Well, summer has DEFINITELY ended! Unfortunately, our summer weather ended just a bit too early for our COPA for Kids event scheduled for October 3rd. With cold temperatures, high winds, snow, and rain in the forecast for both Saturday and the rain date, Sunday, Carl and the other organizers decided to postpone the event until Saturday, October 10th. Of course, this depends on whether or not we can get enough pilots, volunteers, and participants on the Thanksgiving weekend. If you are available, please contact Carl Foreman.

Despite the cold start to October, September has to have been one of the best on record! This led to some excellent flights, including a great trip to Lethbridge on Saturday, September 12th. We had planned to meet up over Chestermere/Kirkby field at 08:30 and make our way south. Although calm on the ground, as soon as I made it into the air, I noticed a significant headwind. It appeared to be approximately 30 kts at 5000’.

As I descended to pass under the Class C airspace around Calgary, I noticed that the groundspeed continued to drop down to around 55-60 kts. I heard the Chestermere crew preparing for take-off and informed them of the high winds aloft. There was a lot of discussion about alternate destinations, and we had all but settled on a shorter trip to Vulcan.

Just about then, Brian Vasseur chimed in from a few miles south and 7500’ with tales of a much lighter 12 kts headwind at that height. As soon as I came out under the Mode C veil, I climbed to 6500 and sure enough, the winds dropped off to a more acceptable 12 kts.

As we passed over Vulcan, the discussion of destination again came up. After a minute or two of indecision (and a 360° turn), I decided to continue on to Vulcan with Bernie Kespe in his Starduster, Brian Vasseur in the CH-250, and Bob Kirkby in the PA-12. A small group, led by Stu Simpson, decided to wimp out and go to Vulcan for breakfast at the golf club. Shortly after passing by Vulcan, another familiar voice came on the radio as Gerry Macdonald called in with his Cessna 182.

Traffic flow into Lethbridge went smoothly, partly due to the efforts of the flight service specialist on duty. Our group got squared away on the ramp, parked in the grass along the edge of the taxiway. Breakfast was excellent, and we had a great time catching up with our Lethbridge friends. Unfortunately, the morning was not without incident. As I made my way back to the plane to meet with the fuel truck, I heard a rather loud “ping-ping-ping” noise coming from up the taxiway. It turned out that the noise came from the prop of a Mooney as its prop did a little furrowing in the grass. The nosewheel found a gopher hole, dropping the nose of the airplane low enough to suffer a prop strike.

After a pleasant morning, we headed home. With the winds, I logged 1:55 en route to Lethbridge and only 1:12 on the return flight!

Work has also been going great. We continue to work on primarily new aircraft! This week, we actually had two 2007 aircraft in the shop. One new skill I’ve been honing is my knowledge of aircraft imports. Earlier this spring, we imported a Cessna 195. Later this summer, we had a Pipistrel Taurus motor-glider come in for import in the Limited Category. Now we’re working on a 2007 Cessna 206.

From all of this, I’ve learned many things, but the most important is just how expensive importing an airplane can get. In chatting with Daryl, he informed me that the least expensive import he did was on a new Citabria. Even this amounted to 50 hours of labour. If you plan on importing a certified aircraft, be sure to budget at least $10,000-$15,000 for import work. I’m sure that those in the club that have gone through the process will agree.

One tip Daryl had is that when you find the airplane you want, arrange to have the owner fly it to your home base for final inspection before handing over the money. Usually, if airworthiness issues are found at that time, the owner will be more than willing to fix it to finalize the sale.

Hope to see you all on Thursday for the meeting. Remember that a number of us meet at Swiss Chalet around 5:30 before the meeting for supper. You’re more than welcome to join us.