David Miller’s physician probably got a call today from our hyperventilating mayor.
At long last, the Toronto Port Authority, and Regco, announced that indeed Robert Deluce’s airline will get started this fall. Even Air Canada says they’ll bring a few flights back to the Island Airport with the new ferry to arrive in a few months.
This is of course what all the lie-ridden mayoral campaign was all about back in 2003. “Stopping the airport expansion” was a fake achievement that kept Miller’s leftie lakeshore friends happy, and him with on-demand self-congratulatory publicity. Having that in his back pocket was handy, considering his rather lacklustre leadership since taking control of the municipality. However, it looks like he and his friends have been out-maneuvered: the new airline will come, the new airplanes will come (they are much quieter than GXRP, by the way), new business will come, and the feds were forced to subsidize it all. Hm, GXRP’s hangar rent will probably rise, d’oh.
The timing of all this is perfect. The incoming conservative federal government is unlikely to do any political favours (in the form of interfering with the Port Authority) for Miller, who after all campaigned in the federal election in support of the liberals or what have you. Miller himself will be up for election again this winter, which is by coincidence (I am sure) just weeks after the new Regco airline will be flying proud.
In other words, Miller will have failed on two fronts after three years of gloating, and the city’s voters will be made aware of it right at election time. He better hope for some act of god.
First hand experience suggests that if you leave your car for service at Scarborough's Heritage Ford dealership, you best avoid leaving the car there overnight.
To: Greg Bleeks
From: Frank Ch. Eigler
Subject: Custody of Customer Vehicles
Dear Mr. Bleeks:
I am a current customer of maintenance service at Heritage Ford.
This morning (2006-02-03), my car was one of the several apparently
broken into while on your property, and some contents were missing.
But all this is background.
When I pointed out the problem to Ashton Francois, he went looking
for the items, in case they were misplaced during the service. A
few minutes later, he asked me to talk to his manager, a gentleman
named Arthur Ophelders. I hoped this person would attempt to set
things right somehow, but on the contrary, he made it even worse.
He started a blustery little speech that he must have given several
times this morning already: that others' cars were also broken into,
that so was his own ("but not my personal car, my dealership car").
That you have insurance, but it does not cover customers' property.
That the other customers were told to call their own insurance
companies and address the loss that way. That you have the "best
security" and "nothing could have prevented it". That it's just
like if the car was broken into in a parking lot across the
street. From many defensive euphemisms, I was to infer that he
was willing to do *absolutely nothing*.
During the entire conversation, he did not express even the
basic courtesy of:
- apologizing, showing any sympathy
- asking what was lost, how much it was worth,
- asking whether the value was below our insurance deductible
- checking if the company can make up the loss in any other way
For the record, had he asked the above questions, these would
have been my answers, respectively:
- okay
- an old piece of electronics and one cassette, much less than $100,
much much less than the amount of the service invoice I just paid
- yes, and therefore essentially irrecoverable
- yes, perhaps some consideration on a future transaction
Need I say that I'm disappointed that a small loss was given
unnecessary amplification by such rudeness? You should be
concerned that such a person is representing your company to
customers who, despite having many other options, plonked down
good money at your establishment. My story may well turn some
away.
Please ask Mr. Ophelders to reconsider his attitude. Please look
into improving physical security for the vehicles entrusted to
your care and custody. Please let me know if you are willing to
set things right.
Frank Ch. Eigler
(contact information on file)
During yet another long Hope Air mission, I was reminded why the blue-tinted gasoline powering GXRP is key to successful flights.
I don’t mean just the obvious sense. GXRP carries over six hours’ worth of fuel, which is ample for one long (3-hour) flight with a big contingency reserve. It is not enough for two.
When flying to a small airport at an odd hour of the day, there is a possibility of having to go without a refuel. With a considerable tailwind homeward, there is a temptation to plan a return all the way home, simplifying the process but sacrificing the reserve. When subsequently flying conditions deteriorate, the reduced reserve can create a crisis. (Here, “crisis” is used in its dictionary sense, being a moment where an urgent decision is required, not as in journalism, where it is a fancy synonym of “trouble”.)
Enough generalities.
After 2.8 hours in the air to Cochrane, the airport turned up unattended. The left and right inboard tanks of GXRP were down to about 20%, and both outboards 80%. I anticipated a good wind homeward, so I figured I would go straight home. A helpful briefer at the London Flight Service pointed out that weather in the Toronto area was no longer as good as at the start of the day. “Good” in this case meant 30-40 kt winds inducing wild bronco turbulence, but still manageable visual conditions. The trouble: an infamous snow streamer formed in a narrow line from Lake Huron over to Trenton, wiggling back and forth, touching Toronto all the way about 50 nm north. I launched anyway, keeping in mind a sequence of possible stopping points: Timmins, Sudbury, Muskoka, and Barrie-Orillia.
To collect all available fuel in one set of tanks, which is desirable for landing or operating in turbulent conditions, I decided to burn off the inboard tanks before using the outboards. Since both engines burn fuel around the same rate, having them both run off of the inboard tanks could cause a double engine failure, even if only momentarily. So, instead I’ve used a little trick, where I alternate running down the nearly-empty tanks, on one engine at a time. So, there I was, at cruise altitude, with the left engine emptying its inboard tank, and the right engine drawing down its fuller outboard. As the minutes ticked by, the left fuel gauge got closer and closer to “E”, and I checked a timer constantly. When the left one was run down “enough”, I’d switch that to the outboard, and the right side to the inboard, for the same amount of time. The result: fuel balanced and collected, without much risk.
Suddenly, after 45 long minutes, the left engine drew its last sip of fuel from that tank. While I did not intend to actually run the tank completely dry (going instead by time or gauge indications), I did rehearse the maneuver to instantly flip the fuel selector valves to restore flow from the fuller tank. Still, when the engine really ran out, the sensation was about as uncomfortable as I ever want to feel in the plane. Within a second, the engine monitor indicated all cylinders cooling, power becoming intermittent. The other engine was pulling strong and there were no control difficulties. Once the fuel selector started feeding fuel from the outboard tank, I expected the left engine to come back to full power right away. Instead, for about ten more seconds, it was hesitating, as if the fuel lines had to be pressurized anew, or some other nasty education was about to take place. This was unexpected, and I disliked it enough to not want to try that one again. I’d rather leave a small amount of unused gas in a tank than have to wobblify the engines.
With that piece of excitement past, I switched tanks as planned, intending to use only about half of those 45 minutes from the right inboard side. Calculations indicated that this would leave about one hour of fuel left in reserve (inboards empty, outboards at 33%) at the time of landing. Just barely enough.
Then some weather news came in: that snow streamer has hit downtown Toronto. “Just barely enough” fuel was not going to cut it, since now there was a strong likelihood of having to try a couple of approaches, holding, diverting to Pearson (again), or some such timetaking entertainment. With low fuel, that’s no fun, so I went to work finding another place to land, somewhere close. I was just flying past Muskoka at this time, and knew that their weather has been all right, so it was my safe backup. I hoped to land closer to Toronto though, so I asked for a diversion to Barrie-Orillia (CNB9). From a long way away, they cleared me for an approach, but cautioned that they had no weather data for that airport. I was fortunately able to raise the Barrie-Orillia ground folks on the radio from way far out. When they told me that they were blasted with at least 4” of snow on the runway, I realized that it was out of the question. I turned around immediately (rather hastily, from an IFR clearance following perspective), and asked ATC to send me back to Muskoka. Ten minutes later, I landed at night on a small amount of fluffy snow, posing no slipperiness challenge to GXRP. After the complications of this flight, it was a relief to be on the ground.
The airport staff had gone home by then, leaving open the apron, and the terminal building with phones and washrooms. I ended up calling a cab to a hotel in nearby Bracebridge. It was fairly cheap, as was the awesome steak & beer dinner nearby. The only concern now was how GXRP was going to deal with being left out in the cold overnight.
Next morning, Muskoka weather was lovely. A crisp -14 C, blue skies, no overnight snow, lovely pine tree forests. I got back to the airplane before the airport staff got to work, and warmed myself by scraping off some of the overnight frost. Cleaning the wings and the tail properly constituted the second use of the handy dandy deicing fluid sprayer I have been carrying in GXRP for months. It paid for itself right there. However, only I will get to pay for the extra wear and tear on the engines, which were cold-started. Poor things: starting reluctance was both mine and theirs.
Once refueled and warmed, the airplane was happy to go home, as was I. There was still some cloud piercing, some airborne snow here and there. But with so much fuel on board, the stresses from the previous night were a distant memory. This short flight was just plain fun.
Some think of the couple-of-hundred homeless in Toronto as a problem. I think of them as an opportunity for lateral thinking. At each meal time, offer each person in a caged homeless herd a collection of sharp utensils, and wish them “happy hunting”. If they eat each other, both the hunger and the population problems are helped at the same time. Sheer genius.
Some bloggers and news companies worldwide are trying to make a point by republishing those Danish mohammed cartoons, in the name of free speech. Not I.
It’s not that I don’t appreciate free speech. It’s that there is no need to rub it in. Of course (copyright willing), we can legally do so, but many legal actions are ill-advised in polite company. I only rarely swear to make a point, rarely shout, rarely insult, since overuse of rhetorical hyperbole closes the mind of the audience. Unless one’s point is to foment or alienate closed-minded people, one should communicate as calmly as possible.
Quick jaw-position testing question. What fraction of public corporations are such that the top few executives earn more (from salary plus company-funded stock options) than the company as an entity does?
Today’s weather in the Toronto area included the dreads of every aviator.
Several hours of freezing drizzle and rain, and now a few hours of thunderstorms. I have not heard of these two phenomena occurring in the same place on the same day before. The former tends to occur early winter, the other mid summer. What a kooky winter it has been here this year.
UPDATE: Next morning, we get the strongest winds I remember ever seeing here. “When it rains, it pours.”
Some weather observations, for the record:
CYYZ 161700Z 04010KT 2SM -FZDZ BR OVC005 M02/M03 A3010 RMK ST8 SLP199
CYYZ 162000Z 09008KT 2 1/2SM -FZRA -FZDZ BR OVC003 M02/M03 A3002 RMK ST8
CYYZ 170000Z 11010KT 4SM -FZRA BR OVC003 M00/M01 A2983 RMK NS8 SLP110
CYYZ 170400Z 09002KT 5/8SM -TSRA BR OVC002 02/02 A2961 RMK FG2NS6 CB EMBD SLP034
CYYZ 171427Z 31038G49KT 15SM SCT034 M06/ RMK SC4
How ordinary can those people be who come up with exquisitely sick humor?
There are plenty in mainstream media: the modern raunchy cartoons (South Park, Family Guy, others lesser known), Howard Stern. But those guys get paid to do it.
The internet has bred a bunch of amateurs that do it just for fun. When official censorship is nonexistent, a contempt for polite bounds can create little monstrosities. When the quality of offensiveness hits the “unreal” point on the scale, the audience multiplies. Maybe it’s the same yearning for shock as an ogler at a car crash. Maybe it’s release from a regimented day. For me, it’s just wishing that, damn, I could somehow be that funny.
Some classics, each one totally offensive in its own special way:
Yesterday, my newly father-to-be little brother fessed up that he’s become afraid of flying (in general, not specifically with me). No doubt this is due to a sense of family pressure and responsibilities. Interesting note though: in case the worst happens, the liability insurance carried on the airplane is so much that, most likely, my passengers are worth more dead than alive. So if they want (financially) the best for their families, people should fly with me often!