Flying, flying...

I went flying today, mainly just to keep my proficiency up. It was a nice, if breezy, day so I went out to shoot some touch-and-go landings and play with my turns around a point--always fun when there's a good wind aloft.

And while I was up, I saw some neat things. Here's a World War Two-era T-6 Texan on the apron at Winchester, Virginia. Probably getting ready for the Martinsburg, WV airshow in two weeks.Here's some C-5 Galaxy transports on the ground at Martinsburg, over on the Air National Guard side of the field. Talk about huge. They're 247 feet long, have a wingspan of 222 feet, and stand 65 feet tall. They can carry a payload of 270,000 pounds and have 28 tires on their landing gear to handle the weight of cargo and aircraft, which at wartime maximum is 840,000 pounds. (That's 4200 tons that can FLY!) And it can fly. Maximum airspeed is 518mph, and thanks to it's in-flight refueling capability, it can stay aloft as long as the crew can stand it. As of April, 2008, the government owns 111 of them (I think 9 of them were here today) at a cost of $179,000,000 each. If they aren't the largest cargo/passenger aircraft that flies today, I'm sure that someone can correct me.Also on the field were a few Marine Corps CH-53 heavy helicopters that had just come up from North Carolina to get out of the way of approaching Hurricane Hanna. Sorry that I couldn't get better shots. I was trying to fly a plane at the same time.

All of that prime airpower sure put my little Cessna 172 in perspective!