Missed a Kodak moment

On Saturday a plane was spraying the cornfield just north of my shop. The big door to my shop is facing south and when I heard the big whoosh of the plane coming up over the shop from the north I kept looking out the door to watch it bank and come back. When it was coming out of it's turn and coming back it was at a 45 degree angle and coming right at the shop door. Then it straightened out, just missed the shop roof and swooped down on the corn behind the shop. If he wouldn't have pulled up from the dive I wouldn't be making this post. The WW2 army vehicle in my shop (almost done!!) would have been dive bombed 66 years too late!.
Wish I would have had the camera! Jim

The planes from the Minot and Grand Forks (ND) AFB's used to use our area as a practice bombing and targeting range.

I've had a fighter plane do about the same thing over my shop as I stood in the doorway, and can tell you B-52's practicing low-level bombing runs can scare the $&@^ out of you when you re on a piece of noisy farm machinery and they approach from the rear!

I love watching spray planes fly. Years ago I was in to amateur photography, had 3 different 35mm SLR cameras with all the fancy lenses and such. A friend of mine was a ag pilot and I followed him around several weeks in a row taking pics while he worked. Got some pretty amazing shots.

Last year I had beans sprayed for aphids by an aerial applicator. Our 90 foot silo is about 100 feet from the field- amazing how he could pull up quickly enough!

Yes those B52's are massive! Quite a sound and sound . They used to fly by my uncles farm in ND also. Scared the heck outta 100,000 or so turkeys he raised . Took several phone calls to get them to change route . Think someone up there actually shot at one if I recall.

The pilots who fly those crop spraying planes sure need to be alert, glad your shop is still standing, and with you in it. During WW2 I was too little to remember, but my brother told me a plane flew so low over our farm, he found ground up tree leaves where one plane must have flown through the tree top. I do remember during the Korean war my brother and my self were skyinny dipping in one of our dams, and a plane flew very low to check us out. The pilot probably thought we might be girls, no luck. Stan

A guy shot holes in them, near Springfield Ohio, in the early 1960's, his farm was on the landing path, and made lots of noise, scared his high priced cattle. He even painted 'Rest Home' on his roof, made no difference. He used my step dad's Winchester 94, 30/30 to do this with. He told dad that he wanted it to shoot ground hogs with, ha ha. We lived on his other farm, back the same long driveway. He was a vice president, of Robbins & Meyers, in Springfield at THAT time.

Good thing is, he never hit a human, in one of those B-52's. Bad thing was, he was hitting every plane he shot at, since they wasn't more than 2000 feet up, if that. I remember coming home from school, and getting off of the bus, walking up the drive, and when I got to our farm, the driveway had more black cars in it than I could count. The FBI, and whoever else, was there, and had him arrested. He really had some problems to deal with, and did almost 0 amount of jail time, mostly physciatrical evaluations. He was allowed a bow and arrow, and cross bows only, for the rest of his life. The last time I had seen him, he was working on a high powered cross bow.

The funny thing is, in 1973, I went into the U.S.Air Force, and became a Crew Chief, on B-52's, and KC-135 airplanes, and ended up at Wright Patterson, I could fly over that farm anytime I wanted then, but never looked.

Jim: There are a few videos on the internet of spray planes in action. A few are from inside or attached to the aircraft. Video is different from what the pilot sees and plans on doing. He 'knows' the moment for action and the person watching video is 'waiting' for action. There is a difference in time between those two. The person watching is normally 'behind' the action. It might be similar to a batter and pitcher in baseball. Some batters don't even see the ball in time to swing the bat but the pitcher knew when he let go of the ball and how fast it was going to be, compared to the batter. It takes a long while for batters to catch up... Great batters and agpilots need fast eyes and quick reflex actions. (yes there is a difference is speed of eyes in seeing. My eye doctor told me mine were fast. Flicker on CRT monitore was always a problem unless I used 70+HZ) Birds/animals of prey normally have faster eyes then the prey they are going to catch and eat. Ask any Hawk .. ag

We had fighter jets scaring the bejeepers out of us during the sixties, but never anything bigger than that. Yes, it does give you a rise when you're daydreaming away driving your cabless tractor (what else was there in the sixties) and that deafening roaring big bird goes over you from behind. A B52 must have been a real sight (and sound).

We have a creek going right past our place. Back sometime in the 70's we were sorting cattle when a fighter jet came low from the west following the creek that was about 75 feet from the cattle yard. The cattle spooked, one of them turned ornery and chased us over the fence. Dad was not a happy camper! Jim

I pretty well trusted the pilot and I know planes like that are inspected more often, but it was a great sight nonetheless.

Speaking of eyes, One year in Idaho I was loafing around by a farm's landing strip when a spray plane landed. I sauntered over to chat with the pilot and the first thing I noticed was his piercing eyes. Second thing I noticed was his calm demeaner. Jim

My dad told of buzzing the tobacco fields when he was flying C-47s during WWII. They'd drop their paratroops (trainig) then make low passes over farmland on their way back to the airfield.

Crop dusters - the rodeo clowns of the sky.

B-58 Hustlers flying out of Bunker Hill AFB in the 1950"s over Indiana, Illinois, and Ohio used to do low altitude Mach 1+ penetrations on simulated targets in those areas. Upset so many people that USAF set up damage claims procedure for those with broken windows and scared milk cows.

I had one do that on Saturday. I was on a 2 lane highway and saw him coming across the field toward the road. He didn't clear the cab of my pickup by much. If I'd a had a camera, the caption could have been 'duck!', or "air raid!". I got a real close up look at the prop of that plane. Crop dusting must be a pretty fun job for the pilot.

we are lucky--when we have a fire around here the local cropdusters come in and drop water...very handy to have. especially if you are the one fighting the fire.

I had a couple of A-10's fly over my house this spring, couldn't been much more that 1500 feet up. That's REALLY low for this area, there's no airport near that they'd be flying in or out of. And I don't know of any A-10's based in Ohio.

Even if you had the camera, you might of had trouble trying to get a good picture. We get fly overs on a regular basis, and I have ended up with more pictures of sky and no plane than you can imagine. Back in May I managed to get a handful of shots while they were spraying the sorghum behind us. These 2 shots came out pretty good, and they were both taken out the bedroom window of all places!
When this pilot is clear of the house, he flies under the power lines out front. Must have bigger ones than I do!

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For the past two weeks or so, I have seen planes crop dusting nearly every day. Used to be common, but the past few years not so much. Wondering if the extremely wet spring and early summer we had is the cause for the increase, and maybe aircraft are the only way to put on chemicals for the crops? I do know that the pilot comes a lot closer to the high line wires than I would be comfortable doing!

Many years ago, maybe 1960, a crop duster hit some power lines a couple miles from our house. We went down to look at the wreck. Looked like the wheels caught the line and he went head first into the ground and the plane fliped upside down. It was an old biplane and the wheels did not retract. They had already taken the dead pilot. Sad thing to happen.

(quoted from post at 08:08:51 08/01/11) The planes from the Minot and Grand Forks (ND) AFB's used to use our area as a practice bombing and targeting range.

I've had a fighter plane do about the same thing over my shop as I stood in the doorway, and can tell you B-52's practicing low-level bombing runs can scare the $&@^ out of you when you re on a piece of noisy farm machinery and they approach from the rear!

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Year after we moved on to the farm about 160 miles SSE of Grand Forks AB they were doing low level training in our area. Don't know what thier "target" was but they few B52s directly over our house. When flying that low I understand that they are at wide open incase something happens like wind shear or an engine failure.....the noise was unbelievable!

On another note myself and another Staff Sergeant were at Ramstein AB in Germany as liaison uploading an infantry BN. When leaving the AF messhall on our last day we came around a corner and almost ran over a young female AF officer. She jumped us right away about saluting officers. Doug right away told her "Ma'am, we are combat arms and are not required to salute female officers".....she says OK and moves on. I was very glad we left that day cause I can still she her that nite in the O club telling her fellow LT's that and being laughed at and told we had lied to her.......I'm betting she stormed arounf the AB for several days just looking for us!

Rick

Don't ask don't tell; maybe he liked boys ?