Saturday, February 13, 2010

Pit Stop


In NASCAR racing, a good pit stop will only take 12 seconds! But when we need to stop and refuel the float plane, a good pit stop takes 25 minutes. We store aviation fuel in 55 gallon drums at a number of places. When I land and tie the airplane up, I have to syphon out 30-40 gallons of aviation fuel into 5 gallon plastic jerry cans. Hauling them down the river bank and climbing up onto the wing to pour in 5 gallons at a time keeps all of us SAM AIR pilots in good shape. I usually am drenched with sweat by the time I am done refueling. Relief comes after taking off and getting up to cruise altitude, the air is 60 up at 5500 feet!

1 comment:

jjapol said...

At least you don't have to worry about the line guy scratching your plane... ;-)