Week Five
The Symphony is
Tuning Up
The week started out with one, and only one, very vital project:
‘temper the runway’! The runway
testing service was due to arrive on Thursday to document the load carrying
ability of the airfield. The plan had called for us to soak the runway heavily
on Tuesday and then a day later to use the big roller compactor to pack the
sandy soil to give a hard surface with good load carrying properties. Ever
concerned about possible mechanical delays, we watered earlier than planned
(Monday) and watered again on Tuesday to the tune of another 10,000 gallons.
The roller compacter had barely gotten started by 10:00 am on Wednesday
when a Cessna 310, in my opinion the most
beautiful airplane to come out of the 1950’s, buzzed us and entered the
circuit. Gord, Ray and Mike of CBR Air Services were arriving a whole day early, having cleared
their work early at nearby Kasba Lake.
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| Nearby Kasba Lake Lodge |
After introductions all around, our roller team went back to
work and by late-afternoon our airfield was rolled and inspected. We all
certified as VHF air radio operators and took brief courses so that we could
judge cloud height and were qualified to convey wind speed/direction and cloud
height to incoming aircraft.
Susan put on a great meal of baked trout and we talked, and
talked some more. We talked about aircraft and flying in the north, and about
resort caretakers being eaten by wolves, and about air accidents, including one
involving a DC-3 at our own resort when construction was first initiated.
We also talked about tundra reclamation and stabilization of
dirt runways. Gord shared contact information on both named subjects – and made
me promise to mention his name when following up on these leads. Gord shared
photos of wildlife and Mike showed me a picture of his daughter in company with
astronaut Chris Hadfield. Mike’s daughter, at the age of 14, is a Flight
Sergeant in Westjet Squadron, a new Air Cadet unit in Calgary. She is already
selected for a glider pilots flying scholarship, with her eye fixed on a power
flying scholarship follow-up. She sounds pretty motivated. Needless to say, Mike is a very proud dad.
Mike and Ray stayed
out in a skiff fishing until sunset – expressed another way – nearly until midnight.
After they flew out in the morning we all agreed that we are
looking forward to their return next year. Hit the highlighted flyoutmovie to see video
A week makes all the difference. We are still bringing
machines to life and performing needed maintenance, but we have already arrived
at the point where there is a piece of heavy equipment for everyone. It was
hard work, sometimes having to do something 2 or 3 times before the machine
being repaired was finally ‘just right’. As of today (Friday) we are a colony
of six heavy equipment operators and two dogs.
Susan is the most versatile of us all, driving a roller-compacter while
baking our next meal at the same time.
Gilbert and Ryan came out of the shop yesterday – with all
repair-jobs complete. Gilbert is working the loader as co-worker for Seemee on
the excavator. Ryan took over a
skid-steer loader and is separating old stumps from soil to be used
respectively for heat and landscaping. Beth is running the water truck for some
dust control and Susan is using the ride-on roller-compactor to keep the runway
smooth where there is a possibility that the traffic will make ruts. We have
adapted one of the skid steers to power our new crusher and it works fine.
With the pressure lifted a little bit, we had an easy
morning of getting the machinery started and then we each went off to a work
area and got busy. Most of the machines are engaged in landscaping and general
beautification, cleaning out old stumps and deadfalls in the wooded areas around
the lodge and the runway.
I was the only person not driving a piece of equipment today
(Friday) so I went to work on the crawler tractor treads. At mid-afternoon, I
took a break and sat with the shotgun on the runway – waiting for Mr
2:30, the largest of our black bear ‘herd’. Since his usual route would
take him right through the area where our people are at work, I figured that it
was time for a ‘bear-banger’ or two. Toque doesn’t stay around when
people are using the machines or chainsaws so we might not notice the bear
until he wanders among us.
Today Mr 2:30 was running a little late,
or perhaps he had another engagement. I gave up and went back to my dozer
project by 3:00.
However – I was able to give him a warm welcome on Saturday.
I gave the gang a day off on Saturday in anticipation of a
long workday on Sunday. With 3 separate deliveries coming in by deHaviland
Buffalo, we expect to be busy until midnight on Sunday, with the first flight
arriving in the afternoon. As usual on my day off, I spent the time fueling and
lubing chainsaws, replenishing grease guns and then greasing equipment, and
just generally getting things ready for another week.
I carried a few loads with the water truck, more to
troubleshoot an overheating problem than to prepare the runway for anything. It
was in one of those watering runs that I spotted Mr. 2:30 at the uphill
end of the runway, meandering across. And it was my good fortune to be driving
the loudest vehicle at the resort. I rev’d the engine and put the automatic shift
to 5th gear. I was probably
doing all of twenty-five miles per hour as I approached the bear, the big
diesel screaming.
I can see why bears are type-cast when they are caricatured
by cartoonists. This guy did a double take at the oncoming ‘thing’, and just
kept on perambulating across the runway for a few seconds before taking a good
long third look. I rev’d the engine for extra effect and...he dialed it up to a
trot...and then... a run! And unlike for shotguns fired over his head, he kept
running until he was out of site in the woods.
It was with a sense of accomplishment that I slowed and
carried on with spraying water on the dirt runway. Only five minutes later... there he was,
standing up with his arms at his sides watching me from behind some (too small)
bushes. He was genuinely curious about whether he should feel threatened. It
was time to reinforce the lesson, and so with the engine roaring at full revs I
crossed the runway and faced him down – making the engine growl, and then
making the note rise into a roar. He ran for it again – but this time he was
running through the woods toward the Lodge. Whoops!
For him to start using the Lodge as a place of refuge from
the threatening giant machine was not going to happen if I could change his
mind on this, so I went up to speed one more time and drove off the end of the
runway onto a service path which would bring me at him head-on as he reached
the front of the Lodge.
Or so I thought.
I parked in front of the Lodge, dominating the entire area
from the hilltop and I waited. The engine was growling and I would slowly raise
the RPM’s to make it sound ‘threatening’.
After a New York minute I realized that he must have changed direction
or be hiding, as I should be seeing him. With a mental shrug, I made my way
back to the runway on the narrow service path. As I passed the Lodge, I might
have heard Toque raising the bear alarm, had my engine been quieter. The
bear had hidden under the Solar Collectors. My first inkling that he was still
around was seeing the rising dust plumes from the Honda quads a few minutes
later. They were ridden by Beth, Ryan and Gilbert – all in hot pursuit of Mr.
2:30. Beth was honking at the bear with an air-can warning horn.
Mr. 2:30 just doesn’t get
it! He needs to be somewhere else. We will be making his life difficult until
he decides to leave. However, I suspect that, in reality, the bears are just
staying ‘a little bit’ out of our way – in the way that we people just avoid
our more obnoxious neighbours.
A day later and as we park the runway rollers, get forks on
the loaders and trailers behind a few ‘quads’, the Buffalo makes a low pass. We
have not stopped moving since 7:00 am. The Buffalo departed Resolute at 1:00
p.m. and made very good time to Baker Lake and then to us at Ennadai Lake. Hit the following to view video Daylight landing video
When
I looked into the cargo hold, I asked Chris (the pilot) if he was still
planning to make two separate fuel pickup trips to Stoney Rapids today. His
response was words to the effect: “ Why not?”
Two hours later at 7:00 pm, they took off carrying over a
hundred 45 gallon drums – their return ETA: 10:00 pm. They beat this by seven minutes, greasing it
onto the runway and stopping halfway along it at the road to the fuel dump,
obligingly turning so that they could roll the barrels right down the road for
us. They unloaded and used the remainder of the runway to take off – getting in
the air 13 minutes after touchdown for their second run to Stoney Rapids. If
this was not the BUG CAPITAL of planet Earth, I could solemnly declare that
there are “no flies on these Summit Air guys”.
Prior to takeoff, and just as they were closing the vehicle
access ramp at the aircrafts rear, Susan and Beth came zooming up the runway
with meals for the aircrew. As they flew into the sunset the guys dined on
Susan’s special recipe for honey-garlic ribs, three vegetables, fresh rolls,
coffee and sodas, and with ‘sex in a pan’ for desert.
Susan and I sat in the cab of the wheeled-loader to avoid
the bugs while awaiting their return at 1:00 am. We watched their ‘straight-in’
approach in what I always think of as a ‘bomber’ approach. In years gone by I
used to park when passing through Perth-Andover NB and watch the B-52’s and
F-106’s in the landing circuit for Loring AFB in Limestone, Maine. The bombers
seemed to be coming down a glide-path that extended all the way to the horizon,
while the interceptors/fighters would do a much closer landing circuit. This
led me to refer to those long final approaches as ‘bomber’ landings – when I
later took up flying. We watched the landing lights of this Buffalo coming out
of the South for what seemed like an eternity – although Chris subsequently
told me that they had only been on for the last seven miles.
Our video of their landing was quite blurry – probably as a
result of the brilliant landing lights coming toward us. The emergence of the
Buffalo from a huge cloud of dust is quite dramatic – even so. Video of the final rollout.
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