Fly Me Day 2012

Whilst we wait for the many pictures and other comments to roll in from today, I just want to kick off this new sub-section of our Blogspot.

Fly Me Day has become an important part of our interaction with our communities and part of the dissemination of safety and health messages. This years Fly Me Day was, in my opinion, the best one ever!

We focused on the Queen Mother's in about 20 communities, and added a couple of Schools (one local and one from Techiman) - surprisingly we got a 100% (plus some uninvited) turn out. It was a amazing. All had done their paperwork and flights went smoothly until the heavens opened. Although we were unable to fly all participants before the weather broke, we did do more than ever before.

The faces tell the stories - and it was a very special day....

My favourite question was 'What is the name of this airplane?' (meaning which one was it....) and when I replied 'Alpha Foxtrot', the little mite next to me repeated it about ten times. Other interactions made me smile, such as

ME: 'Who brought you to the airfield today?'

14year old young lady: 'My Queen!'

WOW, what a proud girl.

But I will admit to being remarkably proud of the Queen Mothers, for they decided to NOT take their flights before their children had all gone through.... and then when the weather broke did not even whimper a complaint. Furthermore, they interacted wonderfully with their wards - supporting, encouraging and cheering - not mention waving like a windmill in a gale at their kids in the planes... These are special women and they are fantastic to work alongside.

WE only had two 'code six' moments. A Code six means 'My passenger is not doing well - I NEED TO BREAK FORMATION AND LAND NOW.'

Mine was first. I was the fourth aircraft in the line-up to take off. On this particular run the wake turbulence seemed to hang around and add itself up just as I reached 20ft off the ground. I corrected quickly, but it was rough. I thought it could be overlooked, but the shivering frame next to me, was clearly not happy. At 300' I had the legs moving a lot and tears, tremors and a Vulcan death grip on my right (stick controlling) arm. Melissa had just turned downwind in AE, Patrick was cross-wind in AC and Patricia was only a few hundred feet ahead of me on climb-out.

I called 'Code 6, Code 6, Code 6. AF needs to cut short and land first. Holding the height at 300' I tried to calm the eyes clamped closed form next to me. With full power I managed to get ahead and turn abeam the numbers to touchdown, roll out and clear the area without creating any noticeable disruption to the event....

Patricia will write about hers (which was a bit more exciting!)

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