dangers of driving in anchorage

I have decided that its rather dangerous for pilots to drive within the city limits of anchorage. Not only do pilots tend to be horrible drivers, Anchorage provides significant aerial distractions for these drivers. Here is sample a day riding around Anchorage with a pilot.

Going into town, you come down the Glenn Highway. You may have seen airplanes flying overhead at this point, but the situation becomes increasingly dangerous the closer you get to town. Why? Because the final for one of the runways at Merrill field parallels the Glenn highway. For those of you who are not familiar with Alaska, Merrill is probably one of the busiest GA airports in the world. So, unlike driving by an old abandoned airport in the lower 48 where you aren't likely to see an airplane for miles, you are very likely to see several airplanes buzzing around the pattern.

Lucky for you, there is a plane on final. Given the previously stated fact that final on this particular day parallels the road you are traveling on, your pilot/driver immediately glues his eyes on the plane next to you. The typical pilot instantly assumes his car is an aircraft. "200 feet above the ground, flaps full." You feel the air conditioning turn on full blast as he flips the handle on the dash. If you are lucky, the cross wind will happen to be from the right. a more haphazard situation involves a left crosswind. When performing a crosswind landing, a skilled pilot puts the ailerons into the wind and applies opposite rudder. Suddenly, you realize the car is veering slightly to the left. Oh no....you realize he thinks the steering wheel is the aircraft control. Next comes the rudder correction... You are thrown back in your seat as he hits the left pedal. Naturally, if it was an airplane, you would hope your pilot is applying these control inputs... not so much in a car.

By this time you realize your driver/pilot is probably not paying one iota of attention to the traffic around you, so you start paying attention. Unfortunately for you, this is a pretty busy road, complete with stoplights. Great... the cars in front of you slow as the light turns red. "Brake... BRAKE!" You yell, to no avail. Of course he doesn't apply brakes. If a pilot locks up his brakes before he lands, he is going to end up popping a tire. An embarrassing situation at any airport, but especially at a busy place like Merrill. "LEFT RUDDER!!!!!" you finally scream as you brace yourself for impact. The car screeches to a halt, just barely missing the car in front.
"My approach wasn't that bad..." you hear the driver mumble. You wonder if he even noticed the red light.

As the flow of traffic resumes, Your driver turns his attention to the road again. But suddenly, you hear a deep rumbling. Oh no... You think again as you realize that Elmendorf Air Force Base is sending F-18s off at a regular pace. The car swerves uncontrollably as the pilot/driver tries to catch a glimpse of the fighters. "You hear that? That's what 11,000 pounds of thrust sounds like!" He shouts excitedly as you hear others honking around you. "Watch the road!" You holler. He still isn't paying any attention. Flabbergasted, you try a different approach. "FLY THE AIRPLANE!" You catch your breath as the car straigtens out and resumes travel in its own lane.

Thankfully you aren't going anywhere near Lake Hood, the float plane lake, today, or else you would REALLY be in trouble.

a prayer that covers all the bases

Thanks mom, for sending it to me, I really needed it today :)

Lord, Please Hear Our Prayers, by Tom Norvell


Father, please hear the prayers we offer.

Lord, please take away the sadness. We are hurting. We are weary. There
are days we cannot remember what joy felt like. Our hearts have been
broken. We sometimes wonder if you really care ... and if you are
really there. We are not sure how much we can bear. So, in our sadness
we pray, "Father, restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me
a willing spirit, to sustain me."

Lord, please take away the fear. There's so much happening that we
don't understand. We struggle with the uncertainty. We struggle to find
confidence. We are looking for reasons for hope. So, in our times of
fear we pray, "Father, walk with us and hold us in Your strong hands."

Lord, please take away the disappointment. Too often we've put our
trust in people; too often we watch them fail. We put our hope in
things; and things never last. With each disappointment our hearts grow
sicker as our hopes slowly seem to fade in the darkness. So, in our
disappointment we pray, "Father, help us to be faithful to You, and
never forget Your promise to be faithful in all things."

Lord, please take away the doubt. Deep in our hearts we know you care.
In the depths of our souls we know You are always near. At times our
faith is weak and our confidence is depleted. So, in times of doubt we
pray, "Father, open our eyes and open our ears."

Father, thank you for filling us with your presence.

Lord, please take away the anger. We are not by nature angry people.
But, there are times when the anger waits just beneath the surface to
erupt at just the wrong moment. We don't want that anger to take root
in our hearts. We want to let go of it and harbor no resentment. We
want to forgive. So, in our anger we prayer, "Father, forgive us as we
forgive those who have sinned against us."

Lord, please take away the hurt. The hurts ... well, they hurt. The
hurt seems to never end. Pain is all around us. Not just us, but people
all around us are crying for relief. So in our times of hurting we pray
for Your healing hand to rest upon us, and to feel Your comforting
Spirit within us, and that someday we might understand.

Lord, take away the loneliness. There are times when loneliness almost
completely overwhelms us. We long for relationship. We long for
friendship. We long for love. We know You are always with us. We know
your love is real. But, sometimes, Lord, we need someone we can touch,
someone we can see, and someone we can feel. So, in our loneliness we
pray, "Fill us, Lord, with Your presence."

Father, thank you for restoring joy to us, for calming our fears, for
reassuring us of Your faithfulness, for opening our eyes and ears to
the certainty of You, for forgiving us of our sins, for healing us of
our hurts, and for filling us with Your presence. We love you.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer
and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And
the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard
your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:6-7 TNIV).

---------
(c) 2009 Tom Norvel

hi again

I haven't posted in a while... To my avid fans, I apologize. There has been lots going on at the ranch. So I will give as brief a look as I can!


206 Tom

Tom Regier, an incredible aircraft mechanic, has been with us for a few weeks. He taught at A&P school for more than 30 years, and has a shop specializing in aircraft rebuilds. His most recent project was rebuilding a mooney that got sliced in half by a hangar falling on it. He has gone with MAF a few times, just to do rebuilds for them. He has been a ton of fun to work with in the hangar, and it has been amazing to watch things happen with him cracking the whip. We have a 206 that looked like a broken egg shell when he started, and a 150 that sat around as a fuselage the past few years. The 150 flew on Tuesday, and the 206 has wings and windows installed. It wont fly until at least next year though, as boxes of engine pieces are on their way to Tom's shop in california to be built.

The 150 flies!! After sitting in the hangar for so long, I am sure 402 is happy to be in the air again.

KAC summer flight ops are basically done
for 2009. Most of the pilot/mechanic types have returned home or to LeTourneau for the next year of school. That leaves me here, wondering what's next.

What's next for Liz?
The job hunt is the big thing I am working on right now. I have dropped off applications and resumes, so I am waiting to hear back from a couple of those. As I am waiting to hear back, I am making more contacts, praying that God leads me to the right job.

I have really been questioning Whether God wants me to stay in Alaska, or if it is just a Liz thing. But God keeps providing little things that tell me He really wants me here. Its going to take a lot of endurance on my part, but God will provide. He gave me a good car a few weeks ago for an incredible deal. Just yesterday, I met someone who lives in Anchorage with a guest room. She invited me to stay with her for a few weeks when I get a job to get into town and find some housing. Please pray with me that God brings me the job I need to get me through the winter and this next year. I am so thankful for what he has provided so far.

-thanks to Lydia and Drew for the pics :)-

“Hey Liz, you did this right? You need to sign it off.” Ryan told me one warm afternoon in the hangar in Nairobi.
“But I don’t want to!” I informed him adamantly.
“why not?”
“I don’t want to admit that I did that!”
“Well, part of being an A&P is taking responsibility for your own work,” he told me. Begrudgingly, i scribbled my initials in the box. He was right, I did have to take responsibility for my work. It wasn’t a deep revelation, but it was the first time I really had to sign off my own work, even though it was a simple discrepancy that anyone in the hangar could have fixed.

I enjoyed working with Ryan in Kenya. He taught me a lot about fleet maintenance and working in a third world country. When we weren’t working, he was talking about motorcycles or watching videos of motorcycles. He graduated from LeTourneau, so we had fun comparing notes on which classes we loved, which professors gave the worst tests, and life in the ghetto of Longview. He and his awesome wife picked me up at the airport when I first got there, and encouraged me throughout my time in Kenya.

I think I heard Saturday morning that something had happened to him. I found out that afternoon that there was a plane crash in Nairobi, right off the airport where I worked, less than a mile from where I lived. I put a few more pieces together, and by Saturday evening, I realized that Ryan had been in the AIM AIR plane that crashed. The official statement is here

Ryan is really beat up, but he is going to survive it. The pilot did not make it. I had met Frank while I was there, but didn’t get to know him as well as I did the guys on the hangar floor. Please pray for Frank’s wife and four kids as they work through this difficult situation. Please pray for Ryan’s recovery and his wife and kids while they are going through this.

Please pray for AIM AIR. While I was there, they were under a probationary period where they analyzed every aspect of the operation and made necessary changes to make the operation as safe as possible. The AIM AIR family is mourning the loss of a brother.

I probably worked on that plane. I spent enough time on the 206s in Nairobi that it is very likely I turned a wrench on that plane. Sometimes I wonder why God wants me doing something as important as aircraft maintenance. Wouldn’t He be better off flying himself around with the angels? He doesn’t need me. He doesn’t even need these airplanes. But he loves us sooooo much that He wants us to be a part of His work. Even though all I do is drop tools on the ground, He wants to pick them up, just so He can stand next to me. Maybe he even wrote the laws of gravity so I would be reminded that its Him pulling the tools out of my hand and throwing them at the ground.
Even though all we pilots do is try not to bend the airplane when we get close to the ground, He gives us a nice soft pillow (we call it “ground effect”) to help cushion our landing, just so he can be there next to us. He created physics so we can get above the ground, to get a different perspective of the earth. Or maybe He let us figure out the lift formula so we can routinely jump into his arms in faith. We call it aerodynamics, but we know He is holding us up, getting us where He wants us.