Professional flying & Alcoholism

[Robert Lees]

I'm posting this in the Humor Rants & Raves Forum, because it's a Rave .

It has no direct bearing on most Taylorcraft flyers, but it does have bearing upon us as a flying community.

An English bulletin board that I frequent has a thread on alcoholism & professional pilots. Nothing surprising there, perhaps, except for on this thread, two recovering alcoholic professional pilots have "come out" and openly given their own interpretation of the experiences they went through.

They are both Americans. English Pilots have suffered the same too, but it is noteworthy that the two very honest & open correspondents here are Americans.

The story starts here with the usual slating of drunken pilots, but the interesting bit starts at post #51 on page 3 , with a very personal account from Captain Lyle Prouse.

The subsequent postings are very sobering (literally), and never have I seen such a response to such postings, particularly since the host bulletin board is one of the foremost internet meeting places for professional pilots.

Read & enjoy, and may it be as uplifting to you as it is to me.

Rob

[flyguy]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

"I complained because I had no shoes, until I saw a man who had no feet." Wow.
DC

[VictorBravo]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

When I went to the links, I got an "invalid thread" error.

Perhaps Lyle Shelton and Bob Hoover contacted F. Lee Bailey and they wished that thread away into the cornfield...

A well known pilot named John Parker was a Formula One race champion decades ago. I paid him to build some racing cylinders for me. When I went to pick them up, he smelled like he had been soaked in liquor for some time. The first flight on those cylinders at the Reno races was almost my last; Parker had installed the oil control rings upside down, causing a rapid loss of all the oil in the engine at low altitude and low speed on the race course. Parker flew professionally for American Air Lines.

[Robert Lees]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

I've re-posted the links.

"Re-hosted to prevent any further attempts by the originator to delete the thread"

[Vasey fan]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

Bill, what did you fly at Reno? I'm a big fan of those little Formula birds, but at 6'4" there's not much chance of fitting in one. A friend once offered to let me try his Cassutt, then stood there and laughed his arse off while I tried to get in.

Back to the original subject, there have always been some pretty hard drinkers in aviation (not making excuses, just stating facts). I recall that about a decade ago, ALPA helped shoot down a proposed breathylizer before flight requirement. Part of their argument was that some guys wouldn't be able to function due to dt's if they were to quit imbibing X-many hours before the test.

When I was a sprout, I worked for a great guy who was one of the first to plumb a surplus bomber for aerial firefighting. You could always tell when he was coming up behind you because the cloud of gin vapor arrived before he did.

I once heard (fwiw) that the toxicology results on Paul Mantz had his blood alcohol at over .02. There's more, but I'll cut this ramble short.

[VictorBravo]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

Bill, what did you fly at Reno? I'm a big fan of those little Formula birds, but at 6'4" there's not much chance of fitting in one.

I once heard (fwiw) that the toxicology results on Paul Mantz had his blood alcohol at over .02. There's more, but I'll cut this ramble short.

I had a highly modified Cassutt #81 "BooRay" for a couple of years. It was built by a small guy (Marion Baker), and I haven't missed too many meals over the years, so it was quite a show watching me get in. It was a Cassutt 2 fuselage (not the slightly larger 3), and Baker had cut it down further in height and width to fit him. That's why Boo Ray was the prettiest and sleekest of all the Cassutts. The "fineness ratio" of the fuselage was better.

Don't let your height dissuade you from racing if you want to race. There is more than one tall pilot in F-1. Jon Sharp overcame height and weight to win many many races. He had a modified Cassutt (#43 Aero Magic) before the Nemesis racer. Ray Cote isn't tall but he didn't miss too many meals either and won many many races in the Shoestring racers #16 and #44. If you are interested in F-1 racing for real, build a new airplane that minimizes the losses for your height. That means a low wing airplane shaped more like a glider, which means faster anyway. Search for the photos of the former Race #55 "Bummer's Bullet" built by Robbie Grove in San Diego. If you build an airplane shaped more or less like that, with a slightly shorter wingspan and good computer-aided contours, you can be fully competitive at Reno. One guy who won F-1 recently (Gary Hubler) is tall as well.

I have heard the stories about Frank Tallman (Mantz' partner who died in an airplane crash, and questions were raised about blood alcohol) but I never heard that same story about Mantz himself. Tallman was my first flight instructor, BTW

[Vasey fan]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

Maybe he meant Tallman & got 'em mixed up. I've got Frank's book, Flying the Old Planes, he sure had good taste in machinery.

AFA the Formula racer, I've been finding race #11, an Arnold AR-6, pretty sporty. Can't find much info on it though.

Rob, sorry about the thread hijack.

[VictorBravo]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

I spoke to Arnold some years ago about the beautiful AR-5 mini-racer, and he offered to build me a competitive F-1 for some frightening amount of money. (probably a fair amount of money inhindsight) I am certain that if he built an F-1 it would be competitive... he's a sharp guy. Just looking at the AR-5 tells me he is on the right track. But I've never seen the AR-6... send me a picture if you got one.

Bill

[Vasey fan]

Re: Professional flying & Alcoholism

http://ar-5.com/ar6.htm

[VictorBravo]

IF-1 Racers was Pro. Pilot Alcoholism

JEEZ! That absolutely looks like he's on the right track (Arnold AR-6)! Tht is a top five racer for sure, even with an average motor.

I have a couple of thoughts based only on one quick look at the photos. The airfoil looks a little thick for that kind of speed (275-300 level flight max). I know this was done to save weight and that he chose a good airfoil, but it's tough to keep real laminar low drag flow in real-world racing conditions on a thick wing. My comment is based solely on the photo showing the left wingtip.

I'd be worried about airflow separation around the fuselage behind the cockpit, the fuselage tapers very sharply. He might have to use turbulators or micro VG to keep the flow attached. Obviously a computer program might have determined differently.

I would have used a T-tail especially with that fin area distribution (part of the fin below the fuselage c/l). The T-tail gets rid of two 90 degree intersections and keeps the stabilizer out of dirty airflow. You can see by the photos that he is already concerned about the intersection drag on the fuselage-tail joint. An extra two or four pounds of structure (assuming well-designed carbon layup and bagged) would handle the extra loads on the fuselage from the T-tail.

These are all relatively minor issues and he might have CFD'd or otherwise designed them away. I'm not a trained laminar aero guy, so if Mike Arnold has raised the ghost of Klaus Holighaus and he said it would go, then take Klaus' opinion over mine (even if he is dead).

All in all the AR-6 looks to my eyes to be a little lower drag than either the Nemesis or even the Grove GR-7. Nemesis was hampered by having the original design laid out around a steel tube fuselage, which is why the tailcone is larger and straighter than it has to be. Robbie's GR-7 was and is brilliant but I think he used straight lines on the fuselage because it was easier than making molds of a true sailplane-curved fuselage. That being said, both airplanes were winners and elevated the state of the art in F-1 racing.

If Mike Arnold would let me race that little rocket I surely would! Might take a 2 ton press to get my fat ass in the cockpit, but I'd do it

Congratulations Mike if you ever read this, looks like you're real close!