It was very dangerous to undertake the maneuver and in retrospect we should have said unable, but we didn't want to delay the other team's flyby so did as directed. As we came out of the 360 we were no longer lined up with the runway but cleared to land. After some additional maneuvering we got ourselves lined up and with variable crosswinds, and ended up with one of our nicest landings. Phew! Glad to be on the ground after that one.

We had to park N4685M on the grass and secure it with our tie down stakes. It was disconcerting how easily the stakes could be pushed into the ground. Typically it takes a hammer or at least a heavy rock to drive them in. We secured the plane as best we could.

We found ourselves at a very sorry Best Western and walked to the Texas Roadhouse for dinner. The walk was a bit longer than expected and took us over the interstate. There was a sidewalk so no worries. After dinner as we exited the Texas Roadhouse we saw a black sky to the west and there was lightening. By the time we were on the overpass, feeling very exposed, the lightening intensified, the sky became even darker and the first few drops of rain began to fall. We walked faster and faster, and with a 50 yard dash to the very sorry Best Western, got in just before the skies opened.

As we entered the lobby one of the guests told us about a tornado warning, but the joke in the lobby was there is always a tornado warning.

Once in our room Sheryl dialed in the weather channel and that is when the tornado warnings became real to us. Never having heard one I thought it was a fire alarm. The wind outside was howling to the point we stayed clear of the windows and we watched in horror as the storm approached the airport area where 85M was secured on the flimsy tie downs. Soon the lights went out and we just waited.

Once the storm passed and the lights came back on I called the airport to see if there was any damage to the airplanes. They said not to worry because they had 20 minutes notice and got just about all but 3 or 4 airplanes into the hangar and the ones remaining outside were not damaged.

In the morning we checked weather and the outlook was not good. Most of the next leg was not VFR and we would have to watch to see if we could even get out. The storm that passed the night before was now in our direct path.
We went to the airport to wait out the weather only to find that N4685M was not one of the airplanes put into the hangar and was not where we had left it. It pulled the stakes in the rain and weathervaned into the wind. As a result the rudder appeared to be broken so we had 85M hauled into the maintenance hangar to be checked out. Word of our possible damage spread like wildfire among the other racers. The mechanics inspected the linkages and the front landing gear and proclaimed no damage. A panicked call to Pete back in Plymouth confirmed that based on what we described, he believed there to be no worries.

Around 4 PM we were ready to take off with clear weather. Unfortunately I failed to pull the wheel chock, so after a bit of embarrassment we were off. We tested the controls as much as we could while taxiing and on initial roll out and luckily all was well with N4685M. She had survived a close by tornado with grace.

We flew to our next stop in Parkersburg, WV, did a flyby and continued on to the final stop in Frederick, MD. Flying over the mountains into MD was hairy. The cloud layer was low and the ground was high so we had to thread our way through. The GPS highlighted the towers so that really helped. The thermals were wicked and we bounced around mercilessly.

One at our final destination we tied down and left the plane at the field.

We heard of the trials and tribulations of many of the racers including equipment malfunctions like vacuum pumps, starters, batteries, a carburetor and lights, one racer lost a wheel faring, some racers flew the wrong runway on their high speed flybys and some failed to communicate with the other racers, the timers on the ground and even the Class Delta towers.

After spending many days on post flight briefings and then the final banquet last night we ended up with no penalties and finishing 41 out of 51. Although this may not seem to be very good results we are happy with them, especially considering we never flew “full throttle” which is what is expected during this race. We finished with great experiences and safely.

Today we leave for home in MA.