Well, a month has come and gone with NO FLYING. I can’t believe it, as this is my favorite time of the year to fly! Except for one lousy weekend, September has been great with lots of events to partake in. There was Aviation Days, the Stettler fly-in, the Lethbridge fly-in, the Calgary Flying Club Young Eagles Day, Garrett’s Indus Potluck dinner, Stu’s second 2006 Air Adventure to Castlegar… and I’ve missed them all!

The problem has been that we are working at a fevered pace trying to complete our cottage to lock-up by the end of September. This has meant working at the lot all weekend and then bringing home siding to stain during the week. However, October is shaping up to be a fairly relaxing month with lots of time for flying. This is good, as I hope to get my Commercial License completed by Christmas.

As I mentioned, I went a whole month without flying, but that cold spell ended last night (September 27), exactly one month after my previous flight. Fortunately, it was a flight well worth waiting for!

The weather was beautiful as I headed out for a late evening flight. Winds were light, and the sky was clear with a temperature of 18 degrees. Of course, late evening now occurs at 6 PM if you want to fly Day VFR. I got in the air at 6:15 PM with my trusty Lumix camera in hand. The mission of the flight was to capture some of the fall colors on film (or, more accurately, silicone).

I headed west to the Sundre area where I figured I had the best chance of finding my quarry. Since the sun was setting, I decided to take all the pictures with the camera pointed east, bathing the landscape with brilliant natural backlighting. Also, the low-angled light made the ground features stand out in exaggerated 3-D relief.

Despite being over the foothills and fairly close to the rocks, the air was perfectly smooth. This allowed me to get some really nice pictures as I let the plane guide itself along the Red Deer River valley. With the terrain rising, I climbed to 7000’ where the temperature was significantly cooler, preventing me from opening the windows for some clearer shots.

I kept an eye on the distance back to Carstairs and the time to ensure I made it back before dark. After being airborne for 45 minutes, I decided to head back, anticipating a 30-minute return flight. To my surprise, it took only 20 minutes. Despite being perfectly smooth, there was a 20-25 kts westerly wind blowing at 7000’! This was definitely a flight worth waiting for.

If you love flying, there’s a new movie in the theatres that you HAVE to see. Flyboys is the story of the Lafayette Escadrille, a WWI French squadron made up of American pilots. The film easily ranks as one of my favorite aviation films with a good mix of real and computer-generated flying scenes. It certainly helps that the film’s director is an EAA member…

Last month, I talked about the Light Sport Aircraft category, specifically how the Legend Cub does not fit any category in Canada. Adam Hunt of COPA National noticed this and responded with the following:

Dear Ken,

I was reading the latest Skywriter yesterday and noted your comments:

“On the lighter side, there were a number of new LSA aircraft on display. Unfortunately, many of these aircraft cannot be imported to Canada as they do not fit any of our categories. They’re too heavy for AUL, and as a completed aircraft built to LSA standards, they do not meet the certification categories available in Canada. This is unfortunate, as I really fell in love with the new Legend Cub. Powered with an O-200, it has all the nostalgia of a J-3, but with modern construction and equipment and a few more ponies under the cowl.”

Lots of people think that the US LSA’s that are over 1232 lbs (but at or under the LSA limit of 1320 lbs) cannot be imported into Canada. This is actually not true. The aircraft that are kits can mostly qualify as Canadian Amateur-built. The aircraft that are sold “Factory completed” can mostly qualify for the Canadian limited class. Ironically, the only exception to this that I have found is the Legend Sport Cub LSA. The limited class rules (see COPA’s Guide to the Limited Class at http://www.copanational.org/non-members/COPAGuides2.htm) exclude aircraft that are:

• Aircraft that have been issued with a type certificate
• An aircraft that is a copy or a direct equivalent of an aircraft that has a Canadian type certificate
• An aircraft which has a type certificate issued by a foreign civil aviation authority and is currently in production
• An amateur-built aircraft, foreign or Canadian

Unfortunately, the Legend Cub is advertised as a “copy” of the (Canadian) certified Cub and so doesn’t quality for the Limited class or any other current Canadian class. We are working on changing that and hope to have the results of that effort to announce letter on this year.

Just thought you would like to know.

Adam Hunt, COPA National