Imagine holding it...  

Plastic fantastic

I went on a fundraising call this week in my role as Director of Donor Relations for the Museum of Flight. I visited a man who has a long and quite accomplished career and life. Johnny flew the first jet bombers in the military, and eventually went to work at Boeing Aircraft as an engineer.

He took up flying again in the early 70s to relieve the stress of working at Boeing - which, at the time, was a very stressful place.

He ended up building his own airplane. He then went on with a number of friends to build perhaps the most complex homebuilt of our time, a Lancair IV P, a pressurized, twin turbo, 300 mile per hour four seater.

Then, one sunny day, he crashed it. He was going into Dayton, OH, four years ago with his 18 year old grandson. He got a little slow, thus nose-high, limiting his forward visibility. And he was a little low on final. He got into this situation trying to let a Cub get off the runway ahead of him. There was a 50 foot high levee at the landing end of the runway, and he just didn't see it. He doesn't remember hitting it. The first memory he has after turning final is coming-to, engulfed in flames inside the airplane.

He was able to drag himself out, though his arm was broken, both ankles were destroyed, and he was on fire.

(To alleviate the suspense on this - his grandson came out fine. Some burns, but relatively minor.)

So there I am listening to the telling of this story. Johnny had eventually lost his left leg from about halfway down his calf. He's fitted with a prosthetic, which we talked about. An engineering marvel, really, these synthetic limbs.

Johnny took great pride in the functioning of this device - he being an engineer and all. He reached down and pressed a button, and the whole thing came off. Alarming. He pointed the stump at me so I could see the simple device by which the real attached to the unreal. Then he handed me his leg. It was still warm from the stump being in it. I turned it over in my hands appropriately, looking - I'm sure - very curious about this invention. Not vexed at being handed someone's prosthesis.

I handed his leg back to him, and he slid it back over the stump, then exerted a tremendous amount of force to make it 'click' in place. "You gotta make it click. You don't make it click, it's going to come off - I can tell you this from experience. It's a surprise to step down with your foot to find out it's not there anymore. Wham! You go down!"

Water, dirt, sky

Just before Chelan on the Columbia this weekend. It's very, very pretty over there right now. Cold. But pretty. (click pic) 

They're everywhere... 

I'm tellin' ya

This Volkswagen thing - I swear there is something seriously wrong with VW and their lights. It's epidemic. (See other writing on this in my archives.) Teri tells me there is a recall, but I can't find anything more on that. (Teri's car one night had one blinker out, the right tail light, and the left brake light. It's the DUI patrolman's wet dream.)