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"Maintain
thy airspeed, lest the Earth rise up and smite thee!"
Self portrait
taken 10,000 ft. MSL over southern Virginia
enroute from Washington, D.C. to Kissimmee, Florida, May 2002.
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and
swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high unsurpassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.
High Flight was composed by Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee, Jr., an American serving with the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was born in Shanghai, China in 1922, the son of missionary parents, Reverend and Mrs. John Gillespie Magee; his father was an American and his mother was originally a British citizen.
He came to the U.S. in 1939 and earned a scholarship to Yale, but in September 1940 he enlisted in the RCAF and was graduated as a pilot. He was sent to England for combat duty in July 1941.
In August or September 1941, Pilot Officer Magee composed High Flight and sent a copy to his parents. Several months later, on December 11, 1941 his Spitfire collided with another plane over England and Magee, only 19 years of age, crashed to his death.
His remains are buried in the churchyard cemetery at Scopwick, Lincolnshire.
Why I Fly
by Stephen Coonts
Every pilot has his
favorite time and place to fly. The urge grips me hardest on dead-still,
cloudless Colorado mornings as the sun creeps up over the earth's rim.
Standing on my deck, surveying the crest of the Rockies, listening to the
meadowlarks, I know how it will be. As the rising sun warms my face I think
about how the airplane will smell and feel as I preflight it. The cockpit will
be just so as I settle into it-- every familiar dial and gauge will be ready
to tell me its tidbit, every knob will welcome my fingertips, and the stick
and throttle will fit naturally into my hands as I grasp them. And I know how
the airplane will feel as her wings bite into this still, calm air. Inside, I
go for a quick shower and shave, then head out to the airport.
The
hangar door squeaks as the door rises, this in spite of the grease and oil I
have squirted liberally over time in vain attempts to cure that squeak. The
door rises slowly, majestically, to the whap, whap, whap of the roller and the
pleasantly protesting, squeaking bearing.
The rising door admits
the sunlight, still at a deliciously low angle, into the dark, cavernous bay
where my airplane awaits. She is a 1942 Stearman, a brute of a biplane that
once trained military flight students, then spent more than 30 years spraying
crops, and now, in the fullness of her age, takes me and my friends joy-riding
on pristine mornings like this one. She wears a 300-horsepower engine and
bright yellow paint.
This
Stearman is not the first airplane I have been smitten by. She is just my
current flame. I have been panting over flying machines on and off since 1968.
Alas, money fuels my passion. Right now I am flush enough to finance a
Stearman affair, but historically my bank balance has waxed and waned. Who
knows, my next winged mistress may be an old Cessna-- another one, because I
have danced with that girl before. Gigolo that I am, I will love her just as
much. Pushing
the Stearman from the shadows into the sunlight is always a satisfying ritual.
The sunlight shrieks when it hits the yellow fabric. I
circle the airplane several times, looking at this, prodding that, checking
the oil, checking the fuel, checking the air in the tires, looking for leaking
brake fluid. Just often enough to keep me interested I find something amiss,
although the problems are rarely significant enough to delay my departure. Because
I am picky, I add a little oil to the crankcase. This chore inevitably allows
me to get oil on my hands and gives me a tiny mess to wipe with a rag. Because
I have the rag out, I wipe at this and wipe at that, scrape some bug carcasses
off the wing leading edge with my fingernail, and finger this and that in an
unorganized, unhurried way. The
magic of aviation is that this 51-year-old contraption of metal, wood, fabric,
paint, wire, and rubber will actually fly. I have seen this miracle occur
often enough to have faith that it will occur again, when I will it, in just a
few more minutes. Yet the predictability of this does not lessen the wonder
for me. So now, I amble along with my rag, touching fabric and struts and
wheels, running my fingers along the leading edge of the prop, looking and
feeling and savoring. Finally,
I am ready. The still, clear air is waiting. The
Stearman comes to life with a chug and a growl and a chuff of smoke. The
round, nine-cylinder Lycoming engine settles into a rocking idle. The
laminated hickory joy stick is cool and hard to my touch as I waggle it. Sure
enough, the ailerons and elevator respond predictably to my inputs. I crane my
neck and watch the rudder as I push right and then left on the pedals. After
nudging the mixture knob up a trifle, I add some throttle and the big yellow
biplane begins to roll. Out
in front the prop is a mere blur, barely detectable with the naked eye, yet
the breeze it produces swirls back over the cockpit and caresses my exposed
cheeks and neck. It plays daintily with my shirt while the early morning sun
casts strong shadows on the gray instrument panel, on the yellow wings, and on
the gray asphalt as the airplane taxis toward the runway. In
the runup area, I sit in the cockpit looking at each dial and gauge in turn,
listening to the engine, surveying the limp windsock and the empty blue sky
above as the engine oil warms. To the west, the peaks of the Rockies are
washed-out pastels embedded in a thin trace of haze. High overhead in the blue
are contrails, perhaps airliners on the morning run to Los Angeles and San
Francisco or maybe Air Force tankers on their way to a rendezvous or bombers
on a practice mission. The airplanes at the end of the contrails are tiny
silver specks, too high to be identified. Soon
the engine is ready. I run her up to 1,600 rpm and check the mags, cycle the
prop, and engage the carb heat momentarily. Everything works as it should,
precisely as it should, when it should. After
announcing my departure over the radio, I taxi the Stearman onto the runway
and line her up. Anxious to be gone now, I feed in throttle while jockeying
rudder and stick to hold her straight. The engine's moan rises to a pleasant
roar and the prop wash becomes a stiff breeze. Down
the runway we go, the speed steadily increasing. The tail rises, and I can see
straight ahead over the nose. The rudder is very sensitive now, the stick more
solid. A glance at the airspeed indicator-- 60, 65--and stick back to let the
wings bite into the air. The
miracle occurs again. The ground recedes, my craft swims upward readily,
willingly into the atmosphere, greatest of the earth's oceans. Upward
I steer away from the ground, away from the strident voices shouting for my
attention and my time. I cannot completely escape the people or the problems
up here, not for very long anyway, but for a little while I can see the earth
and its inhabitants from a better perspective. Where else but aloft in an
infinite blue sky can you see how small the towns and cities really are, how
tiny the houses, how minuscule the people? Where else but here can you see how
a stream has meandered down its valley as the ages have slipped past, how the
hills have weathered, how the mountains are once again surrendering their
crown of snow as the days lengthen and the sun climbs the sky? The
engine and the bright yellow wings lift me higher and higher. Now I see a hawk
circling haphazardly, searching vainly for a thermal. He is too early. He'll
have to work awhile, until the sun has had a few more hours to heat the earth. My
craft cleaves this still morning air with a dreamlike quality. Every twitch of
the stick and rudder gives the anticipated reaction and nothing more. No
burbles or thermals yet--just this wine-smooth air with a trace of haze out
there on the distant horizon, provided, no doubt, so I will not be tempted to
think that I can see forever. And yet up here I can see far beyond today. I can see
into yesterday, and I can see into tomorrow. I can see how the earth used to
be before the white man came, and I can see how the towns and cities will
continue to spread, how the streets and highways will lengthen and widen, and
how the traffic will flow in five years, 10, 20. I can see it all so clearly,
yet I am powerless to stop the process or speed it up. I
am alive. Up here with the song of the engine and the air whispering on my
face as the sunlight and shadows play upon the banking, wheeling wings, I am
completely, vibrantly alive. With the stick in my right hand, the throttle in
my left, and the rudder beneath my feet, I can savor that essence from which
life is made. Too
soon I must head down, down toward the waiting runway. As usual, I do three or
four landings, play the power and the controls and try to induce the airplane
to kiss the earth precisely where, when, and as I want it to. The errors are
mine alone. Finally,
I am taxiing again. In front of the open hangar bay I pull the mixture to
cutoff, and the engine dies. The
silence stuns me. I fumble with the switches, making sure that mags and
battery are off, then pull off the flying helmet and let the sun dry my sweaty
hair. Reluctantly, I climb
from the cockpit, smell the grass and earth, gaze at the motionless prop, and
feel the heat radiating from the silent engine. Yet my flight isn't over. When
I have come completely back from the sky, I must wipe her down, swab off the
oil that the big radial engine sprayed so wantonly, check everything, and,
finally, wheel her back into the semidarkness of the hangar and chock her
carefully, so she will be ready next time I yearn to fly. Then
I go to work, to the office with its computer and telephone, its fax machine
and morning mail. But
maybe, just perhaps, the wind will not pick up much today. It looks like
clouds will drift in this afternoon, but if the wind doesn't come with a
vengeance, perhaps this evening. Perhaps this evening I can fly again. For
I will tell you a secret. Flying on a still, calm spring or fall evening, as
the sun sinks behind the peaks of the Rockies and dusk settles over the land
and lights wink on in the villages and towns--that flying is even better than
flying in the morning. Stephen Coonts owns a Cessna 421B, a
1942 Stearman, and a Breezy. A formal naval aviator and attorney, he is the
author of "Flight of the Intruder," "Final Flight,"
"The Minotaur," "Under Siege," "The Cannibal
Queen," (a highly recomended non-fiction account of Coonts'
transcontinental adventures in his Stearman biplane) and "The Red
Horseman." Reprinted courtesy of AOPA.
Reprinted from Great
Aviation Quotes [Home | About
Me | Amateur Radio | Photos
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me]
It is, just as the sky and land are. I am a mere spectator floating in the
pristine wilderness of air.
I don't have the words to explain the wonder of flight better than John
Gillepie Magee, Jr. or Stephen Coonts, so I won't try. Suffice it to say,
aviation has been a big part of my life and is a cherished treasure. The
following links may be of interest: