Michael McCafferty - USA Biplane Tour


Day Thirty Two
Low Passes and Tall Tales


A perfect morning: sunny, calm air, very high scattered cirrus clouds, 70 degrees. We are up early and out at the airport so we can get flying before the expected winds kick up.

Art has one more ride to give. Dave Perewitz, master builder and painter of custom Harleys, is the guest of honor on this flight. Art takes the grass runway for the lift-off because the wind is nil, and why use asphalt when you can use grass! While Art is out flying, I'm loading the extra bags into my front cockpit and refueling and saying good-byes to the people who have gathered to watch us take off and firing up the engine to warm up the oil so I'm ready to take off as soon as Art lands and drops off his passenger.

In the 20-plus minutes that Art is out flying, the wind appears, and builds to such a degree that a landing on the grass runway is no longer advisable, so he takes the main (asphalt) runway and taxis in to the ramp. Dave jumps out all smiles! (Of course.)

I'm ready to roll, and taxi out with Art right behind me. We lift off in close proximity, circle the field, and come back in for a low pass along the grass runway so that the spectators can capture the moment on film. My low pass starts at about 600 feet and about a quarter mile from the edge of the field, then I switch on the Pulse Lights, and push the stick forward to dive steeply down to just a few feet above the ground, level off and run the entire length of the field before pulling up sharply into a turn to the east and the island of Martha's Vineyard.

We fly at only a few hundred feet above Interstate 495 which runs from Mansfield east to Cape Cod, then south along the coast of Cape Cod, past Otis Air Force base, to the end of the island. We stay low along the water for the entire length of Cape Cod, hopping over the little out-islands at treetop level, and staying over the water and looking level into the second story windows of the legendary beachfront "cottages" (mansions) of Cape Cod.

At the south end of the island of Cape Cod, we fly the few miles across the ocean to the island of Martha's Vineyard. No road connects the two, only a ferry. We fly low along the north and western shores of the island and marvel at the absolutely magnificent geography. This place was first settled in the 1600's and has been a choice of the rich and famous for centuries. And now WE are here.

Our destination is the airpark at Katama, which is one of the premier all-grass airports in the United States. We read about it in an issue of Private Pilot magazine earlier this year, and we have been planning on making this place a highlight of our trip.

I have been flying the lead position since leaving Mansfield, and I have been very busy with navigation duties such as staying out of Otis Air Force base airspace, dealing with the control tower at Martha's Vineyard airport to negotiate clearance to transition their airspace, and locating Katama Airpark, all while going "oooh aaaah" over the landscape below, and staying out of the way of the masts of the taller sailboats, and dodging seagulls. So when we rounded the southern end of the island, and got within visual range of Katama, I was really ready. I had Katama in my moving map, the radio frequency already set up and monitored, I called the field Unicom for landing advisories, had noted the field elevation, was aware of traffic in the area, and knew exactly where to look for the field.

And right on schedule, there it was off to the left of the nose, just a hundred yards from the beach. All grass! It was just beautiful, and I was completely stoked to be so close. The were calling runway 35 in use. I look down to orient myself to runway 35. Blank. Hey, wait a minute.... there's no numbers on these runways. Of course... they're all GRASS. How are you going to paint numbers on grass? Adding to the confusion is the fact that there are THREE runways here, not just one as in most small airports. Something is wrong. I'm not getting my bearings at all. I haven't got a clue as to where the runway is. I look at my compass and can clearly see which way runway 35 SHOULD be going, but when I look down to find it, all I can see is grass, grass, and more grass.

At every other runway I have landed on, it's very easy to see where the runway is, but here there is no difference at all between the runway itself and the surrounding areas. It's all grass...... everywhere. I break off my approach and radio to Art: "I'm lost, Art. I'm going around. I'll follow you in." For some reason, he has no problem seeing where the runway is, and as soon as I see where he is lining up, it becomes pretty obvious to me too.

His approach is HOT, coming in a lot quicker than he normally does, but it come out OK and he lands well, with plenty of room to spare, even though this is a short runway, with houses at both ends.

I'm watching him from downwind, I must have still been thinking about being confused because I'm not descending as much as I should, so when I turn final I'm still too high, so I set up a slip to bleed off some altitude. I figure this will be no problem whatsoever. In fact, I have earned somewhat of a reputation for my slips to landing. So here I am flying the Waco sideways and nose high, dropping like an elevator, and expecting to be touching down about halfway down the runway. No problem. Except that this runway is already about half as long as a normal runway, so I don't really have much space to work with.

About 5 feet off the deck I'm thinking to myself about how close those houses are getting at the onrushing end of the runway. And I'm thinking that I'll probably be down on the ground in a couple more seconds, and that I'll probably stop a lot faster on grass than on asphalt, so I'll probably be able to brake to a stop before I introduce the neighbors to my Waco, the rude way. Another second or two of these thoughts and calculations and I'm still not a whole lot closer to DOWN, so I figure: "Go around. Yeah, that's the ticket! I can do better than this. I don't really need to leave the Waco in a ball in a living room in Martha's Vineyard. Go around!"

I firewall the throttle. The houses slip easily beneath the wings. Pull up into a left turn to pattern altitude and downwind for another go at it. Out over the ocean and turn left base, then final. Again I set up a radical slip to lose altitude, only this time I've got it nailed! It's a perfect three point touchdown, possibly even caressing the tailwheel a microsecond before the mains. The Waco rumbles to an easy stop on the turf.

Pilots and fishermen are some of the world's best "storytellers", so when I unbuckled and sauntered up to the waiting audience I enjoyed telling them that my go-around was really a low pass for their entertainment.

Is it really legal to have this much fun?


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