Monday, April 16, 2012 Will I Ever Make it to Luverne?!?

By looking at the weather forecast in the Sioux Falls area, particularly at the Luverne airport, I am able to monitor the conditions, especially the wind. On a number of occasions this past month or two I have scheduled with Larry Miller to come down and get the Jetwing flying. The latest was early this week. On Monday and Tuesday this week, the winds were forecast to be light so we scheduled the trip. I was to leave on Sunday afternoon (yesterday) so we could fly Monday and possibly Tuesday. But every time we schedule, the weather turns bad. There was even some tornado activity in southwestern Minnesota and South Dakota this past week-end, and some extreme weather in other parts of the Mississippi River Valley.

So again we were met with disappointment. I really hope that when we finally take this trip, we can accomplish our purpose in one day. That purpose is to first have Larry again inspect the aircraft and then for him to do an initial test flight to ensure it is stable, airworthy, and safe. Then, second (assuming Larry’s flight is in all ways successful), I want to fly the Jetwing myself. I will be happy with a single take-off and landing, or maybe a series of take-offs and landings, or possibly even some touch and go’s. After I do that under Larry’s supervision (I should not call it “supervision”, since he is not a CFI yet, but at least his observation), I will feel confident that I can fly it here and develop techniques and skills I will need to be an accomplished Jetwing pilot.

In the meantime, I have been doing some other stuff. Just for fun, I have been doing some flight planning for short trips around the area here if (and when) the Jetwing is able to be flown. Even though I know the Jetwing is not a real cross-country airplane, it is fun to go through this exercise, reading charts and planning trips.

I have even been playing around with John's old Garmin 295 GPS to learn what it can do. It does have an altimeter function, which I don't have on the airplane, and can of course give speed and tracking information. That will be good to have.

So we wait.