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What did you do with your RV this weekend (6/26/21 - 6/27/21)

Jack

Jack the German Shepherd was on a two day, eight leg transport from Brownsville, TX to Newport, RI. He spent the night with a foster in Chattanooga, TN where I picked him up (KCHA) this morning and flew him up to Kingsport, TN (KTRI). At 72 pounds, he is definitely the biggest dog I have flown. I think I have found my upper limit!

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Jack the German Shepherd was on a two day, eight leg transport from Brownsville, TX to Newport, RI. He spent the night with a foster in Chattanooga, TN where I picked him up (KCHA) this morning and flew him up to Kingsport, TN (KTRI). At 72 pounds, he is definitely the biggest dog I have flown. I think I have found my upper limit!

yUqAJYWhLxnbrhOhVitYDrDmGeJqalqy2g7lStTiXgxOh2oyiP7kU80N5vXB9lURDDJuXj4FygF95xsNITbd9zVYCnqVXXuEelEx6fczF1SELITfwFoIo4xDHJ7Oswi92nzZocVKteFot3lVCf6mFfIMidIvKUYRewnLWrxrMe9MXtukEX7IyYNR9PBLCsMbqQk2vLSvQpXss3wV071vio1bxxHop0PBoumjFj2-s-w607LGOcbhg1vBkvno254Wzii9AblIbgje9IFTohBhuyfclafYzVzwTQuakyHqCo_K55pT0hjXuj3Y0dfJg7LP6Qy2JNfjB3LaY1NbTsQoOX-LUNpPT-MQY_-yo4hq2GpkXqVenFpF_B1kYp3PbqugSWxnGrlhTzOfU7VTIVPGrGn515yEwfaus9chvIMM3-pVFrBILg68UewIPQcDvNCNyK9vBwTg44aPv4rfnj52xA2aAucg6Knp_wetU49LPbFMdGaN-uygCR8D6OiEpq5OEhfGhJo-DAZMgw97hKiAuoDeXwZLMnVNJ9YLT-aD__VU6vtZgB_LN8aJCmyiq_fJPZ89N79eIN_lSECD0jWhZpu8TIYX6zLQb2Y73tNZqV9Cskh-_4dhH4-G3mESQy54m8d5x7azUmSev0iDQ92MDspqLEhmhFBqESz-XEJNpf1Pp7ClYCXU4yy6MnFwGMyLBRbGufB-Uhs-jV4Xhanr8f3LyQ=w670-h893
Awesome. Good doggie.
 
Jack the German Shepherd was on a two day, eight leg transport from Brownsville, TX to Newport, RI. He spent the night with a foster in Chattanooga, TN where I picked him up (KCHA) this morning and flew him up to Kingsport, TN (KTRI). At 72 pounds, he is definitely the biggest dog I have flown. I think I have found my upper limit!

Dan, You are doing excellent work! That is definitely bigger than Tanya has moved. Imagine that good dog getting frustrated with your flying skills :). It seems that a lot (most?) transports are moving south to north.
 
Fueled it up and updated databases in anticipation of flying to the lake after an OT shift. Wx ended up being fly-able but horrible lake weather so I stayed home and did other projects.
 
Dan, You are doing excellent work! That is definitely bigger than Tanya has moved. Imagine that good dog getting frustrated with your flying skills :). It seems that a lot (most?) transports are moving south to north.

Yeah - he is tethered back there - but it wouldn't be good if he really went nuts. 62 dogs/puppies so far and only one that was even a little bit of a problem.

The South seems to always have full shelters and lots of strays. Lax or non-existent neuter/spay laws contribute. Northeast and Midwest are definitely common destinations for these dogs. Interesting though, is that a common destination I and some others around here have with pups is central FL. Tampa/Orlando seem to be hot spots for rescues accepting dogs from other areas.
 
Waiting for the humidity to subside in Michigan so I can finish painting my fuselage, I switched to the wings, doing fuel tank testing and designing/building my wing rotation system. I think I'll share it in a thread, but here's a teaser photo.
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Preparing to give three forums at AirVenture

Preparing to give three (3!) presentations at Oshkosh on the Expanded Envelope Exercises®, plus the contest on Tuesday night. Didn't like the videos I had of the stalls in turn exercises, so went out to re-shoot them. Lighting was less than optimal -- too early in the day, and the sun was behind a high cloud -- but the flying part at least came out alright.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAGYvZnjQS4
 
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Dodged some scattered storm cells around Lake Oconee in central Georgia yesterday afternoon.
 

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Section 9 Done and Dusted!

I thought this was a cool pic. Kind of a Rorschach test. Quite happy to be moving to section 10!
 

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Jack the German Shepherd was on a two day, eight leg transport from Brownsville, TX to Newport, RI. He spent the night with a foster in Chattanooga, TN where I picked him up (KCHA) this morning and flew him up to Kingsport, TN (KTRI). At 72 pounds, he is definitely the biggest dog I have flown. I think I have found my upper limit!

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So my King Shepherd, a rescue dog is 100 pounds of absolute love and affection, I would love him to be my flying partner. So is he too big or what would you recommend?
 
Saturday 26 June 2021

Saturday the 26th I flew the Idaho Primitive Area from U70 to 32S and then back to KORS:

Flew directly over one of the airstrips my Grandpa used to take me too; The Root Ranch.

The Flying B was under cloud cover so did not get to see it. He was one of the original three founding members> Used to spend summers there on the end of a shovel and other tools that you use for horses and mending leaks in the water pipe for the hydro electric plant.

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Hot, hot, hot bumpy flying even at altitude.

Mike
 
Sunday 27 June 2021 KORS-PAPG

Time to head back to Alaska.
This flight covered 1558.8 miles in 9.9 hours flying time. Lunch break/refuel at PAPG.

This the KORS to PAPG Post 4.6 hours covering 758.3 miles, a 34 mph tailwind (airspeed marked in mph so changed gps to reflect the same) was a super big help!
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Border screenshot
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What the border looks like
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Alaska Islands
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Petersburg Airport PAPG. Real happy to see!
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Next post PAPG to PAYA then divert to PAGK-PAAQ finally to PAEN.
 
PAPG to PAYA

After checking the weather along the route, PACV reporting MVFR, so was PAEN.

Flew the plan until reaching PAYA, it didn't look good towards PACV. A quick call to Juneau Radio verified IFR conditions.

A choice needed to be made: Land at PAYA and wait the conditions out, probably 2-3 days, no fuel available at PAYA to make things even more interesting.

Or turn back to Juneau/Petersburg.

But, wait; I can see blue sky to the north.

Juneau Radio verified that PAGK (two hour old weather report) was good VFR, Kenai was 5500 broken, PAAQ was 6500 broken. Mountain obscuration was mentioned several times.

Briefer checked the webcams for me, everything was open into PAGK. Webcams are awesome, too bad there aren't very many in the lower 48!

If you ever fly to Alaska while flight planning you need to view them along your route: https://weathercams.faa.gov/map/-210.17823,26.88859,-43.36182,71.76907

Here are some photos flying over the islands to Yakutat [PAYA].

The big Mountains are MT Crillion and behind it Mt Fairweather, always great to see them, they are absolutely beautiful. The best thing about them, they signal you are close to the main land again.
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Yakutat is the 7-shape in the dark area on the right background, before the Bay.
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Mike
 
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Please consider splitting the Alaska trip out into a separate thread (appropriately titled) so it doesn't get lost in the dust of the RV weekend threads....


;)
 
PAYA to PAEN

Here are some photos of the diversion. AUX tank was a big help when deciding what to do. At the decision point I still had 5-hours of fuel to burn, 2-hour flight to PAYA so far.

I did not take any photos of the portion from PAAQ to PAEN. Too much traffic along this route, everybody was forced below the clouds, flight following through the Anchorage area verified this. Not taking pictures with this much looking out going on!

When I left Orcas Island, a call to Victoria Approach got me some flight following. A few minutes later a C182 called and asked for the same. They took off from Friday Harbor going to Ketchikan. Following pretty close to my route.

We were both routed towards Port Hardy at 8500'. Once near COMOX, they let me climb to my requested altitude of 12,500. It was a hot day so I leveled off at 10,500 to cool the engine. Once at that altitude, the C182 asked the controller to ask what winds I found at 10,500. 30mph tail wind.

Increased to 34mph at 12,500 this stayed constant along the whole route.

Didn't hear to much from him after a couple of freq. changes with Vancouver and Victoria controllers. Didn't think too much of it as he was going to Ketchikan, instead of Petersburg.

Then when nearing Gulkana, he asked me to go to a different freq to talk. He was just getting to Yakutat. We talked it over, he was IFR equipped. Found out his final destination was Soldotna, 10-miles from Kenai. Due to fuel quantity he went IFR to get there.

First time ever that someone else was flying the Coastal Mountains. Good to have company!
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Note radio, GPS, and temp at altitude.
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12 o'clock white peak. Behind it is the hole in the clouds over Knik Glacier-you can see it is open goin to the right, not really a good angle but time to start a descent to get down under the clouds. Was open all the way to Palmer! No more photos...Time to do some flying!
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Mike
 
Big Dogs

So my King Shepherd, a rescue dog is 100 pounds of absolute love and affection, I would love him to be my flying partner. So is he too big or what would you recommend?

Well - the baggage area weight limit on an RV-7 is 100 lbs, so you would be right at the design limit. From a practical standpoint though, getting big dogs in and out of the baggage area is what can be challenging.

If it is your personal pet, and you are sure you know his temperament, you could possibly let him ride in the passenger seat (or area normally occupied by the seat). I would still tether him to keep him out of your lap! Still riskier than restraining in the baggage area. I am unwilling to do this with dogs that are an unknown quantity like the rescues I normally transport.

This time, fortunately, Jack actually jumped onto the folded down passenger seat back, and stuck his head into the opening behind the seat. All I had to do was push a bit and he went right back into the baggage area. Getting him out was more difficult. He came half over the support bar behind the seat, but was then unable to step over the cockpit side onto the wing walk. I ended up having to very awkwardly try to pick him up to get him out. I wasn't pretty but we got it done.
 
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