Shrek passed on some pictures he took on the day of the flight. I'm in the back in the first picture. The rest were taken on Shrek's flight.
I wanted to go through all the stunts. I was nervous but wanted to do them all.
Kilawatts taught us the "hook maneuver" in the preflight briefing. He said the loop-the-loop would pull 4G's. (1G = normal gravity). "Clench every muscle in your body, arms and legs repeatedly, and breathe out like this: 'huh' 'huh' 'huh' I want you to practice this right now." It seemed silly.
The "Hook Maneuver" keeps the blood flowing to your brain.
After my brief stint at the controls, Kila took over for some aerobatics. The first move was a stall. Kila pulled the T-28 into a climb.
The T-28 is stable. It didn't want to stall. Kila ticked off the airspeed as it fell. From the sound of his voice even he was surprised how long it took to stall. When it did, it was anti-climactic. I imagined STALL = FALLING, going nose down till the plane sped up enough to pull out. Inside the cockpit it was more like a gentle ease out of climb position back to an attitude just below level flight.
Next was a "Wing Over." The T-28 began to climb again, then the left wing dropped and the plane turned left to point back down toward Earth. I did the "Hook Maneuver." - no doubt unnecessary as we were not pulling heavy Gs. I can still picture diving toward the farmland below. I was tensed up like any roller coaster ride.
Upon recovery of the "Wing Over", I was already sweating. Worse, my stomach was going uneasy. I told Kila I was "a little queasy"
Next, was the "Aileron Roll." It was over fast. I had a video camera dangling by a strap from my neck. The camera never moved at all during the roll. I wish I had taped all the stunts, but I was busy doing the "Hook Maneuver." It was a dreamlike experience to see the horizon roll around. I've seen cockpit video of rolls before, but...wow.
To this moment I regret what happened next. I told Kila that I had had enough. I was ready to puke. I drank one of his Vanilla-Cherry Cokes in his office while waiting out Mr. Shrekkie's wild ride. Now that Coke was trying to escape. I put my hands up on the instrument console, and focused on keeping the contents of my stomach inside.
"Relax" said Kila. "Breathe in and out." after a few minutes of silence from me, he said "I can tell from the position of your arms that you are not relaxed." At that point I did not have much to say. Kila offered to let me fly the plane again. "That sometimes helps" but I declined. I took some video shots as we flew back toward Livermore airport. We were going to do a "break turn" to land, but as we flew back straight and level I began to regurgitate my coke into my throat. I was clenching a little white plastic bag that Kila had given each of us, just in case. I REALLY REALLY did not want to be the one to throw up in the plane. I somehow kept the Coke inside, although it was practically back in my mouth. I felt like a loser to call off the rest of the stunts. My only triumph was not puking.
Back on the ground, I had to lay down in the office for a few minutes. When I got home I was never so tired in my life. I seriously questioned whether I'd ever agree to ride in that plane again.
As I recover now though, I keep reliving the experience. I was bitten by something that day. I hope to fly again, although I'll be sure to take some motion sickness medicine beforehand and no Coke! I even wonder whether I should try for a pilot's license...
A special thanks goes out to Kilawatts for taking each of us up in the T-28.
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very forward or back of the stick brought that "rollercoaster" feeling. I feared that. We've played pilot on the computer. We know what it looks like. But we only guessed what it feels like, until we were sitting in the back seat of a T-28 at 5,000 feet over the Altamont pass. It was LOUD. It was rattling.
"Did you have to sign a release? Isn't that dangerous?"
"If anything goes wrong. I'm going to yell 'BAIL BAIL BAIL'" said Kilawatts. He was hunched in the shade under the wing of the Centurion, in front of one of his South Hangars.
Shrek, Dorian, and I listened to the preflight briefing. "That canopy is going to open in like.... point three seconds, it is THAT fast. It has explosive bolts. Unplug your intercom cable, release your seat belt and climb out. Dive DOWN past the right wing..."
"Will our parachute open automatically?"
"There is a D-ring release. Practice reaching up and grabbing that with your eyes closed. Pull that ring and your chute will open. Just before you hit the ground, DO NOT look down - LOOK AT THE HORIZON, and...keep your knees bent and...I don't know what else to tell you..."
more later....Incidentally Kilawatts will be at Beale Air Force Base (near Sacramento) along with Brigadier General Chuck Yeager for an airshow this weekend June 3-4 2006.
he big man from American Fork, Utah : Mr. S came to SF for continuing education classes in medicine. He is a P.A. in a small town.
So Northern California members of our gaming clan gathered to greet him. Kilawatts "the generous" offered to take us in a Centurion to soar over the city, down to Monterey, then back to Livermore. We slipped away from the Earth around 11 a.m. on 29 May, a Sunday.
Set a course for S.F. but not a few minutes in the air, Kila became unhappy with the sound of the engine and the readings on the instruments.
Turn back then, we passengers to a man contemplating our impending doom. Back on the ground the Centurion was left for the local mechanic who suspected it was a bad sparkplug.
Kila calls his boss. Can he fly each of us in the T-28, a 2 seat Navy Trainer? Sure, NP.
Shrek went first. A big guy with an obvious love of life, He returned a happy man. "That's the best thing I've done in my entire life - don't tell my wife..."
We were next. We're not fans of rollercoasters and G-forces, so we were a bit worried though we tried to conceal it. Kila took the T-28 up over the Altamont pass area, put both hands in the air, and said "You have the controls."
I took the stick and did some meek and mild things. Tiny bank left, tiny bank right, tiny descent, tiny climb. "Try a bank and turn. Bank to 45 degrees and pull back on the stick."
I banked the plane to a terrifying angle. "That's about 15 degrees" says Kila, "bank a little more", so we went off the edge and stood the plane on its wingtip "That's about 30 degrees. Keep going" said Kila. I banked the plane to an impossible angle "Ok that's good, now pull back on the stick" and I did. What was frightening began to become routine.
to be continued...
