On the way home from work today, I thought I was going to be a witness to a plane crash. Turns out the guy was crop dusting in an old biplane. I've never seen that before so I pulled over to get some pics (sorry for the low quality). Must have taken a tremendous amount of skill. The field is hemmed in by some woods to the east and west. He'd dive in just inches above the tree line, level out about 15' off the ground, then climb into an upside-down U turn, and make another pass. I've been known to have trouble following a straight line with my lawnmower!
That's a pretty common site here in my neck of the sticks this time of year. I have met a few of those guys that do that for a living. They are some fearless fliers I'll tell ya what. Tween trees, under power lines, don't spray homesteads or livestock all while movin pretty fast.
Have a good buddy that did that for years in the Canadian prairies. Lots of power to weight ratio in those specially designed planes.
Was a local lad up here that had 3 Ag Cats. He was always neat to watch. Retired now, so no one else here doing it. Always figured that if you were a good bush pilot, you'd be a good duster as well.
We get an air show here quite often. They spray the bogs and blueberries. It's amazing to watch them fly. They drop in right over the trees and get within feet of the ground. I've got some awesome pics on the computer that I'll post once I get the internet fixed.
We have a family who has 3 planes and live not too far away and we see them often. We see them daily every spring too because the country hires them to spray a lot of the county for mosquitoes. So when they are doing that, they fly over us in the morning and then we see them going by again late afternoon. One day one of their planes was spraying a field of by brother-in-law's. I stopped to watch and then one of the neighborhood farmers also stopped. We chatted as we watched and as he was doing his last pass, we got into our cars to leave. I let the farmer go out first and suddenly I heard this plane...CLOSE! Then I had a rain of pellets come down on my car. Actually they were chopped up corn cobs they put chemical in. Really made a racket! I bet that guy was laughing all the way home.
I seriously opened this thread expecting a slightly different topic... But those agricultural aviators are pretty cool to watch
