Last weekend, Louise and I had a rare opportunity to participate in an Air-to-Air photography clinic. No, we didn’t get a chance to click any fabulous pictures – we were way to busy flying formation on the rear end of a Shorts Skyvan with a bunch of dedicated photo-nuts hanging out the hatchback (with harness of course!). The seminar was conducted by a few friends that we know through our magazine connections – Richard VanderMeulen, Moose Peterson, and our own Doug Rozendaal (he of the Red F-1 Rocket….). They hold these seminars so that aspiring Air-to-air photographers can practice techniques while flying face to face with an interesting assortment of airplanes – on Saturday they got to stare down everything from a B-17 to P-47…and I understand that they could almost feel the heat from the Corsair when that was in trail! Sunday morning they got to play with those of us with lesser horsepower – Louise and I gave them a two-ship of the RV-8 and RV-6, and Bruce Bohannon brought the Flyin’ Tiger (an RV-4/8/rocket hybrid) out of the closet to fly in a three-ship with two RV-4’s. A great time was had by all in the short space of an hour (it costs money to run a Skyvan!), and unfortunately, we don’t have any pictures to show – twenty feet back from a twin is no place to be wielding a camera, and the photogs are no doubt all busy digging through their thousands of pictures from the session – we hope to see them someday!
The reason I wanted to bring this all up however was to point out one of the very best preflight briefings I have ever had, and an important point for anyone doing complex air operations. Doug Rozendaal was the Ops lead for the activity, and he started his briefing this way. “OK everyone, the goal of today’s mission is for everyone to come home safely and in one piece, then to go have breakfast and enjoy talking about what we did! If we get some pictures, that would be nice.” Now, how many of you think about your flying “missions” in those fundamental terms? It really tears things down to their basic elements, doesn’t it? With the possible exception of the Nigerian Air Force, none of us are flying our RV’s or Rockets into war. Even that important business trip isn’t a reason to take extraordinary risk – nothing is really so important that it trumps “…everyone comes back safely”. No matter what your mission for the day – Phase 1 testing, air-to-air, aerobatic practice, local sightseeing, or a vacation trip – nothing should get in the way of coming back in one piece.
Preflight briefings are a necessary part of a group activity, like formation flying. But there is nothing that prohibits you from doing your own, conscious briefing for yourself just going out alone. When I fly by myself, I talk to myself when I do the checklist – vocalizing it makes it real. Before you crank that engine, it isn’t difficult to do the same thing with the “mission goal”. It sets a bit, and makes it real – it challenges your mind set and puts you where you want to be for in-flight decision-making. We're not in the position of a scheduled airline with paying passengers expecting to get to their destination on time (if you absolutely, positively NEED to be there, leave the RV at home, and take the airlines!), and that gives us much greater flexibility to poke around and stay safe by aborting the flight at any time. Staying safe is the mission - not getting the load of passengers to Cincinatti....
I just wanted to thank Doug for making sure that we “did it right”, and for making the flight not only a complete success (we all enjoyed a great breakfast afterwards…), but making it enjoyable as well.
Paul
The reason I wanted to bring this all up however was to point out one of the very best preflight briefings I have ever had, and an important point for anyone doing complex air operations. Doug Rozendaal was the Ops lead for the activity, and he started his briefing this way. “OK everyone, the goal of today’s mission is for everyone to come home safely and in one piece, then to go have breakfast and enjoy talking about what we did! If we get some pictures, that would be nice.” Now, how many of you think about your flying “missions” in those fundamental terms? It really tears things down to their basic elements, doesn’t it? With the possible exception of the Nigerian Air Force, none of us are flying our RV’s or Rockets into war. Even that important business trip isn’t a reason to take extraordinary risk – nothing is really so important that it trumps “…everyone comes back safely”. No matter what your mission for the day – Phase 1 testing, air-to-air, aerobatic practice, local sightseeing, or a vacation trip – nothing should get in the way of coming back in one piece.
Preflight briefings are a necessary part of a group activity, like formation flying. But there is nothing that prohibits you from doing your own, conscious briefing for yourself just going out alone. When I fly by myself, I talk to myself when I do the checklist – vocalizing it makes it real. Before you crank that engine, it isn’t difficult to do the same thing with the “mission goal”. It sets a bit, and makes it real – it challenges your mind set and puts you where you want to be for in-flight decision-making. We're not in the position of a scheduled airline with paying passengers expecting to get to their destination on time (if you absolutely, positively NEED to be there, leave the RV at home, and take the airlines!), and that gives us much greater flexibility to poke around and stay safe by aborting the flight at any time. Staying safe is the mission - not getting the load of passengers to Cincinatti....
I just wanted to thank Doug for making sure that we “did it right”, and for making the flight not only a complete success (we all enjoyed a great breakfast afterwards…), but making it enjoyable as well.
Paul
Last edited: