REFLECTOR: GA is Great

[Chuck Jensen]

I just got back from a week in SLC.  It killed me not to be able to fly it,
but my plane is still down for an injection of avionics steroids.  Seeing
crystal blue skies and all those big pointy rocks, it was hard not being up
there amongst both.

Instead, I had to rely on that most pedestrian of travel modes; commercial
aviation.  On the return, I connected thru DFW and found comedy is still
alive.  As I was setting in the terminal waiting for the connecting flight,
an announcement came over the PA that the all the airport ramps were being
shutdown.  I immediately thought PLANE CRASH, TERRORIST ATTACK,
TSUNAMI...not.  It was a single bolt of lightening 5-6 miles away that an
ever so sharp eyed ramp worker spotted.  Really!!!  I'm not making this up.

The day was 12005KT OVC040 10SM VFR except for one ever-so-little rain
shower off on the horizon that had emitted one ever-so-little lightening
bolt.  With that, all the ramp workers stopped work (including 1/2 way thru
the push back of one loaded jet) and went inside to escape this life
threatening weather.  During this vicious frontal weather attack, nary a
gust of wind, rain drop or a second lightening bolt was observed.  About an
hour and a half later, the card game broke up and they went back to
work....in the same benign weather conditions as before.  During that time,
nine incoming planes sat on the ramp for at least an hour, because there
were no open gates.  When we finally taxied out, we were number 19 for
departure on 17.

It's too bad we can't outsource DFW ramp jobs to India.  And yes, I could
have flown a 180kt recip from Salt Lake to Knoxville and beat the 450kt jet
aircraft by a few hours.  God is great and GA is pretty good too.

Chuck