It's been wet and windy here in central Florida with widespread
destruction and power outages. We were on our built in 5 KW generator for four
hours this morning. The Wi-Fi was down at the Quest club house with the power
out. Tim Ettridge went over to Sun 'n Fun (no Sun or Fun today) where there was
carnage. Jim Lee and his Phoenix emerged without a scratch. Haven't heard from
Russell Duncan from Airborne.
This morning Dolores and I drove an hour south to Lakeland
Airport's Sun & Fun Fly-in, probably surpassed in size and significance of
anything in the States by only the yearly gathering Oshkosh (known as AirVenture).
We stopped by and said hi to Jim Lee in the LSA area, where he was displaying
his Phoenix. While attending a FAA seminar on Flight Risk Management by John and
Martha King, a squall hit so strong that, at first, Martha King had to pause
because even the studio's sound system couldn't amplify her voice above the din
from the rain on the roof. A few minutes later, the power went out.
When we stepped outside afterwards in what had by then become light rain, we
were awestruck by the scope of the damage we saw. In just my field of view, I
saw at least 10 aircraft scattered about like rumpled paper (including three
beautiful AirCams, one even on floats). One $100K LSA was crumpled against a $2M
jet, which seemed to be unscathed except for some paint scratches.
One LSA on floats that ended up on it's back on a taxiway had short dog anchors
(the kind we hang gliders rely on so much) dangling from a short rope on each
end of each float. With the rain that we've had here all week, the ground was
probably just too soft to have them provide any security.
Dolores and I decided to leave for the day, as it was just a terribly sad thing
to see in any direction we looked. We stopped by to check in on Jim Lee again on
the way out. Though an LSA 100m from his plane was on it's back, Jim's Phoenix
emerged unscathed. He said he saw pea-sized hail falling but his plane had no
damage to it's surface.
His tent, however, was last seen heading somewhere over the trees.
