Nov 22nd.

This was the big event this week.  Hubby has been looking forward to this day for 14 years.  Yep, he started this the same year I started medical school.  He built an airplane, and this Wednesday, and 7:47 am, it took off and flew for the first time.  

He was in flight training in the 90's when I was in college, hoping for a career as a professional pilot.  Then I was accepted to a school out of state, he tried to find training there, but between having to work and weather part of the year that made flying difficult, he wasn't able to continue.  So he started building instead.  The first parts of the project were constructed in our living room.  (Random bit of information: TV remote control signals actually work better when bounced off aluminum airplane wings, even if the wings are suspended on the wall behind the viewer.  I suspect there's some scatter of the beam, so a greater chance of hitting the sensor on the TV.)

The project was put on hold for 4 years in residency, as we had no garage at our apartment.  By then he was up to the fuselage, and it would not fit in a living room.  Besides, we both had commutes of about an hour, which didn't leave much time for fun.  But as soon as we moved to a larger, grownup home with a garage, he started up again.  The plane has moved twice since then.  The first move was to our house, where it occupied half the garage for a couple of years.  Then when the wings went on, it was too big for the garage, so moved to a hangar at the airport.

Last year, he went to Montana to meet with the builders of his instrument panel.  Earlier this year, he spent several days in Texas assembling his own engine.  (Under the supervision of the factory engineers, of course.)  The last couple of weeks he's spent testing instruments, engine, brakes, etc.  Last Saturday it was inspected and found 'capable of safe flight'.  (No experimental aircraft is ever 'airworthy'.  But experimental does not mean unproven.  There are thousands of planes of this design flying throughout the world.)  And everything came together on Wednesday.

I confess, I haven't always been supportive of his project.  It's cost lots of money, which I would rather have put toward debt reduction or retirement.  It's taken up room in our apartment or garage.  He's missed social events in order to work on the plane.  (Heck, this weekend we're going to see 'The Mikado' out of town, and making a one day trip instead of an overnighter so he can stay here and keep playing with it.  That means I miss my chance at visiting a yarn store.)

But this week, I'm so proud of him.  And I'm excited that now he has an airplane, so trips to mid-range destinations will be easier to make.  (Taos Wool Festival, anyone?)

I've read a couple of blogs this week which mentioned trouble with Typepad.  So I'm going to claim less than full credit for some of the formatting here.  I first attempted to post a short video clip of the the plane taking off, but Typepad wouldn't recognize it.  So I deleted it, and posted a still photo instead.  It took 2 tries, and each time it moved down a paragraph, and all the text above it was underlined.  I couldn't get it to un-underline, and don't have the time or patience to re-type it all, so it will post as it is.

Comments

[Laurie]

*very impressed* with your husband's work. And yeah, your example is another way Typepad doesn't play nice.