More rocket building! She is almost ready to fly. I skipped a step involving putting glue into a spot I firmly believe there is no way to get to without some specialized tool (super narrow and long glue syringe?), which I don’t have. The glue was to firmly connect the fins to the body tube, so I figured I’d just make some mega epoxy filets on the outside. Same thing, right? Actually no, because epoxy is way heavier then CA glue, so she’ll need a CP/CG check once everything else is done. Basically: if the center of gravity (CG) is too far aft (i.e., behind this rockety thing called the “center of pressure,” or CP) the rocket naturally goes into a turn–not a spin, a turn–as soon as it’s in flight. Turning rockets are bad juju. Speak of bad juju, I will add–at risk of jinxing this whole thing–that I am a wee bit worried that the fin mount rings aren’t well-enough secured to the motor tube. If that concern bears fruit (weird way to say it? yup), then the motor and motor tube will blast through the rocket and fly god-knows-where, spinning and turning and corkscrewing at speeds extraordinarily unbecoming for such behavior. Exciting! I believe I will wear scientist goggles and hide behind a piece of plywood for the launch.
:)
Checking the fin mounts for alignment in the body tubeFins secured!Final motor mount centering ring epoxied in, launch lugs mounted, and fin root filets done. She’s close!Thanks to willis for storing his tripod in my classroom, for without it this selfie would not have been possible!
No, actually, literally, Russian dogs. From the Russian military base across the dateline. They showed up last week and wandered around, staying clear of the village. Then yesterday three of the four took off straight out to the edge of the sea ice, skirted north around the open water and then made tracks straight back to Big Diomede. They left one behind, which was shot late last night.
Seriously, I’m not making this stuff up!
The second photo is a very, very very cropped version of the first.
The last week of school is: Rocket Week!! This year I decided to take part in the fun. I’ve wanted to shoot off a big model rocket for a while, and when I was buying model rocket motors in Anchorage back in August I simply couldn’t not pick up the largest motor they had that didn’t require a license (an Aerotech G80-10, for the interested). When I ordered rocket kits for the kiddos, I also ordered a big rocket for the big motor.
Since next week is the last week, today was building time! The motor mount is all done (approximately half the work). It was very interesting and kinda fun to put together: unlike the small rockets I’ve made before, this model’s design manifests significant thought towards distributing the motor’s impulse effectively to the body through surface to surface joints and not through cement/glue/epoxy joints. Which is to say it made me feel a little bit like a rocket scientist as I worked.
Also, according to a youtube video, this sucker should get to 2000 to 3000 feet, traveling at 600+ mph. Yeah! Awesome!
Er..also..yeah..that does make me a little nervous. Did I mention the launch-button-controller thing has all of twenty feet of wire between the switch and the alligator clips? I’m seriously considering building a plywood box with a narrow-slit-window from which to control/launch/video the launch.
Reading instructions and looking at diagramsChecking the fin mounts for proper alignment. The fins, which mount through the body, transfer the motor’s impulse from the motor mount to the rocket’s body. Cool, huh?everything ready for epoxy? ready! ready-set-mix! and apply! Go go go! … that’s kinda what goes through my mind when work with a very, very very limited supply of 5-minute epoxy.One motor mount ready to go. Not seen: the cool internal steel-ribbon baffling designed to even out and cool the gasses from the ejection charge before they reach the fragile lightweight parachute. Rocket science, folks.
There is a story behind this picture, email/comment for the details. Summary: it was either the best day of my life or the second best day of my life. Jury’s still out. Huge thanks to Ross for the photo!
After 72 hours, Zora is safe and home. Today after school there were reports of whining coming from the top of the island. Ed busted out the binocs and got a brief visual. Jori and Ed took off, made it most of the way up the island. The final stretch was steep and difficult–but Edward persevered and made the final ascent, picked her up and began the long and difficult trip back down the island. A few hours later, Zora was safe and sound and home and happy.
Folks, this here story has a happy ending. Look at the happiness in these pictures of Owner, Dog, and Rescuer.
I spent the better part of my weekend searching the island for Zora, Jori’s (one of my coworkers) dog. Zora is a wonderful dog who we all love and adore, and she took off for a walkabout saturday afternoon. I searched all saturday evening, late into the night, finally getting close enough to hear her, and I used everything I had in me to try to get her, but I reached a point where there was no safe option but to turn back and follow my own footholds in the wind-hardened snow back down to the village. Anything else would’ve probably resulted in a search and rescue operation for me. Ed and I went up today to look for her again, but the wind had since kicked up and the snow was worse: visibility was poor and even if she had barked for us when we called, we would not have heard. I am exhausted, ever muscle aches and many joints hurt, I am worried sick for her, and I fear that the sad and frightened barks and yelps I heard when I had to turn back will be the last memory I have of her.
Yeah, I know she’s just a dog. But still. God damn it.
I’m not sure how it’s related, but it also occurred to me to note that Birches by Robert Frost has been for some time and likely will continue to be one of my favorite poems. Below is an excerpt.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away Not to return. Earth’s the right place for love: I don’t know where it’s likely to go better. I’d like to go by climbing a birch tree, And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more, But dipped its top and set me down again. That would be good both going and coming back. One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
Seven months ago (last August) I walked into a hobby shop in Anchorage and bought a hundred dollars of model rocket motors.
Most folks call it “The [Dreaded] Last Week of School,” but I call it “Rocket Week, the Most Awesome Week Ever,” Rocket Week for short. This bundle* of rocket motors was for Rocket Week.
Needless to say, this isn’t something I could bring to Diomede in my luggage. Rocket motors are considered HAZMAT and cannot be shipped by USPS, the only carrier which delivers to Diomede. In Anchorage I optimistically called all the Alaskan cargo airlines that fly to Nome, full of false hopes. Nothing. Nobody would ship a little tub of rocket motors.
I called the barge companies, hoping to drop off this explosive little tub at one of the docks to be shipped up to Nome (or if I was super lucky maybe even straight to Diomede!). I guess barge companies operate on a week by week basis, because after some very serious rounds of phone tag I had a “maybe. we will get back to you.” from one company and nothing from the other.
Asking dear friends for huge favors is generally something I save as a last resort, and I indeed was left with no other options. So I call Darla, who works with our school district and also happens to be a private pilot. She agreed to ferry the motors up to Unalakleet the next time she flew there from Anchorage.
A few months later the weather was right and the stars aligned, and sure enough Darla managed to help the rocket motors on the first leg of their journey to Rocket Week.
Then came a long period of waiting and hoping. Sure enough, a month ago a teacher from Nome–the Legendary Mr. Nate–happened to be passing through Unalakleet, so I emailed him and crossed my fingers. Darla brought the bomb-like box to the District Office that morning, and Janice–a great friend and a teacher in Unalakleet–made the handoff to Mr. Nate. He got the tub onto his flight from Unalakleet, and when he arrived in Nome he made the handoff to Erickson Helicopters (previously Evergreen), the airline that services Diomede. The absolutely wonderful staff there jumped through god-only-knows how many logistical and legal hoops and one and a half weeks later on the helipad here Hank (Diomede’s Erickson agent) handed the box off to Mr. Willis, our principal.
The final leg was carried out by Jason and Raleigh, two of our adorable 1st grade students. Those two little whippersnappers hauled the box up from the elementary to my classroom and made my day absolutely as brightened as it could be.
Here is the tub at the end of it’s journey:
*I should mention that I tossed in a few bottles of HEET with which to make miniature jet engines. Not terribly relevant, doesn’t really have any line in the story, but nonetheless a part of how things went down.
First thing: I love to teach. Second thing: I love to teach because it is fun, challenging, intricate and fulfilling. Of course it is like any other trade–it has ups and downs, some days are good and some days are bad, and there are just plain regular days too. Well, this day was one of the great up’s. Maybe even the greatest up day I’ve had yet.
What was great? Well it’s this thing that happens once in a while when the stars align. It begins with waking up in the morning well rested and ready to take on the day. I love those mornings. And it only gets better. My students all seem to be equally well rested, they eat a great breakfast too. My lesson plans work like clockwork. The students are engaged and fascinated and they ask great questions. We talk about science, we go on silly tangents wondering about scientific things. ‘Mr. dave, what would happen if the sun was bigger? what if the sun went away? how would we get energy then?’ brilliant discussion with my middle schoolers! And a great chat with one of my high schoolers about the philosophical and ethical facets of teaching chimpanzees to communicate with humans. One middle schooler spontaneously tells me that I should stay here until they all graduate because I’m a good teacher. At the end of the day, my students are happy and their minds are active and they run out of the school to go play.
I sit down in my chair and look at my classroom, gaze out the window at the sea and the ice and the blue sky and I smile inside. I don’t know what to do with myself. It is that pure type of contentment that is positively splitting just like heartache is splitting. I guess that’s because it is a type of heartache. It’s too beautiful. I don’t want to work on prep, I don’t want to go take a nap, I don’t want to read a book. I want to sit and feel and I don’t want the feeling to go away.
If I had to summarize why I teach I would say it is days like today. And I’ve been thinking a lot about that. If you know me even just a tiny bit, or if you simply peruse this blog, you’ll know that I have this thing for flying. It is the dream I have had for my whole life. And the little bit of flying I’ve done has been even better then I hoped. When I fly there is a beauty I feel, beyond words, but it is no heartache like I feel now*. So there’s my quandary.
Yes, I would love to be a commercial pilot. I would love to wake up in the morning knowing that I would be flying an airplane that day. And the staggering magnitude of the craziness of being able to fly for a living would last me some time, maybe months or maybe years. But sooner or later I know that I would feel something missing. The heartache of that perfect day of teaching. I’m sure flying has some sort of equivalent ‘best day ever’ scenario but it could not match the smiles of my students after a perfect day here.
So–what do I do? I have a few vague ideas involving flying in the summer and teaching during the school year; but I’m not sure that’s sustainable. Flight instruction is a near-certain possibility, as is flying commercially during the summer and teaching during the school year.
So–what do I do? I don’t know, really. Thankfully I have time to think of and percolate ideas. If I keep up my summertime flying, it will be a good handful of years, five at least, before I could be a commercial pilot.
yeah, that’s a lot of words, and i’ll admit i am not terrific at concisely writing my thoughts and feelings. so just for good measure here is a picture that, to me, has some of the feeling that i attempted to write out in this post
*I have a hypothesis: I think it has something to do with the glittering instrument that is the human soul (thank you, steinbeck, for those words) and the act of loving others, a thing that is not central to flying.
Well, ok..no, it wasn’t really morning, and technically it wasn’t breakfast seeing as we ate at around 1 o’clock, but by george it was a beautiful morning and it was a beautiful morning all because of breakfast. This breakfast. It was THAT good. The bacon was thick and delicious, the french toast perfect, the maple syrup was the real stuff (and good quality real stuff, at that), the potato and onion and red pepper fry was exactly as delicious as it sounds like it should be, the OJ was cold and zingy and the coffee fresh brewed and hot out of the thermos. It has become something of a saturday afternoon tradition for the four of us here: a big hearty breakfast sometime after noon on saturdays, usually a similar sort of thing..pancakes or waffles or french toast, bacon or sometimes sausage, eggs often and/or when the supplies afford it, fried potatoes and onions and bell peppers.
You know, routines and habits and doing the same old thing sometimes get a bad rap. Don’t settle into a rut, don’t be afraid of change! Do something different each day. Do something that scares you! Well I am good with doin’ something scary and I do believe that complacency in most parts of life can be deathly. But I’ll be damned if I don’t love sleeping in till just about the same time on Saturday and then eating the same-ish perfect breakfast in the afternoon and then sitting back with a cup of coffee to enjoy the ensuing food coma.
complete with a cameo appearance by none other then uncle silasyum.
Yeah, it’s been about twenty years because my first clear memory of wanting to fly helicopters was from when I was something like five. But somewhere in that growing and learning and forming infant brain of mine, I believe I knew. And so I have been waiting my whole life for this day.
Sometimes wonderful people surprise you by saying “hey, instead of grabbing coffee, how about going flying?” to shoot the breeze over glaciers instead of coffee. Beautiful. Shooting the breeze, while great over coffee, I can verily say is better over a glacier.
The chopper comes. Everybody is excited–we are going on 10 days without mail today. The chopper lands. In lieu of mail, the Huey brought freight (food) for the school, a phone technician, and a passel of heat-packin’ USPS agents to do some good old inspectin’. The only official word is that the post here is shut down–rumor has it we may get a delivery of mail in a few days.
Want to hear a funny story? The chopper came at lunch-break, so I ran out to take a few pictures of the take off. When I got down there, they had finished unloading some freight and there were a bunch (4 or 5) of people all standing out by the chopper. Weird…usually we don’t get passengers on mail day. They were taking pictures and talking, sorta like tourists, also weird. And they walk by and on this one tall fellow’s leg I see strapped a big ol’ forty-five. In my mind I’m like “who does this guy think he is? just walk into town packin’ a big old handgun? what is he, mr. sheriff?!” and right as that last thought was going through my mind I see, sewn on his duffle bag, a “federal law enforcement” badge. My next thought: “hmm. so he probably is the sheriff.”
I was thankful in that moment that humans don’t communicate telepathically.
The chopper was back by the end of the school day and I managed to run out and snap a few more pictures in the beautiful sunset light.
My science students have been practicing weather observation and some basic forecast. They check out the current barometric pressure and the predicted barometric pressure for the next day and they write a weather forecast.
Yesterday they predicted bad weather today. Right now, it’s foggy, rainy and snowy, windy, and some of the really big waves I can see hitting the south end of big diomede (southerly wind means the big waves hit the south sides of the islands) are crashing well over a hundred feet high.
In precisely one year and five months–if all goes to plan–I will have one hell of a decision to make.
Door 1: blow my savings to buy a little plane and a tremendous amount of aviation gas and enjoy the first of what I hope would become many summers of flying around for fun, and someday when I’m good and ready, for both fun and income.
Door 2: blow my savings to learn how to fly helicopters and begin what would be a journey of many, many summers to becoming a commercial rotary wing (helicopter) pilot. There are two big snags with this plan: flying would never be strictly recreational, only work. fun work, granted, but strictly work. The other: this plan puts a cap on my teaching career. After earning a commercial license along with instrument and CFI ratings, I would have no option but to immediately give up teaching and take a flying job wherever I could find one, mostly likely leaving Alaska in the process. To take a break from flying is a very, very very big no-no for a brand new commercial rotary wing pilot.
I do have to say, of all the dilemmas I could possibly have, this one’s beautiful, as both options involve flying. I suspect that, should I actually come upon these two doors in one year and five months, I’ll go for door 1, but only time will tell. Next update: end of november.
