Lex Anteinternet: Poster Saturday: For Our Aviators
Saturday, September 9, 2017
Sunday, September 3, 2017
Lex Anteinternet: The CST goes into the Sunday before Labor Day with a barrel of economic news
Only the third item in this longer item is relevant to this site, but it is relevant. So we're posing that section here.
Lex Anteinternet: The CST goes into the Sunday before Labor Day with a barrel of economic news
3. Wyoming to subsidize air travel?
That isn't going to work, actually. Regional air travel is limited here as its not economic. Chuck feels the solution is to attract Southwestern which. . .isn't going to happen.
Lex Anteinternet: The CST goes into the Sunday before Labor Day with a barrel of economic news
3. Wyoming to subsidize air travel?
"The air liner "Hannibal" on the Alexandria aerodome"
In a really surprising story the Wyoming Department of Transportation is advancing a plan to contract with air carriers in Wyoming the same way that airlines do with regional carriers., this story coming in the wake of Allegiant saying "Tally Ho!" to Casper. That is, basically, they'll buy any seats the regionals don't fill. It's an ambitious and surprising plan. It basically accepts the reality of the situation, that being that Wyoming is too small of market, in the modern world, to support much air travel. Casper has what little there is, and even its services are being reduced. Part of this is fueled, as the paper notes, by a new regulatory requirement that pilots for commercial carriers have a much increased number of hours in order to take that job. This has resulted in a pilot shortage, which was coming on anyhow, and it's also meant that its more expensive to operate in the small venues. A law of unintended consequences thing, sort of.
This plan would have to get past the legislature, of course, and I'm somewhat skeptical that in the current political environment that will occur. The paper interviewed Chuck Grey with the nearly predictable result of Grey, who is a far right conservative fellow traveler with the Wyoming Liberty Group, not being keen on the idea. The surprising part of that was that Grey wasn't as hostile to the idea as I would have expected, even though he doesn't support it. Grey told the Trib; "We need to continue to look at the current situation and purse competition".
That isn't going to work, actually. Regional air travel is limited here as its not economic. Chuck feels the solution is to attract Southwestern which. . .isn't going to happen.
I can see the opposition to this plan and what it will entail already. "Socialism!" But the fact of the matter is that the American transportation infrastructure is already government supported, with the except of the railroads. The poor railroads have to make it on their own for some reason but this isn't true of other things. American highways and streets are not, after all, privately owned. When you drive into your subdivision you likely don't pay a toll to the homeowners association, and there isn't a Wyoming State Turnpike Company that owns the highways. Nope, all subsidized. Indeed, we're so used to this that we don't even consider the inequities in the funding of highways. Looked at that way WYDOT's plan is really farsighted. The lack of intrastate air travel has long been known to be something that hurts Wyoming's economy. The airports are barely making as it is. Some, like Natrona County's, are real gems. What WYDOT is proposing isn't really any more radical than what the state and the towns are already doing with wheeled transportation.
Friday, September 1, 2017
Lex Anteinternet: Airport flaps and the law of unintended consequences. Parking should be free? No, it shouldn't, and it actually isn't.
Airport flaps and the law of unintended consequences. Parking should be free? No, it shouldn't, and it actually isn't.
Flying back from Tulsa, Oklahoma.
A trip which entails going from Tulsa to Denver (cheaply) and then from
Denver to Casper (expensively). Parking while you are in Tulsa is
hardly going to be a significant element of your costs.
You must pay for everything in this world one way and another. There is nothing free except the Grace of God. You cannot earn that or deserve it.
Maddie Ross in True Grit (written by Charles Portis)
I sometimes get the feeling recently that the Star Tribune is looking
for something to do. It probably needs something to do as its paper
declines to the size of a large pamphlet and its reduced to running
columns from the national syndicates.
Maybe not, but it's hard to look at the story on airport parking at the Natrona County International Airport as a real story. Or at least its hard to get all worked up about it. But I suppose its a legitimate story.
Here's the deal.
The airport is putting in some new parking, but it isn't in yet. It
won't be, maybe, for a long time, as its part of the airport's strategic
plan, not a present project.
Big deal, you might say.
Well, it sort of is, maybe, in that there's a Wyoming state law that provides:
For public convenience, commissioners or boards having jurisdiction to regulate parking of vehicles shall provide free parking areas adequate to accommodate at least twenty percent of the number of vehicle parking spaces for which a fee is charged.
That's nice, eh?
Well, it is. And it was a law that was backed by former Natrona County Democratic legislator, Dick Sadler.
So, what's the deal, you may ask?
Well, the free parking is 1.5 miles distant from the terminal. Quite a
ways. Probably nobody is going to park there. At least not very many
people, and not very often.
The tribune, alerted to this (it seems to have come up in recent airport
board meetings), interviewed Natrona County Airport Board president Joe
MacGuire on this. MacGuire, who holds a pilots license (and whose
father once kept a really neat A26 Invader out at the airport), is also a
Republican state representative from Natrona County. He tends to be
blunt. So, he told the Tribune that he knew it was a long ways away and
admitted that its unlikely to be used. He even stated , about the
law;“It was kind of added in there at the
very end and wasn’t even placed in a part of the statute that directly
deals with parking, Honestly, it’s kind of an unfunded mandate"
You know, it is an unfunded mandate.
Now, this is just the sort of thing that's fun for some people to get
their back's arched up about. Dick Sadler, the former legislator who
often focused on Democratic populist type things while in the
legislature has been working on this, apparently, out at the Airport and
stated about the situation; "I passed that law and they hate my guts
for it."
M'eh.
I very much doubt that.
But some folks are mad. One friend of mine with far left political
leanings commented "It's always obnoxious when rich people like MacGuire
are quoted saying
shit like, 'I wish everything at the airport was free.' I'm sure he's
not really that much of a tool."
MacGuire did say that, in the interview, but maybe he just deserves credit for being honest.
Consider the following. The airport is only within $33,000 of going
into the red. That's really tight. According to MacGuire the free
parking at the airport costs the airport $165,000. That makes quite a
difference.
And now we learn, on top of it, that Allegiant Air is pulling out of
Casper, and that will cost the airport $26,000. With that loss, that
$33,000 in the black becomes only $7,000.
That's really tight.
And as the airport manager noted, that's just the direct costs to the
airport, not the ancillary loss, and that's likely to occur. So that
$26,000 direct loss is likely to become a bigger loss. Indeed, it
almost certainly will. Quite a few of those Allegiant travelers would
have, well, parked at the airport while they were in Los Vegas (which is
where Allegiant flew to from here). That's a loss. So, we can
probably say that bare minimum, at least right now, the airport has
probably less than a $5,000 margin, post Allegiant, before it goes into
the red.
And while "free parking" is just the sort of "looking out for the
average man" type of program that folks like to get behind, in this
case, it makes darned little sense in general.
Indeed, the common thesis behind such things is that this protects the
interest of the little guy. That would presuppose, in this instance,
that the little guy is able to afford a ticket, set by the airlines not
the airport, to fly out of Casper. Most Casperites can in fact afford
to fly out of here, but its so expensive that many, including most
experienced travelers, actually choose to drive to Denver and catch a
plane from there. The most expensive leg of air travel in and out of
Casper is the flight to Denver or Salt Lake City.
Indeed, generally if you do that (and maybe you have to), you then park
your car in a public lot that's so far from the actual Denver terminal
that its located just outside of Dallas, Texas. Or at least it feels
that way. And you catch a bus from there to the airport terminal.
All of which makes the "free parking" at the Natrona County
International Airport more than a little bit absurd. You can shave off a
little of the costs of prolonged parking, sure, but not much. And any
free parking is always going to be second best and always, therefore,
going to entail an added element of risk for whatever you left there.
All this means that the thought was nice, but extremely unrealistic.
The view from Salt Lake City's airport. Like a lot of business travelers, I go to both airports a great deal.
The entire airport is a legacy of the Second World War. It was the
third airport in the county, replacing a second that is now the Town of
Bar Nunn. There's no earthly way that Bar Nunn airport, which wasn't
even completely flat, could serve the needs of the county today. Not
even close. It was likely barely adequate at the time it closed. The Natrona County International Airport
was built as a training airbase for B-24s and B-17s during World War
Two, on a much flatter piece of ground, and the runways are numerous and
enormous. Beyond that, probably a majority of the hangers date to the
Second World War and are gigantic. The airport complex it self features
numerous buildings that date from the original airbase as well. It's a
huge, and great, airport. Probably the closest thing to it in the state
is Cheyenne's municipal airport, once a major stop for transcontinental
air mail runs, but it's a shadow of what Casper's airport is.*
The airport receives quite a bit of international traffic, given its
great facilities. If kept up, and they're trying, it'll continue to.
Better yet, if the retired runways could be put back in use it would be
fantastic, but there's no money to do that.**
British Antarctic Survey airplane at the Natrona County International Airport. This is a common site at our airport. Surprisingly, they did not fly here from the UK for the free parking. Go figure.
Which takes us back to parking. The airport's master plan is to put in
new parking near the terminal, and it will include public parking, so
that will solve the problem.
But it won't solve the short funding problem.
And, everything that legislators mandate must be "free", no matter what
it is, in the end, isn't. It's a reverse tax of some sort, or it just
becomes a public impossibility. Free health care, free college, free
highways, whatever, aren't really free. When there are few public
"frees" its easy to appreciate that, when there are thousands of such
mandates, however, they cease to be.
Which doesn't mean that they aren't worthwhile. Some are. Some are
not. One like this, in its intent, is perfectly understandable.
But it isn't free.
__________________________________________________________________________________
*Indeed I'll note here that the location of the Wyoming Air National
Guard's infrastructure at the Cheyenne airport is somewhat unfortunate.
The Natrona County International Airport was built by the United States
Army Air Corps and it has everything, including size and an out of town
location, that an airbase needs. Cheyenne's airport is surrounded by
the town, on the other hand (you can circumnavigate the darned thing by
car) and is smaller. In terms of placement it wouldn't matter whether
the Guard's airbase was in Casper or Cheyenne and the only reason I can
think of it being in Cheyenne is that its close to F. E. Warren Air
Force Base, which is also in Cheyenne. But F. E. Warren houses missile
wings and nothing else, and doesn't have a large air strip itself. The
aircraft at F. E. Warren are helicopters.
Maybe this is something that Natrona County should ponder, although over
the years some super huge hangers have been built for the Air Guard in
Cheyenne and it is, no doubt, too darned late now.
**Military traffic. . . is anyone listening?
Thursday, August 31, 2017
North American T-6 Texan, Natrona County International Airport
I think that this North American T-6 Texan has been featured here before, but it was out the other day which gave a good opportunity to photograph it again.
This beautiful T-6 Texan was the racing plane of the late Jim Good of Casper.
Thursday, August 24, 2017
Radu Manicatide IAR-823, Natrona County International Airport
This is a Radu Manicatide IAR-823, a Romanian trainer of which only 78 were ever made. This example flew into the Natrona County International Airport for the 2017 Solar Eclipse.
Wednesday, August 23, 2017
Embraer EMB-312 Tucano, Armée de l’Air (French Air Force). Natrona County International Airport
This is a Brazilian made EMB-312 surplus from the Armée de l’Air, i.e., the French Air Force. While these are primarily used as trainers, some countries use this airplane as a ground attack plane, which the USAF considered doing.
Tuesday, August 22, 2017
Maybe Berlin Airlift Rates were achieved.
Light private aircraft parked on unused runway at the Natrona County International Airport. This part of the tarmac was used just for small private aircraft. Another was used for private jets.
They came in, and then they left again.
Hundreds of private aircraft, arriving in time to see the August 21 solar eclipse, stacked up waiting to land and landing one right after another all morning long, and then taking off right after that.
The airport has likely never seen anything like this take off and landing rate. . . at least not since World War Two.
Monday, August 21, 2017
Lex Anteinternet: Berlin Air Lift Rates?
Lex Anteinternet: Berlin Air Lift Rates:
One plane every minute.
Will that actually occur?
One plane every minute.
C-54 during the Berlin Air Lift
That was the highest rate achieved for the Berlin Air Lift in 1949.
Today, for the eclipse, the rate is predicted to be one plane every two minutes.
Sunday, August 20, 2017
Lex Anteinternet: Changing times. The centennial of the 94th Aero Squadron. August 20, 1917-2017
Lex Anteinternet: Changing times. The centennial of the 94th Aero Squadron. August 20, 1917-2017.
Pilots of the 94th, including 1LT Reed Chambers, Capt James Meissner, 1LT Eddie Rickenbacker, 1LT T C Taylor and 1LT J H Eastman, in France with a Spad XVIII.
While this blog, now that the Punitive Expedition has concluded, no longer does that many daily anniversaries (save for photographs) here's one worth noting.
On this date, in 1917, the 94th Aero Squadron, the Hat In The Ring Squadron, was formed at Kelly Airfield in San Antonio, Texas. The squadron, now the 94th Fighter Squadron, is the second oldest formation in the United States Air Force. The unit chose a red, white and blue top hat going through a ring as its symbol, signifying the Uncle Sam throwing his "hat in the ring" of World War One. That is, the unit symbol commemorated the United States' decision to enter the war.
The way it was at first, Curtis Jennys being used in training at Kelly Air Field.
The unit being formed might not seem particularly remarkable, but the U.S. Army. . . and all aircraft were in the Army at the time (prior to the war they were in the Signal Corps and the official establishment of a separate Air Force was decades and one major war away) had only had one single squadron, all equipped with the already obsolescent JN4, just months prior to that. As we've seen on this site before, that unit, the 1st Aero Squadron, would cut its teeth and prove its worth in Punitive Expedition of 1916, at which those Jennys constantly operated at the upper limit of their service ceiling, showing just how inadequate they really were. Now, the Army was rapidly expanding its air arm.
The 94th in fact would make the crossing to France in October and November. In France training continued and the unit was equipped with
Nieuport 28s.
Nieuport 28s.
Eddie Rickenbacker, a pre war automobile racer, with a Nieuport 28. Rickenbacker transferred into the unit in France. He actually got into the unit by making a deal with a commanding officer for whom he was a driver, concerning an on the spot emergency repair of an automobile.
It would first see action on April 14, 1918. It would go on from there to have a famous combat record and, of course, served to give the US some of its first pilot heroes. While in France it would under go a degree of consolidation with the 103th Aero Squadron, although that unit would remain a a separate unit throughout the war.
Pilots of the 94th, November, 1918.
The unit continued to serve in post war Europe up until the spring of 1919, and then was returned to the United States and demobilized in June 1919 but the unit shortly continued on as a regular Army aviation unit, changing its designation to the 94th Pursuit Squadron in July 1923. At that time, the 103d was folded into it so that the ongoing 94th would retain both units' lineages. The unit received constant aircraft upgrades prior to World War Two, which was a feature of all air forces at the time as aviation was progressing at a blistering pace. Prior to World War Two the unit was equipped with P-38 Lightnings.
German aircraft shot down by Capt. E. Rickenbackerand Lt. Reed Chambers, 94th Aero Squadron, Oct. 2. 1918.
As with all other fighter squadrons in the United States Army Air Corps, the unit was re designated as a fighter squadron in 1942, during which time it served in North Africa and then later in the Mediterranean and Southern Europe, flying out of Italy. The unit was one of the very first to receive what would become P80s, actually receiving the jets in April, 1945, and flying two missions (without encountering German aircraft) with them prior to the war's end.
It continues on in its existence to this very day, making it one of the oldest formations in the United States Air Force. It's currently equipped with F22 Raptors.
F22s of the 94th Fighter Squadron.
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