Thank you all for your supportive messages regarding the
plan to fly N81EU around the world - an adventure I label
*Orbit*.
I'd like to give you updates as the departure approaches:
N81EU was flown to Cranfield last weekend - arriving after
the show was over but not too late to take a picture aside
the RV of Jon Jonson of Australia who appears to fly around
the world like other people do their grocery shopping.
After a short stay I flew up to Tatenhill, Graham Singleton's
home-airport. The first part of that flight was in
formation with the company demonstrator piloted by Andy
Draper. After a while he pushed his throttle a little further
and showed me what a 914 powered XS is capable of doing...
It was an honour to spend an evening with Graham, his partner
Joan and his friend David before flying to Wombleton to
meet Andy Draper once more.
I feel better now as the pro's have looked the plane over.
Rotax Germany has agreed to check the engine before departure,
too. We'll do this next week after German "Cranfield", which
will take place on June 30 ~ July 2 in Hildesheim. See
http://www.ouv.de
for more info - and please come in great numbers !
As to *Orbit* some people have asked why I want to spend
winter in Mongolia. The outset for this flight was that
I am going to be posted as the Consul of the German Embassy
to Ulan Bator by end of August. Soon the idea came up to
fly the plane there - and then the idea to do so the wrong
way around which would bring us right into Oshkosh during
AirVenture 2ooo. Thus the trip basically ends in Mongolia
where N81EU will be based for the next 5 years. All I have to
do is to fly her home to Germany during vacation of 2oo1 to
complete *Orbit*.
For us homebuilders this is nothing new - to create something
impressive by many small steps. None of the legs I'll have to
fly will be anything strange. Short hops as the machine and
weather permit. But all together it will be *Orbit". We make
layups and do our sanding for years - until one day the
dream comes true.
I haven't been able to find a network of Ham operators and
Internet gurus who would be able to setup realtime tracking of
the flight. I'll thus work with daily updates - kind of a
diary of the flight.
Take a look at my website
http://www.thomas.scherer.com
it has been updated. Under "gallery4" I have images of Andy
flying in formation and of a wooden Europa - a picture I
took in the workshop of Graham Singleton...
Sincerely,
<Thoma, N81EU>
|