Happy birthday Chris and thumbs up for your relief efforts!
Honestly, I have no idea how the Caribbean have to get fixed. The logistics of that alone impress me.
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The handmade map me and the other Captain sketched out showing the temporary facilities and non radar non comms areas… Cartographers we are not…lol
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Happy Birthday @BeachAV8R! 
We all clubbed together last night and got you… hmm, ah, no we didn’t, we just flew carrier ops again and again and again. 
Come back safe, rest up and we’ll get to watch @near_blind drogue tank up in a 50 degree bank in the dark and me crash into the deck.
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Happy Birthday Beach, stay safe. On my way to Dairy Queen.
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Hey Mudspikers… Mudspikeeters…
I moved these posts out of the Where You Are Photos thread because I thought it was important to hear what our fearless leader is up to and that might get lost in the other thread. Please excuse the temporal issues above this post 
@fearlessfrog might be able to do a little magic to fix the timey-wimey problem I created. @BeachAV8R I apologize for hijacking and cutting up your thread
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I punched Biff Tannen and managed to fight off my mother at the prom (euhh) but got hit in the jaw with a Delorean car door, so things stayed ‘heavy’.
My technical fix is that we just ignore it, never mention it again and it’ll be fine.
BeachAV8R,
Althou I have not lived there since the 80s, I am Puerto Rican. I just want to say. THANK YOU for helping out in this time of need. Without the assistance of pilots like you, the island would be worse off. You are much appreciated.
Happy Birthday Beach.
Maico
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Beach, thanks you for what you all are doing there. I was on Guam when several typhoons hit the island. The magnitude of the destruction and impact on life and economy was a teeny tiny fraction of what is being experienced in poor PR. But we had FEMA, ships, C-130s, fuel and generators staged on the island BEFORE the storms hit. Americans need to call the island North Carolina and MAYBE they will understand the need for immediate support for Americans in trouble.
Well…that’s me typing. You are doing. Thank you!
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Oh!..that map is super cool! Reminds me of the old maps Jeppesen drew to keep himself off the granite as he flew the mail.
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I showed the map to my friend who was flying Twin Otters for Eastern Metro out of St Croix during hurricane Hugo. He said that they went 8 months without power. Hugo was a smaller storm, but sat stationary a while longer over St. Croix. His comment was that map looked very similar to the one he used at the time.
I was living in Munich at the time, but my dad said that John caught a jumpseat ride on an EAL B752 back to ATL. He was only in town long enough to purchase two necessary items, a Honda generator and a Sig P226.
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Happy Bday!
And wow seems y’all are really busy over there! Keep up the good work and stay safe!
Happy birthday, and thank you for what you’re doing down there. Sounds like it’s busy down there - stay safe.
Dadgum, Chris. Stay safe, happy birthday and thank you for your efforts over there. My mom was born there.
Thanks for all the positive thoughts. The real heroes are the people we are flying in there that are actually leaving the airport and getting out there and doing the real work in incredibly difficult conditions.
So we flew in replacement pilots and medical crew last night, but I was asked to stay on a few days to orient the new crews. So it looks like I’m staying for a few more days, tentatively leaving to return home on Monday when a replacement pilot will come relieve me.
Last night, I thought our plane was having maintenance peformed, but the guys only replaced a tire and changed out our LOX orb, and put the plane back in service. So I got a call at 6AM that another plane was coming with a patient and was landing in 20 minutes in St. Pete and I needed to go do a wing-to-wing transfer and take that patient up to Jackson, MS. Shoot…that was short notice…! Somehow managed to get my crew together, get semi dressed, get to the airport and met the airplane just as it was leaving customs.
So flew that trip up and back to JAN, came back, and have spent most of the day getting the new crew briefed. They just took the airplane to San Juan to position it, and I’m allegedly hopping on a Challenger with my crew to ride out to be in position for flights tomorrow. We’ll see how that works out. Things have a way of changing quickly and the plan that was given to you 5 minutes ago has usually already been changed.
Will post more pics when I get a moment. I’m doing laundry right now and the smell of detergent is practically bringing tears to my eyes.
I sent my crew of seven days home today and there wasn’t a dry eye among us…it has been a tough week of flying with not enough rest and some interesting conditions, and they really made it awesome. I can’t wait to get home and have a beer with them and talk about all we did.
So heading to San Juan in three hours…might be out of touch there, but we’ll see.
Thanks for keeping the place humming guys, I can’t wait to get back to doing some more relaxing flying LOL…
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Glad to hear your still giving it hell out there. Fly safe and we’ll see you soon!
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I can’t believe that poor homeless guy met the owner of Mudspike! Did you buy him a cup of coffee?
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Does he have a type rating for your Challenger?
OMG Nicholas CAGE!
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