NEWSLETTER EAA 297 - KITTYHAWKERS VOLUME 47 NOVEMBER 2015 NUMBER 11 FROM MIDFIELD Garry Brown and I had the opportunity to share a flight with two naturalized citizens last month. My friends Desland from Trinidad, and Bo from Cambodia, have performed contract roofing work at GE for over eight years. When I have a big roofing job at the plant, I always ask for them because they do excellent work. They are both very hard working family men in their mid-30 s. But neither Bo nor Desland had ever experienced flight in a light plane, not to mention an experimental homebuilt. So Garry agreed to fly Desland in his RV-4, (he s much lighter) and Bo flew with me. Off we went on our Topsail, Wrightsville Beach, Battleship North Carolina, and (of course) GE tour. videos of himself to show his kids. After we landed, you could tell they were amazed and delighted by the experience, and for an afternoon we were all transformed into adventurous little kids out breaking the bonds of gravity. Frankly, I believe it did more for the pilots than it did for our passengers. Here s to promoting and sharing general aviation.. We have a full agenda for the November 7th meeting. As this will be our last business meeting of 2015, we ll be finalizing our plans for the November 14 th fly-in, electing 2016 club officers, and planning the December 5 th Christmas Party. And of course, we ll be talking about flying and building. Speaking of building, we have a new project on the board. Treasurer Phil Sharpe is riveting away at this new Rans S-19 project. Side by side, the two RVs sped us along a route that our two passengers had never seen nor experienced. Crashing waves and blue-green water whizzed by as boats appeared and then disappeared beneath the wing. Bo, shown in the picture, sat in my back seat, and it s a good thing I had the canopy closed or he would have caught bugs in his teeth for forty-five minutes. Desland sat in Garry s back seat and shot You can tell when you talk to him that he has been thoroughly bitten by the building bug. The bug comes with certain visual traits that are unmistakable; wide and intense eyes, rapid speech accompanied with intense gesturing, probing technical questions, and a unique aura of angst mixed with determination. Good for you Phil, I m envious! So whether this is your first project, or you are a repeat offender, be like Phil and go get your bug on. All things aviation, Drew
EAA CHAPTER 297 107 AVIATOR LANE, BURGAW, NC 28425 www.eaa297.org PRESIDENT DREW HOLBROOK (910) 259-7477 andrew.holbrook@ge.com VICE PRESIDENT DAVID MOORE (910) 686-8907 cmoore016@ec.rr.com SECRETARY JERRY COLLINS (910) 617-9703 g.collins.nc@gmail.com TREASURER PHIL SHARPE (910) 880-5669 phil.sharpe@mac.com NEWSLETTER MARK THOMAN (910) 577-5446 mnthoman@embarqmail.com HOOD S FLY-IN It dawned a spectacular North Carolina day on Saturday the 31 st of October. And what a perfect day for a fly-in. Bill Hood and Gina Boccetti hosted an outstanding fly-in at their airfield in Dover. The sky was a crystal clear Carolina Blue, the winds were light, and during the late morning over twenty aircraft, and more than two hundred people, arrived to share the festivities. Bill and Gina are avid aviation enthusiasts. Bill retired from service with the aviation maintenance facility at MCAS Cherry Point. He is currently a contractor, at the same facility, working on the CH- 53 rotor and drive train systems. Along with their home they have two hangars at their airfield. Bill built and is restoring a Vagabond, an Acro Sport, and his current pride, an Air Cam. He has owned a Breezy, and he currently holds an NAA World Speed Record in his RV-6. Bill and Gina are active members of EAA Chapter 1423 in Winterville, NC. His favorite flying sport is counting bear from the air. He launches late in the afternoon and spots the bear as they travel along the edge of local fields. At that time the bear are moving from their favorite feeding areas back to their dens. I do not know what the current annual total is but the record flight this year was seventy bear in a single evening. In preparation for the fly-in Bill and Gina combined 100 pounds of beans and 80 pounds of beef to create over 200 pounds of chili. In the hangar they have two, gas fired, cast iron cauldrons in which the chili was prepared. And for lunch there were lots of other fixings and desserts to go along. No one went hungry. Following lunch several of the local pilots including; Steve Winn in his Sky Jeep, Robert Monty Montedonico in his Aeronca Champ, Tom TMac McFalls in his J-3 Cub, and of course Bill Hood in his AirCam gave rides to all, young and old, who wanted to go flying. Bill said, I estimate we took sixty to seventy five people up, and a lot of them first timers. Taking someone flying for their first flight is really rewarding. Drew Holbrook and Garry Brown flew in from Stag Air Park in Drew s Red RV-8. Bill Clark and his wife Carroll drove all the way from Wilmington to join the festivities. Bill mentioned that he had seen too many miles of two lane farm roads in finding Hood Field. We all enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.
Aircraft that flew in included the typical assortment of Cessnas and Pipers. And there were Piper Cubs, both old and new, Aeronca Champ s, Citabria s, Decathalon s, Maule s and the famous Sky Jeep. They were all very much at home on Bill s beautifully maintained grass airfield. There were also two para-gliders, and just to top it off there was a drone that captured an aerial photo of the gathering. Spectacular weather, delicious food, and a gathering of aviation enthusiasts! It just doesn t get any better.
RAFTING ON THE NEUSE The following story was told by my brother Paul Thoman. In 1978 he was a 1stLt in the Marine Corps stationed at Camp LeJeune. He and his wife Kathy were camping at Cliffs of the Neuse State Park. We went camping at the park with our friends Dennis and Susan. We both had rubber rafts, and the plan was to float down the river for an afternoon. We took a right out of the gate at the park, and it seems like we found a bridge across the river no more than a mile from the gate. We thought it was too close, and our float would be too short, so we took off over some back country roads and followed the river looking for a place to put in. After some driving, we came upon Seymour Johnson Air Force Base. We found a place to cross the river, and stopped to talk to a guard at the main gate. She told us to follow the runway all the way to the end and there was an area where we could put the rafts in. We passed a bunch of B-52 bombers, and we ignored the Restricted Area signs posted all the way down the runway. We parked at an ammo dump at the end of the runway. A bunch of guards were practicing being invaded by communists or hippies, but they ignored us while we aired up the rafts and took off down the river. By now, it was probably around noon. It was a beautiful river, and we never saw a single boat or another person on the river. By around 4pm we were out of beer and getting kind of thirsty and hungry. By around dark, we finally crossed the highway at the first bridge we encountered, so we were no more than a mile away from the park what a relief. What we didn t take into account was how windy a river can be. It just kept going and going with no sign of the park. We finally reached the cliffs around 1 am. That last mile took forever! Then we had to haul the boats up the cliff. By then, I was very worried about my fancy Dodge van parked at the end of the runway. Dennis and I left the park in his truck and found our way back to Seymour Johnson AFB. We drove down the side of the runway in the dark, but I felt very conspicuous every time we passed one of the Restricted Area signs. We got to the van at about dawn. I hopped out as fast as I could and jumped in the van and started to take off. In an instant we were surrounded by headlights, guards, and mean looking German Shepherd guard dogs. The Air Force guards were overjoyed to find two Marine Lieutenants what a prize! Then they began arguing over who was going to get to drive my van back to headquarters. (I think rank eventually won out). They put us into a holding cell, but they were very polite, and didn t close the cage door. We had to sit there until around 9 am when some overweight Major got to rake us over the coals. He eventually sent us on our way muttering some comments about dumb jarheads. Paul and Kathy are hard working business owners living in Nacogdoches Texas. FUTURE EVENTS November Sunday 1 st South Carolina Breakfast Club, Orangeburg SC, (KOGB) Saturday 7 th Chapter Meeting 10:00 AM in the Chapter Clubhouse Lunch, for a nominal fee, will be served after the meeting. Saturday 14 th EAA Chapter 297 Fall Fly-In, Stag Air Park, 10:00 AM 2:00 PM Thursday 12th Sunday 15 th at KSUT hosted by EAA 939 EAA Ford Tri-Motor Sunday 15 th South Carolina Breakfast Club, Mount Pleasant SC, (KLRO) Thursday 26 th Thanksgiving Day Sunday 29 th South Carolina Breakfast Club, Winnsboro SC, (KFDW) December Tuesday 1 st Chapter Board of Directors Meeting, No Whining Saloon, 7:00 PM Saturday 5 th EAA Chapter 297 Christmas Party, Chapter Clubhouse, 6:00 PM Social Hour 7:00 PM Dinner and Entertainment Sunday 13 th South Carolina Breakfast Club, Spartanburg SC, (KSPA) Saturday 25 th Christmas Day
Sunday 27 th South Carolina Breakfast Club, Graniteville SC, (KS17) Thursday 31 st January 2016 Saturday 2 nd New Years Eve Chapter Meeting 10:00 AM in the Chapter Clubhouse Travis Traffic Monty Control