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1. Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 05:58:54 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

   • samjay ganges

   As a fellow peace corps "volunteer" fag I have to point out that while it's great of people to help out in this stuff, it's only about 30% charity. The other 70% is our excitement at FINALLY being able to play bush pilot, fly somewhere with a mission, and undertake some no-strings-attached flying where we're free to do what we want.

   At most that guy's R44 is carrying 500 lbs of aid. It's nifty and all, but people often severely overestimate the charity when we fly in to do shit like this. All the missionary operations are like this too, busking for donations at every fly-in as if it's vital that you pay for them to shuttle gap-toothed natives from one island to the next. It's not, but that guy doesn't want a real job at home, he wants adventure, and thrill, and he'll pretend he's only there because "someone has to roll up their sleeves and help".
   
   RT: https://poa.st/objects/09b74e3f-4e1c-45ea-9636-8c9c8274aa7b

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 05:59:47 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges Guys flying in to help and being lauded for their brave selflessness is like insisting on giving a standing ovation to a guy at chili's when he walks in wearing camo fatigues, because he's "fighting for your freedom". It's cute to say but you know he's a fuckup who just went military because he couldn't figure out how to get a different career out of high school.

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:00:53 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges I just wish people wouldn't gas up these guys so much, they end up coming to us to ask for handouts, assistance, grants, free maintenance & support because they "helped". They opt for these elective, unapproved missions in the moment, all excited to FINALLY use that faggy little robinson for something other than a burger run, and then they'll be ringing us up in November asking if there's any way we can "bring that price down" because "You know I really helped out a lot during the hurricane, isn't there something for that?"

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:02:34 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges Sorry man, welcome to old-school charity, where the $200 an hour operating costs are coming out of your pocket - and your pocket alone. I'm sure the people really appreciated those 35 gallons of bottled water though.....that'll be $217,523 dollars, thanks

     Geez, I was thinking my memory was harsh, when I first wrote this post 1.4 minutes ago I thought an R44 overhaul would be about $120k, it's gone up an insane amount since I looked last

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:03:49 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • givenup
     • samjay ganges

     @givenup @samjayganges Yeah, as long as those guys can afford to help. It's expensive, and after seeing some guys brag about making 8-hour flights to bring in a backpack's worth of gatorade I'm back to being cynical about my industry's "charity"

     It's always about having fun first, with a very thin fig leaf of doing actual, effective good.

   • givenup (givenup@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:03:50 JST givenup

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     @WashedOutGundamPilot @samjayganges i'm a fuck up who didn't even go into the military and doesn't ahve a career, bro, i'll tell you waht tho, in the end, if a guy is helping people who need help, and he's half doing it cuz people blow smoke up his ass for doing it, fine by me, peoplke are getting helped, end of story.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:10:32 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges We already had one guy call us asking if we wanted to "sponsor" his "relief mission" by just tossing him the keys to a shiny, expensive Baron. When we said no he supposedly said he could "settle for the 206"

     Yeah not how this works, having good intentions isn't some magic password to loot everything and go play SAR on someone else's dime. Who cares if it's "just a cessna" the damn thing is almost a mil

     "quick! Ferrari of Toledo? I need your fastest steed, I'm doing a rescue mission to uh, that one state with the hurricane, I'm taking supplies, let me drive your best car down there for free!!! What, no? Oh so you're just selfish assholes? I guess they'll just have to shrivel up and die, I was going to take them a whole trunk worth of costco goyslop! All 8 cubic feet of it!!!!"

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:13:52 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • givenup
     • samjay ganges

     @givenup @samjayganges I'll believe they're helping when someone's got a caravan loaded up, that's enough space and payload to ACTUALLY do good. These guys are taking their Miatas on a 3-day road trip and calling it charity because they have a case of gatorade in the trunk, it's gay and I'm not playing along.

     I've been back and forth in the world of do-gooder volunteer work, we're in it for fun and adventure more than charity, I'm embarrassed to make normies play along with the kabuki and pat us on the back. I've helped deliver "aid" before and cringed when I looked at the tiniest token of assistance knowing it was all a vanity project for everyone else on the team

   • givenup (givenup@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:13:53 JST givenup

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     @WashedOutGundamPilot @samjayganges i get being cynical cuz some people don't do mcuh actual helping and want kudos and what not, but this is a very serious disaster and people need help, so i *shrug*
   • samjay ganges (samjayganges@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:13:56 JST samjay ganges

     in reply to

     • givenup
     @WashedOutGundamPilot @givenup I'm just compiling the info and videos I find. Mainly for elftummy who is going out there so he has a better idea of the situation.
     
     It looks like the pilots are mainly out to locate the survivors to report back to rescue teams. The people bringing supplies are driving, and now they are bringing items like 02 and diapers as they have received enough food and water.
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:17:45 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • givenup
     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges @givenup I've been asking for any evidence of actual people turning them away, the only reports are anon people online, low level bureaucrats. IDK if I can pass along the bits of FSDO rumor I'm getting but some in the FAA are embarrassed to see everyone going on their own. I don't think they can lock the airspace down without having DOD aircraft to come in and take over.

     I think the boys will get 1-2 days of joyriding left but the noose will tighten, and some bureaucrat may try to burn them to prove a point. IDK how much power they have though, it's really just the assholes who are worrying about retarded noobs and 150-hour helo pilots crashing and adding yet another emergency to the list

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:30:55 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • Frondeur
     • samjay ganges

     @Frondeur @samjayganges You'd basically have to buy it, we just have no way of insuring it if we loaned it unless you've been checked out and basically hired. Keep in mind a new-new 206 is like 1.3 million or so - not cheap at all, but a well kept older one is maybe ~$350 to 450k? I haven't seen the one we got, I think it's a '98, if it's as clean as I hear then we might get mid 5s for it. Aside from cutting us a check for the whole value, I don't know how we'd just let it go. I'd personally expect to never see it again if I sent it out with a stranger.

     I don't -and to a lesser extent my boss doesn't - trust any stranger to be competent. Aviation is too damn expensive for the average guy to stay current. The only way I'd happily throw you a 206 no questions asked is if you showed me a logbook with entries flying a 206 every day, 8 hours a day as a survey/charter/tour/CAP guy, for enough months to touch on different weather conditions.

     "oh but I'm a united pilot, I fly every day - "

     NOPE, airliners, fighter jocks are some of the worst I've ever flown with. It's a different feel, different power delivery, and you have to be a thoughtful operator to realize you can't trust your A320 muscle memory when you're flying the cessna. Many of my near-deaths happened at their hands, they don't tend to respect light aircraft, and they get sloppy, fly fast, overcorrect....

     If you were dead set on a rescue op, you'd basically charter us, and we'd find a different plane for that, and it would probably be...$6,500 or so for a 3-pax journey out that direction? Unless we levy hazard pay or board, too, that drives it up. And I'm probably lowballing us, TBH.

   • Frondeur (frondeur@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:30:56 JST Frondeur

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     @WashedOutGundamPilot @samjayganges how much collateral would need to be put down for you to consider it...by you I mean someone you know who might...for the 206???...
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 06:38:11 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges

     @samjayganges Now, if you came to me with a real mission of value, things would be different. Like, if the local oncologist called us up and said "hey, we have patients in the area that are going to die unless they get these $100,000 bags of IV fluids in their bodies within the next 10 hours*" then we would likely rouse to action. Bossman would find some way to defray the cost, or try to bill the hospital, and we'd be speeding out to the airport and bringing up maps for some bush plane shenanigans.

     That's effective, and genuinely helpful, and requires a level of professionalism and care you can't get from some IT jackass with an R22 and an empty seat. And we'd be having a ball the whole way.

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:33:38 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     While I'm talking about the tenor of this whole affair in the industry, it's worth catching you up on part of why the fuddyduddies aren't too happy to see light aircraft swarming around. Light helicopters are seen as death traps, such that our company doesn't even let us ride them without having a pre-buy done, and tapping in our very old school apache pilot to give them a test flight. (of course, the caveat here is that they're still better than having nothing at all, for some of these cases, so it's good to have these people helping out.)

     Basically, Helo flying is even MORE expensive than plane flight, which means the guys doing it for fun simply can't afford to do it as much. **That means they're less experienced, less practiced at dealing with emergencies from the get-go, and have only ever flown within the narrow confines of their local stomping grounds and airspace. Top it all off with the fact that for many, bereft of an overseer like the Civil Air Patrol helping to unify these rescue ops, a whole bunch of these guys are probably doing SAR for the first time in their life, just winging it and hoping for the best.

     But still, having just them is better than having nothing at all.

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:39:32 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to
     But even as dangerous as it is to have a bunch of no-name mystery guys flying their private aircraft in, **they're the only ones who showed up to help**.
     
     So now the lords of ZOG are stuck twiddling their thumbs in angst. They worry that some dumbass will cause even more tragedy via well-meaning ineptitude or inexperience, while also chafing at the fact they log in to twitter and see an avalanche of condemnation for not lifting a finger to help.
     
     I'm not surprised some of them want to shut down the airspace - if you wanted me to fly in there sunday I'd be very leery of getting in the mix when a random sample of the 12 closest aircraft could fairly likely show each one is operating thus:
     
     - unfamiliar terrain
     - unfamiliar airspace
     - low time pilot
     - poorly rested from long XC to get to the AO
     - low time-in-type
     - no experience in SAR
     - unreliable piston helos
     - sparse traffic control
     - Unknown traffic procedures
     
     But even with all that, they're the only ones who showed up. Oops! Imperial moment!
   • Frondeur (frondeur@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:39:42 JST Frondeur

     in reply to
     @WashedOutGundamPilot Why is helicoptering more expensive??? insurance???
   • Ame (americanchampion@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:39:42 JST Ame

     in reply to

     • Frondeur
     @Frondeur @WashedOutGundamPilot Maintenance, primarily, but also fuel (because they're relying on constant thrust to keep them from falling straight down).
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:47:17 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • Frondeur

     @Frondeur Economy of scale, insurance, near total absence of paying work. It's inherently more dangerous, because planes can lose an engine and mostly glide for miles and pick out the safest area to put her down.

     With a helo, your engine stops and you have to IMMEDIATELY do your autorotation and set her up to drift down safely. If you're absentmindedly looking out the window, this understandably goes poorly. That makes insurance costly, even more so when you're renting to people. So it's a vicious cycle: Pilots can't afford to fly and train like they want, making them less safe when they ARE flying.

     It's also a smaller market, because there aren't many jobs for heli guys, and the military produces tons of qualified guys, so there isn't much of a training market to buoy sales and rentals.

     Maintenance is harsh, piston engines aren't a great choice for a helicopter, but turbines are too expensive. I think the cheapest one out there is taken from the chinook's APU, the T55? That's a $500,000 helo if you're willing to build it yourself in the garage. The government wants to help owners (i.e. the guys renting YOU an aircraft) by forcing them to take care of maintenance and maintain it to a safe standard, so you have extra inspections (shop hours) and parts replacements on a schedule.

     I said upthread that the R44 overhaul is around $200,000, and I'm probably lowballing that too. I don't know anyone that's done an overhaul on a private helicopter, probably because it's so much money.

     Anyways, you have to overhaul all that stuff at ~2,000 to 2,400 hours, fed mandated because that's the most cost-efficient timeline to give you good operating life without parts failure (death)

     It's like an economic death spiral, and that's not even touching on the cost increases from lawsuits over the years. Many wrongful death suits through the 70s/80s/90s that really hammered the industry

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:49:43 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • Ame
     • Frondeur

     @Frondeur @AmericanChampion Drones are only so useful, the average person owns garbage. If you got some nerd with a $3500 unit then yeah, he can be very useful, but a lot of them can only do 20 minutes of flight at a time, before recharging that battery for 2 hours. Add in the crappy reception through all the woods, and it makes sense why we don't see many.

     I bet the guys with good gear, plenty of extra batteries can do a lot of good though. 10 mile transmission range, FPV goggles, 5 spare batteries, and a high-altitude LOS position and you can help inspect a lot of ground. But that gear is like, $6,000. There are giant ones that can haul a couple hundred pounds at a time, but they're north of $50,000

   • Frondeur (frondeur@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:49:44 JST Frondeur

     in reply to

     • Ame
     @AmericanChampion @WashedOutGundamPilot what are the drone pilots doing in all this??? I know they probably cant lift someone...but dropping supplies and scouting for people??? is anyone doing things like that???
   • WhitestTemplar (whitesttemplar@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:52:57 JST WhitestTemplar

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     @WashedOutGundamPilot @samjayganges This could all be true, but at the same time, so fucking what? The whole "it's the journey not the destination" idea is fucking retarded. If they help people then they help people. You don't have to move mountains to make a positive impact.
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:52:57 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     • WhitestTemplar

     @WhitestTemplar @samjayganges Like I said, it's cool they're helping, but they're having fun, making content out of it. I'm not going to be guilted into giving them medals or throwing $5,000 into their till for their "charitable" joyrides and youtube videos.

     It's the pilot version of a guy approaching you and saying "Hey thank me for your service, I'm in the army and I'm FIGHTING FOR YOUR FREEDOM"

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 07:54:52 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     I forgot about this one, the guys were doing coke and had a guy hanging from a slackline below. They ran it dry, and the pilot panicked and cut the rope loose way too high. Rough.

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 08:02:18 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     Oh the other thing that pisses me off is warbird boomers getting pissed that they can't just show up to your fly-in and get paid $15,000 for making an "appearance"

     I'm just really sick of how everyone with an aircraft is constantly busking, begging, and guilting every single person they meet into helping pay for their hobby. I think even oshkosh only pays around $2,500 for a single, maybe twice that for the bombers? I heard it a while back and it seemed super low.

     But none of us can afford this shit, quit asking me to fund YOUR good times, I can't even buy my own!

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:07:31 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • d
     • John Rando

     @john_rando @deprecated_ii It's really so blackpilling, one of our little cousins got a baofeng, looked up a guide, got on the big state net freq and immediately got chewed out because two old guys were "in the middle of a conversation"

     He's normally quite polite, I can't imagine he was really in the wrong. Ham guys might be real touchy after years of pranksters?

   • d (deprecated_ii@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:07:32 JST d

     in reply to

     • John Rando
     @john_rando @WashedOutGundamPilot more of an elitist bullshit attitude from them than actual cost. but still, it's not a welcoming group
     
     a sense of exclusivity is often the appeal to such people
   • John Rando (john_rando@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:07:32 JST John Rando

     in reply to

     • d

     @deprecated_ii @WashedOutGundamPilot Yeah, I rarely interact with other hams. My interest is mostly just in listening and building homemade antennas out of speaker wire. If I do any talking its usually more in the digital modes like psk31. Those modes tend to attract a better crowd.

     The most fun I had was listening to some griefer keep talking over people on an HF net being done with boy scouts. He kept telling the kids "Don't listen to her, she's full of shit!" when some old lady was trying to say something.

   • d (deprecated_ii@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:07:33 JST d

     in reply to
     @WashedOutGundamPilot small planes would be less expensive, there would be a lot more of them, and there would be a lot more pilots if it wasn't a gay boutique hobby being kept that way by many of the people in it
     
     same as any other gay boutique hobby. amateur radio, machineguns, take your pick
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • John Rando (john_rando@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:07:33 JST John Rando

     in reply to

     • d

     @deprecated_ii @WashedOutGundamPilot Oh come now, anyone who can pass the license exam and can afford a baofeng can into ham radio. Don't let the crusty old farts get ya down!

   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:09:08 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • d

     @deprecated_ii It's so funny how the only time the FAA tries to improve the GA scene is when they want to let baby boomers fly some more. LSAs, sport pilot, basicmed, now the next shakeup are all great news for the 87 yo diabetics

   • Dragon Zero (william_the_dragonborn@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:09:58 JST Dragon Zero

     in reply to
     @WashedOutGundamPilot Look while I despise the old warbird bullshit I would fucking love to see the Ho 229 at least fly in the modern times
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 09:16:39 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • Dragon Zero

     @William_The_Dragonborn I have a longer thread about it, I love/hate it. I hate how the greasy boomers try to fleece people for it, charge money just to sit inside....they want to pretend their personal toy is a public good when it comes time to pay the bills, but if they see you getting too close on the ramp they'll send over the golf cart fag to tell you to stay away. I just hate dealing with them, about 70% of warbird guys are super cool, but the other 30% drive me crazy. I get why they're money grubbers, we all have to be just to survive, but you don't see the guys at a classic car show holding out a venmo address demanding everyone chip in to cover the cost of the drive home.

     More than anything I hate that they don't care about anyone flying beyond their death. I've only seen one guy under 50 get trained on an actual warbird, most of these commemoration wings just let the younger guys fly shitty T6s and chipmunks, pretending that someday they'll move up to the corsairs, mustangs, and spitfires. I think they'll be extremely disappointed when the boomers finally pass on, because the owners will cite their inexperience to put it on static display. We're all watching the boomers play with the controller with the promise that "you can play next" but the second they're done mom's taking away the playstation.

     But damnit I would love to have one, that spanish civil war BF109 really speaks to me:

   • Peter (mcmlxviiotg@nicecrew.digital)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 10:09:43 JST Peter

     in reply to

     • samjay ganges
     Logistics. Space program makes a huge deal out of weight savings because of limited payloads, they throw $$$ at shaving ounces. So they scrutinize the hell out of what goes up. No, you can't bring your house keys, we'll take care of them for you.
     
     On the ground? Guy with a pickup and trailer can easily bring in pallets of water and a quad. An auxiliary fuel tank would be an excellent addition, might need it to get in AND out. If you didn't venture in too deep, the surplus is much appreciated.
     
     If a pilot needs to leave his co-pilot behind just to evacuate a single person, well, maybe he should have flown in solo. Helicopters should distribute stuff like satellite phones. Water filters? Meds. Priorities.
     Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks likes this.
   • Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Thursday, 03-Oct-2024 10:31:48 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

     in reply to

     • Peter

     @MCMLXVIIOTG That's the stuff that would be helpful. Meds? Starlink receivers? Generators? Fuel/O2 if we put up with hazmat? All that would actually help. But that takes work, consideration, planning, and real money. It's easier to buy some cheap groceries, check off the "aid" square on the checklist, and move on. They're interested in making the trip, getting the video, and if people on the ground get some actual assistance that's a bonus.

     Our place was sort of spitballing a flight, and when I asked what we're bringing in, since we have 1,500 lbs of useful if we fly light, they just told me "we'll just get sundries from sam's club". It just pisses me off, I've been on both sides of the charity grift, you'd think a same-day airmail shipment can allot that vital resource to something more important than a few boxes of granola bars, paper plates, and shampoo.

     I've been on the receiving end of "aid" for the locals, it sucks ass opening up the box and finding out it's just a bunch of old t-shirts and beat-up shoes from the baptist's clothing drive. I don't want to be the guy dropping them off.