I want everyone to look at these pictures closely.
Notice where all the campers are.
Notice where the planes and gyros and so on are.
The CLUB did not pick this location for things. The city and the airport put us there along that fence and alongside the taxiway with our campers. Typically in the past, the airport and the FAA has allowed us to close the taxiway to traffic and to close the use of runway 1 to outside traffic. This year they did not allow us to close the taxiway nor to limit use of runway 1.
Notice all the ultralight airplanes. They do not normally taxi down the runway to the grass, they normally taxi through the grass to and from the runway. does anyone who looks at these pictures believes these ultralight planes should NOT be parked where they are parked?
Notice the three little specs in one of the pictures, between the two rows of ultralight planes.... these are the ultralight helicopters. This is where the owners of these helicopters decided to " fly " their helicopters. I asked them to move the helicopters to a area about halfway between the far left row of ultralights and the runway to " fly " them.
Notice the big yellow X painted on the ground besides the taxiway. Next to that X is the yellow hold short line on the taxiway. About halfway between that X and hold short line and the runway itself, the gyros were to have blades stopped and engines off. Any movement of gyros past that point was to be engine off and blades tied. And for the most part that is what the gyro pilots did. this is why you see so many gyros parked to the right of the big yellow X.... so they would not have to push their gyros far to get to where it was safe to untie blades and start engines.
If you look at the picture, you can see two tents with blue tarp roofs in the middle of the line up of campers. This is where our registration tent was located and this is where the " public" was dropped off from the people mover. If case you don't know what the people mover is, it is a tractor pulling a open trailer with seats on it, to take people from the parking area to the fly-in area. We were told BY THE AIRPORT and CITY, that we HAD to park the public where we did, which required the use of a people mover, and we were TOLD BY THE AIRPORT AND CITY, to drive that people mover straight up the middle of the taxiway. ( Animal may think that was unsafe, but that is what we were told to do, not our choice )
If you look at the picture overall you can see many people here and there, but clearly no one near the area I described above where we were active with gyroplanes with running engines or spinning blades. All of this hoopla over the public being " loose " and under no control is problems with the public and HELICOPTERS. Again look at the picture and look at where the 3 ultralight helicopters are parked. They are told to move them further away, they did not. If they had moved further away there would not have been THAT issue. ................. there was not a problem with the public near the ultralight airplanes. Those pilots were responsible, and the area around them was cleared as they arrived and taxied in and as they taxied out for departure. Again, like I said, I do not think there was a issue of lack of safety measures here with the way we had this set up.
Look at the picture one more time and if you look to the left of the group of ultralights on the right... You will see the White Rotorway exec sitting on the ground being fueled up by the fuel truck. Why did the pilot decide to park this close?
Again, if you look at the Yellow X and yellow Hold short line on the taxiway, and go halfway between it and runway #1, that is where fly-in participants were to start or stop engines and spinning blades. We did not feel we needed a dedicated helicopter area.... We never had many helicopters show up anyway. I was expecting the rotorway, but assumed he would see the airport and our fly-in area from the air - just as you can via these pictures - and he would park closer to the runway and possibly INTO the wind.
I think the only mistake we made was not having a area roped off for the helicopters since they were going to land where they wanted and it is clear now that even though it is their responsibilty, since the club did not designate a special area for them, we are getting some of the blame for this accident. The other mistake was not being firm enough with the ultralight helicopter pilots about moving their helicopter far away from where they are sitting in these pictures. I asked them, I as the club president clearly asked them to move them back, but they didn't move them very far and they ended up back close to people again.... I should have been a dick and really got on them for not following directions, but I didn't - and people still think I am a asshole... -
I ask people like Tim Oconner, and others who have been to many fly-ins, after seeing these pictures, and knowing what you have seen at other fly-ins, do you still think the club was lazy or lax or did not do what we should or all we should have in the name of safety???? Again, keep in mind that we were forced to be where we were as far as along the taxiway with the campers and so on and so forth.....