|
FS: You two have the distinction of being the first, and to my understanding, the only husband and wife couple who have attained every license and rating from the FAA. I personally find that very fascinating and I'd like to ask each of you: what's your favorite aircraft out of all these aircraft you can fly? Which one do you like the best? And why?
JOHN: You know, there's something that can be more fun than anything else, is a plain old 172. It's an airplane that lets you see well. It demonstrates in a very safe and comfortable way the wonderful capability of an aircraft to take you places and in a dimension, in a third dimension you couldn't do otherwise. In terms of just plain old fun, everyday flying, it's just very hard to beat the Cessna that you see in Flight Sim.
MARTHA: If you want to get into exotic aircraft, for me it would probably be the airship . . .
JOHN: The blimp, you might want to say?
MARTHA: The blimp. Primarily because it's so stately and it's so challenging to fly.
JOHN: And every time you fly it, it's a big event. The excitement. The people on the ground are excited and everybody's happy to see you and . . . it's like participating in a party or in a great celebration every time you fly. It's a celebration of flight.
MARTHA: Every time you do a landing or a takeoff, you've got about 21 people there looking at you and grading how well you do. All your ground crew is around there and watching you and so on.
Click image for a larger picture
JOHN: We finally got them to quit holding up signs.
MARTHA: It took a while though. (laughing)
JOHN: Now, for me, my favorite aircraft--and there's one built right in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2000 - is the helicopter. The helicopter is what flying was like when I dreamed as a kid about what flying would be like. When I was a kid, I dreamed I could go up vertically and fly backwards and fly sideways just by flapping my arms. And a helicopter lets you do all of that, and you don't even have to flap your arms. You can pick it up and look at something from all angles and you can fly backwards and sideways and fly at slow speeds and fly at faster speeds. A helicopter lets you explore the third dimension at altitude and absolute control of it in a very, very special way. The other thing about a helicopter is, of course, it's one of those whole new things to learn in aviation.
Click image for a larger picture
FS: Now you make me want to run out and fly one!
JOHN: That's the idea.
Next: Flight Training Challenges
|
;)
;)
