Mountain Solitaire

Not me, just the planes I fly. The forest fire airtanker I flew in 2004 is on the 2007 airtanker calender put out by Goleta Air and Space Museum. And not the chemtrail kooks got a Discovery Channel episode dedicated to them, and I see the exact plane I am flying on there.

Its fun to watch these stupid chemmie kooks, with their numerous conspiracies which actualy debunk each other. I have a link to a friends message board (F-16 pilot) where we make fun of those kooks. Its in the list of links to the right.

What is with these people? For many of these liberal arts professors, they have never had a real job or been outside of the university system since they were a freshmen. Every university seems to have its obligatory contingent of those who worship at the altar of socialism, who blame the US for the troubles in the world, and who cry when a jihadi dies.

http://bridgenews.org/news/0207/bellaciao

Some excerpts of this lunacy :

"The American military and mercenary soldiers who “sacrificed” their lives did not do so for the teacher’s freedom to teach the truth about the so-called war on terror, or any of US history for that matter. They sacrificed their lives, limbs and sanity for money, some education and the thrills of the violence for which they are socially bred. Sacrificing for the “bling and booty” in Iraq or Afghanistan, Philippines, Grenada, Central America, Mexico, Somalia, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, or any of the other numerous wars and invasions spanning US history as an entity and beginning with their foundational practice of killing the Indians and stealing their land."

"

The excuses that they give for joining or intending to join the US military terrorist training camps are first and foremost motivated by a desire for money.

One student proudly said that he is willing to kill for money, a better standard of living and an education. Another student, who had done two tours of duty to the Empire in Iraq, justified killing and torture, citing the importance of staying on top as the world’s number one super power so that his family could have the highest standard of living and unlimited access to the world’s oil supplies."

I feel like I need to take a shower after reading that persons thoughts. Its just ironic that the reason this person has the freedom to express such detestable thoughts, is because of the US military. I am sure the countries that this person holds in higher esteem (probably Cuba, Iran, North Korea) would have dealt with such dissent rather quickly.

About a year and a half ago, I was living in my mountain house in Angel Fire, NM not far about the famous Angel Fire Vietnam Veterans memorial. There is an outfit there selling one of those snakeoil scams for "oxygenated" and "structured" water, which of course is impossible. The only kind of structured water is ice, and if you add extra oxygen by molecular bonds as they claim, you start ending up with Hydrogen Peroxide.

It was about a year and a half about I wrote about it on here first. Writing about it again should ensure it comes up in another google search. Interestingly enough, one day I had a phone number that was unfamiliar to me in my missed calls, so I looked it up and it was the owner of that company.

I do have a science degree with experience in water quality assessment and a fair amount of chemistry. Enough to know to throw up the BULLSHIT flag with these people. If someone finds this and I keep one bottle of that liquid stupidity from being sold, a few minutes of this is worth it. I hate seeing people being taken advantage of by people peddling junk science in order to make a buck

At least I did get them added to a list of scam sites. http://www.chem1.com/CQ/gallery.html

http://www.angelfirewater.com/

Well I found a company that is looking to hire a Smokejumper Captain on the Twin Otter for the summer fire season, and when I got ahold of the chief pilot, he was already made aware of me by someone I met in Reno. So that is a good thing.

I would expect to not then get this Boise winter project as mentioned earlier, however it goes along with my long term goals to be in the aerial side of wildland firefighting, and getting carded as Smokejumper Captain is a definite "feather in my cap" so to speak, and it a big accomplishment if it happens. I would rather do that, then go off to Africa again, although I sure liked the pay from Africa.

I am am hoping that I can get this position, even though it will mean less pay over the next year. But when applying to get on with Dyncorp for CDF, it would really be something that makes me stand out and is fire related.

Flew again last night, wasnt much happening, and little to no icing. It probably really takes about an inch of ice to start getting my attention.

Its not bad I admit, when I have not had to fly in a month. I do enjoy flying, but its also nice to have so much free time, especially compared to this summer when I worked every day, flying 1-2 times per day.

It was actually pretty crappy for cloud seeding, I could see that while I was driving to the airport at 4am, but hey, its not up to me to decide when to fly. So I did my flight, came back and slept. Looks like tomorrow I will fly again too!

Here is the plane with a bit of ice on the nose after a recent flight.

Well it is nice having options. My long term goals are to get back into flying airtankers, either for a contractor or CDF, or USFS pilot. I have a pretty sweet winter contract with Weather Modification here in Boise, that I would like to be on next winter.

So do I go do forest fire flying, either recon aircraft or possibly flying smoke jumpers and risk not having this winter contract? I think if I get an offer to fly smoke jumpers as captain of a jump plane, I would probably take it. Getting a carding as Smokejumper Captain is pretty good to have, and would still look good when applying for USFS or CDF (actually the CDF contractor). It looks like Wxmod will have lots of summer overseas work, which means that there will probably be an excess of pilots for the winter, and naturally the ones who are currently on would have priority.

I fly a King Air C-90 right now, well because it has been so dry, I have not flown a lot, so it is a paid vacation compared to Africa. If I do stay on with them, then I could choose whatever summer contract I want.

However, since apparently I have made substantial headway in getting on with CDF, I think it would be wise to try and fly on fires this summer, but we shall see.