On Mon, 09 Feb 2004 21:29:43 GMT, "Dudley Henriques"
wrote:


"John S. Shinal" wrote in message
...
"Dudley Henriques" wrote:

A self inspired night checkout in the average warbird would kill all but
the
most "inspired" I can assure you!! :-)))

"All right, time to rotate...hmmm...what the...why can't I...
AAAGH ! The gust locks !"

PRANG ! Boom.

Actually..... saw a guy do something almost as bad once. He had a Tri-Pacer.
We were all watching through the window of the flight office as he taxied
out with a rather large concrete block trailing along behind him tied to his
tail. We yelled at him on the radio, but naturally he didn't have THAT on!!!
So we all climbed on the field pickup truck and raced across the field after
him. We caught up to him while he was doing his runup. To this day, when
some of us get together and remember this, we bust out laughing thinking
what must have been going through his mind when he saw about fifteen people
hanging onto a bouncing pickup truck coming directly at him shouting and
waving like a bunch of banshees!!
He told us he nearly **** a brick!!! THAT REALLY broke us up!!!!!
:-))
Dudley Henriques
International Fighter Pilots Fellowship
Commercial Pilot/ CFI Retired
For personal email, please replace
the z's with e's.
dhenriquesATzarthlinkDOTnzt

Didn't see it myself, but friends who did swear it is true. A locally
(to me) based Cherokee successfully took off with a 5-gallon bucket
full of concrete still tied to the wing tie-down. Upon landing, the
bucket flailed around and damaged the underside of the wing and flap.

I actually did catch a student taxiing out (with instructor) one day
with the rudder gust-lock still installed (this was on a C-172 as I
recall).

Two of us sitting in the office saw it at the same time, and we both
bolted out the door running after the taxiing 172. We did catch it,
and pounded on the sides of the doors to get their attention and
to get them to stop. The looks on their faces (before & after they
realized the gust-lock was still in place) were priceless!

Bela P. Havasreti