Sunday June 22
The teams trapped in Elko NV now call themselves the Elko Racing Team. We all lost a total day there and most did not finish. We left our airplane in Council Bluffs, Iowa and arrived at the finish in Harrisburg, PA via rental car late Friday night. A third of the racing teams did not finish this year due to horrible weather.
The race was won by a Texas team, pilot Dianna Stanger who also won in 2012 both times flying a Cirrus. Even Marge Thayer last year's winner did not finish this year. Dianna and her husband are ranchers and also own a company that manufactures jet engine components. She manages the local airport, owns a flight scool and owns and flies seven aircraft from helicopters to jets to her grandfather's biplane.
En route back to Council Bluffs today to retrieve our airplane we stopped at Eagles Mere Air Museum owned by one of our sponsors. He has a magnificent collection of vintage airplanes, all of which fly. Anyone near central Pennsylvania should visit this very special museum.
We intend to arive in Council Bluffs tomorrow and head for home in the airplane. The forecast continues to be grim.
Sunday, June 22, 2014
Thursday, June 19, 2014
ARC June 19th
Still the 19th, though the clock is about to turn over to a new day. This last one was a waste of flying time. We left Norfolk without flying the timing line since we knew that we'd never make the deadline at the finish today - so decided that we're out of the race officially and want now to just make the finish to be there with all the teams. We never made it to the next stop, Iowa City. Even Minnetta, a college professor who lives there and worked hard on that stop didn't make it in to her home airport stop. Airplanes are parked all over Iowa. There was a huge line of storms running from the Canadian border down through Oklahoma. Our iPads give us radar shots of the storms and we saw a hole down in Texas we could have gotten through! Knowing that we can't possibly finish, we finally parked the airplane in a hangar in Council Bluffs (didn't want it to be hailed on), rented a car and headed east. This is our 8th Air Race Classic and we've never experienced such weaher - first the weather in the western mountains with snow and ice, then the cloud covered high mountains near Bear Lake with icy rain, and today's inpenatrable wall of weather. This year's race has gone to the faster airplanes which got out in front of this continuing miserable weather - the luck of the draw. The teams still on the west side of the heavy weather will hope it's flyable tomorrow to make it in for the final banquet. We're on the road and are seeing the results of the recent tornadoes. We're also seeing lots of corn which doesn't look like it will be knee high by the 4th of July, despite plenty of rain. We've been driving in rain tonight and are in a motel for a few hours' sleep.
Wednesday, June 18, 2014
Air Race Classic 3rd Day
Yesterday was a total loss. Those of us trapped in Elko never moved off the airport, nor did new teams come in. In fact, with one exception, we 15 teams in Elko were the last racers. We learned that 21 teams RONed (remained overnight) in Pinedale, and10 teams were in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Not a soul moved in or out of Elko and we called ourselves the Elko Racing Team. The mountains are beautiful with a new coat of snow. This morning as we went to the airport at 5:30, we discovered that the airplanes were covered with ice. We all worked on the airplanes for at least an hour de-icing them by hand. Finally we were off air racing. HA! As we proceeded to Pinedale we became disillusioned with the weather prognostigators who promised good weather to Pinedale. It was a horror - climbing to 13,500' to cross snow and cloud covered mountains, then into icy rain. We finally gave up and landed off course with several other teams at an airport at Bear Lake in Idaho. The clock continued as we sat on the ground. We finally decided to detour around Pinedale and go on to Scottsbluff, NE. That worked so well we flew the timing line and moved on to Norfolk, NB, my husband Bob's hometown, arriving in time to beat the deadline. You may remember that several days ago a double tornado attacked Norfolk, then two days later another tornado hit. When we racers arrived the hospitable airport folks went all out to find a place for us to rest our heads. There were no hotel rooms available due to the tornadoes and a nice couple took us home for the night. Airport people are that way! We understand that teams have completed the race in Pennsylvania and we'll have to fly four legs tomorrow to complete the race prior to the deadline - in Iowa, Illinois, Ohio and finally Pennsylvania. So I'd best get to bed and be in the airplane ready to go at dawn.
Yesterday was a total loss. Those of us trapped in Elko never moved off the airport, nor did new teams come in. In fact, with one exception, we 15 teams in Elko were the last racers. We learned that 21 teams RONed (remained overnight) in Pinedale, and10 teams were in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Not a soul moved in or out of Elko and we called ourselves the Elko Racing Team. The mountains are beautiful with a new coat of snow. This morning as we went to the airport at 5:30, we discovered that the airplanes were covered with ice. We all worked on the airplanes for at least an hour de-icing them by hand. Finally we were off air racing. HA! As we proceeded to Pinedale we became disillusioned with the weather prognostigators who promised good weather to Pinedale. It was a horror - climbing to 13,500' to cross snow and cloud covered mountains, then into icy rain. We finally gave up and landed off course with several other teams at an airport at Bear Lake in Idaho. The clock continued as we sat on the ground. We finally decided to detour around Pinedale and go on to Scottsbluff, NE. That worked so well we flew the timing line and moved on to Norfolk, NB, my husband Bob's hometown, arriving in time to beat the deadline. You may remember that several days ago a double tornado attacked Norfolk, then two days later another tornado hit. When we racers arrived the hospitable airport folks went all out to find a place for us to rest our heads. There were no hotel rooms available due to the tornadoes and a nice couple took us home for the night. Airport people are that way! We understand that teams have completed the race in Pennsylvania and we'll have to fly four legs tomorrow to complete the race prior to the deadline - in Iowa, Illinois, Ohio and finally Pennsylvania. So I'd best get to bed and be in the airplane ready to go at dawn.
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
blog 6/17/14
Blog 6/17/14
Sorry about yesterday's blog date. Should have been 6/16 from Concord to Elko.
This blog actually starts the 17th in Elko. I usually summarize at the end of the day but am now writing at 9:00 AM Pacific time hanging around the airport since sunrise. We are seeing that everyone in Pinedale and Scotts Bluff has moved on. We 15 teams are not. An instrument flight just made an approach here down to minimums with rime ice all the way down. Obviously we're not going anywhere soon. The twelve- hour forecast isn't good and the twenty-four hour says everything will be slowly moving north. There is some talk of a bridge tournament.
Sorry about yesterday's blog date. Should have been 6/16 from Concord to Elko.
This blog actually starts the 17th in Elko. I usually summarize at the end of the day but am now writing at 9:00 AM Pacific time hanging around the airport since sunrise. We are seeing that everyone in Pinedale and Scotts Bluff has moved on. We 15 teams are not. An instrument flight just made an approach here down to minimums with rime ice all the way down. Obviously we're not going anywhere soon. The twelve- hour forecast isn't good and the twenty-four hour says everything will be slowly moving north. There is some talk of a bridge tournament.
Three musketeers air race Classic 2013
Blog 6-17-14
Concord to Klamath Falls, OR to Elko NV - is the plan for today. If you would like to track our location at all times, you can follow our Spot on Trackleaders.com. We leave it on at all times and you can even check our hotel! Be aware that the tracker sometimes is inaccurate. If it doesn't make sense, i.e. someone is 61 mph or has flown 1,200 miles, disregard.
After an extensive weather briefing, 52 race planes departed Concord, CA east bound, taking almost an hour to depart individually. within 2+ hours everyone was in and out of Klamath Falls
We're #49 which is good and bad. We're behind the mob which is passing and being passed. As time goes along the airplanes spread out. Only 3 airplanes took off behind us, two faster than us and they quickly passed us. One was a Beech Travel Air, the only twin engine in the race and an airplane I loved to fly back in the Beech days. The very fast airplanes were in and out of Elko before we arrived there.
The weather was tough today - high terrain combined with scattered rain and low visibility. We did some going around stuff we couldn't see through (this is a VFR race, no instrument flying allowed). We had some really good tail winds, as did everyone else, mitigated by some minor detours. Our numbers for the first day which are in mph, not knots, and our handicap, top speed, is 123.651 knots or 143.295 mph: max today 250 mph, 700 mi 6+44 hours, average speed 134.6 mph. So we did beat our handicap on the first two legs.
Anticipated weather is pretty wild for the days ahead, snow here in the mountains and tornadoes in the midwest. That's part of air racing, dealing with flying weather challenges. Deteriorating weather as the day went on caused the slower aircraft to RON, remain overnight, in Elko.
RONs: 15 teams in Elko, 21 in Pinedale, and 10 teams made it to Scotts Bluff. You may be interested to know that the teams making it to Scotts Bluff were: 5 Skylanes, 2 Arrows, 1 Cirrus, 1 Bonanza and 1 Mooney. The Skylane is the airplane of choice for this race since it is relatively fast and has the fuel capacity to skip some stops after timing. We carry 60 gallons (we're paying over $6/gal) so we have to land and fuel at every timing stop.
Concord to Klamath Falls, OR to Elko NV - is the plan for today. If you would like to track our location at all times, you can follow our Spot on Trackleaders.com. We leave it on at all times and you can even check our hotel! Be aware that the tracker sometimes is inaccurate. If it doesn't make sense, i.e. someone is 61 mph or has flown 1,200 miles, disregard.
After an extensive weather briefing, 52 race planes departed Concord, CA east bound, taking almost an hour to depart individually. within 2+ hours everyone was in and out of Klamath Falls
We're #49 which is good and bad. We're behind the mob which is passing and being passed. As time goes along the airplanes spread out. Only 3 airplanes took off behind us, two faster than us and they quickly passed us. One was a Beech Travel Air, the only twin engine in the race and an airplane I loved to fly back in the Beech days. The very fast airplanes were in and out of Elko before we arrived there.
The weather was tough today - high terrain combined with scattered rain and low visibility. We did some going around stuff we couldn't see through (this is a VFR race, no instrument flying allowed). We had some really good tail winds, as did everyone else, mitigated by some minor detours. Our numbers for the first day which are in mph, not knots, and our handicap, top speed, is 123.651 knots or 143.295 mph: max today 250 mph, 700 mi 6+44 hours, average speed 134.6 mph. So we did beat our handicap on the first two legs.
Anticipated weather is pretty wild for the days ahead, snow here in the mountains and tornadoes in the midwest. That's part of air racing, dealing with flying weather challenges. Deteriorating weather as the day went on caused the slower aircraft to RON, remain overnight, in Elko.
RONs: 15 teams in Elko, 21 in Pinedale, and 10 teams made it to Scotts Bluff. You may be interested to know that the teams making it to Scotts Bluff were: 5 Skylanes, 2 Arrows, 1 Cirrus, 1 Bonanza and 1 Mooney. The Skylane is the airplane of choice for this race since it is relatively fast and has the fuel capacity to skip some stops after timing. We carry 60 gallons (we're paying over $6/gal) so we have to land and fuel at every timing stop.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
6/15/14
Air Racers Gene Nora, Patty (Pilot) Mitchell and BJ Carter (The Three Musketeers) are in Concord undergoing preparation to fly the 2014 Air Race Classic. We worked hard getting here Thursday. Our route was to fuel at Winnemucca then across the Sierra to Concord. Easier said than done. Air Traffic was advising the airlines of moderate turbulence which was tossing our little airplane mightily. Then it got worse as the mountain wave lifted us to 14,000' - higher than the service ceiling of the airplane! Oh well what goes up much come down. Yes, we did arrive Concord and have been surrounded by really neat pilots and a ramp full of 52 beautiful race airplanes. We're now in pre-takeoff classes. There are 13 college teams. Sometimes their team includes a flight instructor and a student, then that student flies with a newbie next year. Terrific racing friends - the veterinary opthalmologist, the Australian who lives in Italy, a grandmother, daughter, granddaughter team, two darling girls dressed as Rosie The Riveter (they would win the fashion award if there were such a thing) and pilots even older than me! We're packing up to start the race heading north through Travis AFB tomorrow which covers 1,800 square miles, to Butte Valley to fly the timing line, land at Klamath Falls for fuel, then Elko next. Weather is an issue. We'll let you know how far we get tomorrow. We have four days to arrive at the finish line.
Sent from my iPad Gene Nora
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