Homecoming

Yesterday, I flew my first revenue flight since December 21. The three and a half months in between are the longest I've gone without work since I started flying professionally in 2001. As noted, I at least had the Cub to occasionally putter around the wintry skies, so I wasn't completely grounded, and I managed to keep myself busy through most of the downtime. I partook in the various family Christmas festivities, journeyed to see friends in LA and Alaska, had a grand adventure dirt-biking down Baja California for three weeks, and even worked on a few side projects - one of which will be hitting newsstands near you in a week or so. So the break was pretty nice, and wasn't the downer I feared it would be when I left the line in December.

But it was time to go back. I've actually had my medical back for over a month, as the FAA approved the special issuance more speedily than expected. But because my landing currency was about to expire and my annual line check expired in January, training was required to return me to the line, and it took NewCo a while to fit me in. When they finally scheduled the training, they decided to wait another week and a half so I could combine the landing currency simulator session with my regular six-month checkride on April 1 (the first day of my "early grace" month). I used the intervening time to return to Mexico and ride solo from Loreto to Cabo San Lucas via some interesting backroads & trails. When I got back, I had a few days left to study for the checkride, during which I wondered just how much I had forgotten in 100 days away from the JungleBus.

As it turned out, not much. As soon as I was in the simulator and sank down into the familiar captain's seat, each control was exactly where I'd left it, my hands flew through the flow patterns and the callouts dropped from my lips like they were natural instinct, and I moved through the intricate steps of low-vis takeoffs and Cat II approaches and V1 cuts as though I'd never left my old dance partner's side. I don't note this to brag, but rather to show that I've been flying the JungleBus for too long! After five and a half years and over 4000 hours, during which I've taken 13 simulator checkrides, it would be more noteworthy if I didn't ace the ride after a mere three months away. This airplane's behavior and quirks and procedures have been deeply imprinted on my brain over time, to the extent that I worry about learning another airplane - almost certainly one far less automated - when the time comes to move on from NewCo. I haven't had to learn anything thing new in some time, and I wonder if that part of my brain has atrophied.

The fact that the checkride went so well eased my mind, and yesterday's two legs of Supervised Operating Experience with a check airman became less of a test to be passed, and assumed more of the flavor of a homecoming. For once, I enjoyed ironing my uniform and driving to work and even the drudgery of updating my Jepp plates. Where I usually avoid the crew room, I lingered there yesterday, visiting with old friends who were excited to see me back to work. As I sat in our airplane's first class and reviewed the maintenance logbook, I happily eavesdropped on our flight attendants' latest crew gossip and workaday chatter. Such a simple chore as tearing the flight release into its constituent parts and placing each in its usual spot around the flight deck brought a smile to my face. When we rolled down the runway, I called "rotate," the nose lifted off, I felt the wings load up, and the dirty brown grass of MSP just smoothly faded away, I suddenly realized just how much I'd missed this. I talk a big game about the drudgery of airline flying and how much more fun flying small planes is and how nobody should give up a good ground-bound career to jump into the insane airline business, but the simple act of lifting off in the pointy end of a small jet for the five thousandth time is still enough to give me goosebumps. Either I'm really easily amused, or this flying business I've been immersed in since the age of 13 is pretty seriously ingrained in the very core of my being. I suspect the latter.

So, losing my medical and being grounded for three months, rather than making me consider what I might do if I couldn't fly, has further convinced me that I must fly, come what may. It's one of very few things in this world that I can't do without. That doesn't square very well with the diagnosis of an incurable, unpredictable, and perhaps eventually career-ending disease like Crohn's. So I'll just take each day as it comes and do what I can. If I can't fly professionally, I'll fly small planes. If I can't hold a medical, I'll fly light sport. If I become too ill to do that, I'll hitch a ride with friends. In the meantime, as long as I can, I'll continue to practice the time-honored profession of Airline Pilot. And while I can't ignore airline industry turmoil and the various challenges facing my profession, I'll do my best to focus on the positive and appreciate what I get to do on a daily basis, for as long as I'm allowed to do it.

Back from Baja

I got back from my two week dirt bike trip down Baja California on Thursday to find a letter from the FAA waiting me, approving my special issuance medical. Now I'm waiting for the company to come up with a return to service plan for me, but expect I'll be flying again very soon.

In the meantime I'm having a little fun with the photos and film from the Baja trip. This was one of those trips that didn't go even remotely as planned, sometimes to the point of extreme frustration. Through it all, we met many fantastic people and had amazing experiences we never would have had if everything went according to plan. In short, it was a real adventure.

Partly because I got so much GoPro footage, I decided to try something different in how I report the trip on this blog. Rather than doing a lengthy writeup, I'm putting together several documentary episodes - video blogs, really - about the trip. I expect the first one to be ready shortly. In the meantime, I put together a short (4 minute) music video featuring some of the best action of the trip. Enjoy!

Not Entirely Grounded

It's been an interesting winter, with a pronounced lack of deicing, snowstorms, holding, divert fuel calculations, or icy Saskatoon layovers. Of course, being on medical leave also means I haven't had any nice sunny San Antonio layovers to help cope with the Minnesota winter doldrums, either. I've been able to stay surprisingly busy - medical treatment, chasing down paperwork for my special issuance medical application, a few weekend trips to warmer locales like LA and Alaska, a few paid writing assignments, and the various duties of a hausfrau haven't left too much time for moping. In two weeks I leave for a long-awaited dirtbike ride down Baja with my friend Brad, and I expect to get an answer on the medical shortly after I get back.

I'm looking forward to it. I've started to really miss flying - hassles and ennui of modern button-pushing regional airline flying included. I miss being part of a crew, I miss being useful, I miss going places and having some variety in my week. I miss just being in the air.

At least I have the Cub to fly. It falls under Sport Pilot rules, so I don't need a medical to fly it - only a driver's license and self-certification that I'm fit to fly when I take it up (my medical wasn't denied or suspended - don't worry, I checked with EAA Legal to make sure I was ok first!). Mind you, Minnesota winters aren't quite the Cub's element - if it's not snowing or blowing stink, it's usually too cold for comfort - but I've been able to sneak in a few very enjoyable days aloft. I think I'm actually the only club member that has flown it since November!

A few days ago, I took my friend and fellow NewCo captain Dan up in the Cub to try his hand at taildragger wrangling. I brought along a GoPro Hero HD camera I recently scored off craigslist for the upcoming Baja trip, and a roll of duct tape to secure it to a strut. The footage came out pretty decently for my first effort, and I made an amusing little video on iMovie out of it. Enjoy!

Grounded

"What would you do if you couldn't be a pilot?"

The question was first posed in one of my aviation classes at UND, and has stuck with me since. It was always rhetorical, based on various imagined hazards ranging from a family history of diabetes to an industry meltdown rather than any specific, imminent threat. Early in my career any outcome seemed entirely possible, as did my imagined alternatives: Become an air traffic controller. Go back to school. Go into architecture or law. As I aged and my career became more established, both the prospect of not being able to fly and the chances of pursing an alternative course seemed increasingly remote, and the doomsday scenarios faded from my mind.

Yet here I am, in a sterile medical office, staring blankly at an anatomical poster on the wall and trying to understand what the doctor is telling me while the red master warning bell in my brain is blaring deafeningly. I wasn't expecting life-changing news today. I had a sharp pain on the right side of my abdomen last night, and grudgingly made a rare visit to the clinic on the off chance it was appendicitis. I dutifully drank some foul-smelling liquid and lay down for a CT scan, and figured worst-case scenario I'd be getting my appendix taken out laparoscopically before the day was done. And now this doctor is telling me that I have an inflamed ileum, he thinks it's likely Crohn's Disease, and I need to see a specialist to find out for sure.

I didn't know anything about Crohn's except that Dawn and I have two acquaintances with the disease, and their lives have been a living hell of torturous pain, ineffective medicine, failed surgeries, withered bodies, stunted careers, and strained marriages. I knew it was incurable. If I have Crohn's, I thought, it must mean the end of my flying career. The doctor was telling me that many Crohn's cases are mild and controllable with medication and diet, but I scarcely heard him. What am I going to do now? I thought. I looked across the room at Dawn. Despite her forcibly calm demeanor, I could tell she was thinking the same thing.

That was five weeks ago. Since then, I've gone to a gastroenterologist, consulted with several Aviation Medical Examiners, undergone a MRI, and had a colonoscopy. Crohn's is a tough disease to diagnose with certainty, and on the advice of ALPA Aeromedical, I continued to fly while the diagnosis was uncertain but I remained asymptomatic. I flew my trips in December knowing they would probably be my last in a while. And then, just before Christmas, came the final word: I do indeed have Crohn's, albeit a currently mild case. Based on past symptoms, I have probably been living and flying with it untreated for around ten years. Now that it's official, though, I'm grounded - for the time being.

The good news is that my diagnosis isn't nearly the death knell for my career that I initially imagined. Nearly 2,000 pilots currently hold a first class medical despite having Crohn's or ulcerative colitis. Most of the medicines used to treat Crohn's, including the one my gastroenterologist is putting me on (Remicade), are approved by the FAA and require only a short test period to make sure there are no severe side effects. Assuming that I don't have any, and the FAA has no objections to my case and their case load isn't more backed up than usual, I should be able to get a waiver by April or May.

Nevertheless, Crohn's is a somewhat mysterious and unpredictable malady, and despite my relatively mild symptoms thus far, it could take a turn for the worse at some point and end my flying career. I have a few things to occupy my time during my months out of work, but inevitably I'll return to the question: what will I do if at some point I can't be a pilot? I really don't know, right now. Aviation is my first love and has become such a large part of my identity that it would be very, very hard to give it up, even if I had to continue in a non-flying role. I guess I can consider the next few months a sort of trial run for an earth-bound existence. Fortunately, I have a few tailwheel-rated friends who can tag along in the C170 or the Cub when that old flying bug gets restless and starts biting again.