Wednesday, April 24, 2013

JK Rallies Brad's Homecoming

JK: "Fx is for lite trades tomorrow and less precip. All eyes on the BLIP in the morning. Looks like XC possible. Who's planning to chase?"
Alex: "Love your enthusiasm JK! But are we reading the same forecast? Maybe you have some special aviation source of weather intel. If it's not classified, I hope you can share it with us!"

JK was not sure if this was banter, but after today's great flights, I am only going to listen to positive forecasts. We have to, or we'll just go crazy.

Brad arrived back in town last night. While he was sleeping, we got hit with a monsoon rain, thunder and lightning. Of course by the time he awoke it was nice and sunny, but there was no wind yet. JK was sticking to his interpretation of the forecast and headed to Makapuu. Brad followed, wanting to get up and tumble to clear his head.

I had to work and pick up kids. Brad gave me the call right as I was dropping the rug rats off and loading my gear. "Flew for over an hour, still looks good, just landed, small squall might hit, but looks good. But I am all alone here." Pause. "No wait, I see someone coming back from Waimanalo." By the time I got there, Brad and JK were on the LZ. I got a quick debrief from JK on his adventure, and his super low save in front of Olomana. Brad was smiling. "Day one and I am cranking infinites." Before I could finish saying, I am going up, Brad was throwing his gear in the truck and saying, let's go.

Manics was a bit strong for us lighter monkeys, but Brad just does not seem to have that problem. He was going to launch Manics while the remainder of us headed to Crazy Mans. Maui Doug and Jorge launched tandems, then I followed with the patented Reaper cross wind huck off. We flew for a while, and then I could see a squall approaching. We all landed and the thing disappeared before landfall.

By now, monkeys started filtering in: 5-0 and Roland were ready to roll. I jumped in with Roland and off we went. Manics was now perfect. Para-Park was open. The antics did not stop at just a launch. There were some wall launches and a few top lands … okay, a lot of top lands. The small crowd of onlookers were loving it. Jorge jumped on a solo wing and entertained the onlookers so well that one of them yelled up for a tandem. He obliged, landed and took her up. She had a blast, as we could hear her screams for miles. Brad got into jumproping his Thriller so much that a crowd was even gathering by the LZ.

The skies were starting to fill: 5-0, Roland, Frank and Reaper were in the mix. Scrappy showed up and finally got a good test of the F-Grav. Then Allegra stopped by and brightened up all our smiles as she flawlessly took to the skies. She had to borrow a helmet. I have to admit, as did all onsite: Brad's helmet never looked so good.

During our flight we could hear the radio voice of Mr. President as he made his way from Kahana to Kualoa. We tried to cajole him to Makapuu, offering sweet beverages and a ride home, but some white puffies were keeping him at bay.

JK called it, Brad seized it and was followed by a great barrel of monkeys. Makapuu roll call: JK, BradG, Sidehill, 5-0, Roland, Reaper, Franky, Maui Doug, Jorge, Allegra and Scrappy.

JK has a secret aviation weather connection, so when JK lists conditions:

It's Time to Fly get Your Gear and Go!!!


3 comments:

Alex said...

Damn the forecast, full speed ahead! :-)

Thom said...

Testing my blogg to make sure i am a team member

sandy said...

"patented Reaper cross wind huck off" -- is that a recommended maneuver? something he teaches or just does?