January 3, 2016 - Airwork and Funfly Eastern Shore
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| Tom K. from Lee Airport stopped by to visit in his camouflaged RV-7. |
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The weather was excellent today. Relatively warm for January, outstanding visibility, negligable winds, clear blue skies. I didn't have anywhere to go or anyone to fly with, so I decided to just do some airwork -- practice things I don't normally do.
Just after takeoff at Essex Skypark.
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Over the Eastern Shore, I did some steep turns, followed by lazy-eights and wingovers. Then I slowed the plane down to 70 mph and flew around. The plane flies fine at that slow speed although it does seem like you are going to fall out of the sky. After that I did three stalls, where I in fact did fall out of the sky. But as soon as the nose drops, the plane picks up speed and starts flying again.
Near Ridgely Airport, I went up to 3,000 feet and pulled the power back to idle to simulate an engine out landing. I slowed the plane to 80 mph and glided the plane so that I was over the field at 1,500 feet. From there it was easy enough to make a landing without touching the power. Later, I did the same thing at Massey Airport. On the way to Massey, I did three stalls, followed by a bunch of rolls. I practiced some short field landings at Massey. Massey is a grass field and I was a little worried about it being muddy -- it did rain last week -- but the field was not soft at all.
I discovered I get good quality pictures in a steep turn looking straight down.
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I was surprised at how green the fields were. It's the middle of winter! It has been an unusually warm winter so far and it mostly rained the previous week, so maybe that explains it.
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| I was cruising over a big, open field at 500 feet when I spotted a large herd of deer. So I turned back to get another look. |
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I count at least 40 deer in his herd. Deer season ended the day before. Maybe I interupted a celebration party out in the open?
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| Visibility was outstanding today. This image doesn't pick it up, but from here I could see the Baltimore skyline on the other side of the bay. |
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Looking on the other side, steam from the nuclear power plant on the other side of the Delaware Bay is visible.
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| White birds clearly liked this particular field. |
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Overhead Massey. At 3,000 feet or so, I chopped power to idle and glided to an easy landing.
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| Did you know there are railroad tracks on the Eastern Shore northeast of Chestertown? I didn't, until now, when I noticed them below. So I followed them to the west. |
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| They turned southwest, and then south. Here you can see they lead straight in to Chestertown. I wonder if any trains still run on this line? |
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