Date posted: April 23, 2010

– Download Stuck… Stuck… STUCK! as PDF –

So, we did a little indoor flying, and once again I come up with a novel way to crash or stick my flying wing someplace it shouldn’t be.  Thankfully I had Pop’s Rescue Service available.

Since we often have weather related issues here in Omaha, from thunderstorms to wind, we try to fly indoors when possible. This also serves as a good lunch break for me, and since it’s almost between Pops and myself in location, it’s an easy place to meet up.

I speak of course of the Center, known as The Omaha Sports Complex. Most of the days we’re able to fly in there with little else going on the indoor soccer fields just because it’s during the work day.

Unfortunately, indoor flying just isn’t the same as outdoor flying, and each has advantages and disadvantages. With indoor flying, we don’t have to worry about weather at all, which is great, since wind… well, blows. By taking our combat delta wing flyers inside, we can practice some more and clearly… we need it, due to an inherent disadvantage to indoor flying – ceilings. There are also guide wires at the center which I’ve also developed quite a knack in finding when I least expect it.

So, flying along, I’m getting a bit high up there, and tada… Stuck. I was starting to stall near the ceiling, so my control surfaces were offering little help. In hindsight, I should have killed the throttle. The result is a combat flyer stuck in the rafters:

A stuck combat flyer!

I apologize for the lack of clarity with these photos… Just another reason I need to bring a video camera and real camera every single time I get behind the sticks. First thing I did was kill the throttle of course, and then switch back to high rates, so I had maximum wiggle action in efforts to loosen this foam morsel from the rafter’s teeth.

Alas, wiggle wiggle, wiggly wobbly, and wobbly wiggles weren’t enough. The prop was wedged. Thankfully, they had plastic rings for either some unknown sport of baby-hool-a-hooping or for marking areas of the floor during indoor soccer games and practice.

Pops gives me his delta flyer to hold on to (this moment also commemorates our first at-field epoxy repair, hence why I’m holding a flyer literally ‘together’), while he throws a ring up towards the rafters.

No joy.

Another ring.

Less joy.

Another… Another… Then, five rings at once… Less joy than before, and if you’re counting, we’re well into ‘negative-joy-zone’. Nevertheless, we’re laughing quite often while this is going on.

Finally, after taking just two rings at once, the magic happens, and the delta flyer is dislodged:

Pop's Rescue Service to the… Rescue!

Thanks to Pop’s Rescue Service, I have a combat flyer back, with no damage whatsoever… until we continued to fly after the fact and crashed it some more, but that, as they say in Conan, is another story.