2007 Idaho Backcountry Safari

[Todd Peterson]

I was fortunate enough to be invited to participate in the Idaho Backcountry Safari this year and it was a lot of fun. We ended up having about 24 aircraft in attendance with a number of Katmai's and Husky's. The level of pilot skills at the Safari ranged from very experienced backcountry pilots to those new to this type of flying. The combination of being with others that love the backcountry, the beautiful scenery and the great flying made this a fantastic event to attend. During the event I took a number of pictures for you to enjoy. I have forwarded these along with some pictures taken by Katmai owners Lud Corrao and Joe (thinking about stealing my heater) Rieger.

Quite a few of us met up in Driggs, Idaho before we flew up to the base camp at Big Creek. Along the way we stopped at Peekaboo (I know the spelling is wrong) for lunch. The ramp was crammed with aircraft taking part in the Safari, the food was great and so was the company. Once the great meal was over we swapped stories (I'm pretty sure all of them were true) for an appropriate length of time and then it was off to Big Creek to set up camp. We were in for three or four nights of camping and backcountry flying and I was looking forward to it. All the forest fires had been extinguished by either rain or snow in the weeks before so smoke and TFR's would not be a problem. The first thing I noticed on short final to Big Creek was the wrecked twin at the end of the runway. For the entire event we approached over the wreck and it was a reminder of what can go wrong when you don't know what you are doing.

I had expected cold nights so I had a great MSR artic tent, cot, -30F sleeping bag and most of all a heater. I would later find another Katmai owner that threatened to "liberate" my heater when I was not looking. Yes that is you Joe. One morning while he was complaining about the cold (it was 17F) I told him I needed to turn the heat in my tent down as it was melting the plastic on my shoes. I made this comment as I was trying to remove the damaged plastic. I will not pass along his comment about my predicament with the excessive heat in my tent but I think you get the picture. He was not very sympathetic to my problem. From that time on I watched my heater and his where abouts closely.

We got in some good flying the first day but everyone knew there was a weather system moving in so the nice weather would not last long. I along with Joe and Kari in their Katmai broke away from the group we were in to visit Vines, Soldier Bar and Dewey Moore. I thought this might be the only good flying day so I wanted to be sure and visit these strips before the Safari ended. I warmed up on Soldier Bar, then shot two take off's and landing at Vines before heading into Dewey Moore. Joe and Kari circled overhead watching just in case I had a problem. Normally I go this alone and I must admit it was nice having another airplane along. The visit to Soldier Bar was great. As always the strip seems to be a little on the rough side but damn was it fun. Joe and Kari estimated my take off distance at 250 feet or so. They said there was just a big cloud of dust and the Katmai literally came shooting right out of it off the ground. Vines is very narrow and little more difficuilt. The first landing at Vines found me with a little too much speed. I had to reduce power for touchdown and this is not what I wanted. After take off I flew a short distance down the canyon, did a quick canyon turn and headed back in to Vines. This time I got the speed down to about 45 kts on short final and all went well. Video of the visit to Vines should be on our web site shortly. From there it was on to Dewey Moore. Before making the standard approach with a right turn to landing I approached Dewey Moore a number of times from the opposite direction as I thought it possible to do a landing out of a hard left turn. By the time I arrived at Dewey Moore it was getting to be early afternoon and with the temperature and wind starting to come up it just did not feel good trying to get in the "hard way" so I just continued down the canyon for a standard approach. The visit to Dewey went well and once again the King Katmai used only a third or so of the 700 foot strip. I tried a straight out departure with a climb over the mountain at the end of the strip. When I was nearing the top of the mountain the trees were in the shadows and I could not get good depth perception. At this point I broke off the climb and proceeded down the canyon. I estimated I was within 150 foot to the top of the mountain when I broke off the climb. Joe and Kari think I could have made it so I will give it another shot this spring when the lighting is better. Safety always comes first. We then joined up with the rest of the group for the balance of the day and man was it fun. As the day wore on the wind kept coming up in advance of the front and it started to get pretty rough in spots. By the time we returned to Big Creek later in the afternoon the turbulence was becoming uncomfortable during spots in our approach to Big Creek. Nothing dangerous but not fun either.

Once back at Big Creek it was time to get a really big fire going and check out dinner. Our host had arranged for a chief to be flown in from a four start resort in Montana and we were going to eat pretty good. The Big Creek lodge provided their facilities for the meals and the people at the lodge were just great.

With the flying and dinner done we now settled in around the camp fire for what looked to be a cold night ahead.

[kwmoore]

Photos (http://www.260sepilots.org/gallery/album11) in the gallery section. :cool:

[Todd Peterson]

You know it is cold when a pilot sitting next to you has his feet so close to the camp fire his shoes are smoking and he leaves them there. As the sun went below the ridge it got cold fast. We all gathered around the camp fire and had a great time but it was getting real cold fast. At about 9:00 pm I decided to call it a night and head off to my tent to turn in. I must say the sleeping bag was very comfortable and I stayed warm through the night. There is just something great about sleeping out in the wilderness with a gun. It really brings out the best in you. Damn, I like this. About 3:00 am I woke up thinking about needing to "drain" some of the previous nights spirits that we all enjoyed. It was at the moment I stuck my head out of my sleeping bag that I realized it was damn cold out. Way, way, way too cold to be leaving a warm sleeping bag to go tramping through the forest to a near by out house. I decided I could live with the discomfort as sun up was only three hours away. It was at that moment that I also came up with a rule of thumb. During the balance of the Safari I would not drink anything after 6:00 pm to avoid a repeat of this. Absolutely no trips to the out house after turning in.

I woke back up before 6:00 am and my prior planning proved to be a winner. I had strategically placed the heater near my cot so I could just roll over, reach one arm out to light the heater and quickly retract it back into the warm sleeping bag until the tent warmed up a little. It worked like magic. I laid there for about half an hour getting toasty warm then got up. I even had warm shoes to put on. It was great. Of course I felt sorry for Joe and the rest that were freezing but then again not all that sorry. I must also say that Joe had little sympathy for me when I told him about the problem of overheating my shoes and melting the plastic on them. While Joe threatened to "liberate" my heater while I wasn't looking he is an honorable man and chose to remain cold rather than compromise his integrity.

The second day found us in good weather but with the wind really picking up. For the most part we thought it better to stay on the ground as the wind was gusting to better than 20 knots at times. Some went fishing, some went four wheeling and others like me just chose to take a hike. I spent the day in the forest miles away from the base camp. While I love to fly and came here to do just that the break turned out to be most welcome. I really enjoyed being alone in such a beautiful wilderness.

Everyone knew of the approaching front and the forecast of snow. Most decided to depart the next day as there was the possibility of being grounded for most of the following week if we missed the upcoming weather window. Later that afternoon and early evening a light rain started to fall and we knew that night was going to be a tough one. Once again the meal was superb, we gathered around the camp fire and I refrained from drinking anything after 6:00 pm. In the past I have had a number of individuals ask me if it is possible to camp out in the Katmai and I said yes I thought it was. As this looked to be the last night in camp I decided to spend it in the Katmai so I would know first hand if camping in the airplane was possible and comfortable. I had been in the tent for two nights and I thought the third should be with the airplane. Later that night I was hauling my sleeping bag out to the airplane. Even with one of those neat lights that you can strap to your head (truly a "head" light) it was not the easiest thing to find my way to the Katmai. Dark, rain and snow with no real path to follow. Damn, I still love this stuff. I spent this night in the Katmai and I was very comfortable. Once again it was bitterly cold with freezing rain turning to snow but I was pretty snug. For those that wish to camp at a different location every day sleeping in the airplane makes the most sense to me. It saves putting up and striking a tent every day and spending my last night in the Katmai was very comfortable. I found that one does need a small tarp or some kind of cover for the various camping things you might have left in the airplane. While there is more than enough room for sleeping there is not enough room to leave folding chairs, coolers, etc. in the airplane with you. I also found that for one person the room is very adequate. Two could sleep in the airplane but it would be snug. I can now discuss camping out overnight in the Katmai with some experience.

As I took my first look out the window come morning I became somewhat concerned we might not be able to leave before the front really hit. The freezing rain covered the airplanes with ice before a few inches of snow were dumped on them. The mountains and forest were beautiful but the airplanes looked like it might be spring before we could thaw them out. The temperature was 17F.

[Todd Peterson]

The morning was beautiful but boy was it going to be a job to get the airplanes ready to fly. My biggest concern was the approaching weather and the thought that if we did not leave today we could be stuck for the balance of the week. It was way to cold to melt any of the ice and snow and to make things worse there were low clouds keeping the sun from helping out. After having grown up and been flying in this kind of weather for a long time the first thought that came to mind was finding a broom. I walked to the Lodge and got one of the two or three brooms they could find and went to work cleaning the snow off the King Katmai. Most everyone else was just kind of drifting around waiting for breakfast. I told a fellow Katmai owner of the brooms and off he went to get one also. I knew that shortly when everyone realized what they needed to do to get their airplanes ready to fly there were going to be about 24 aircraft owners all wanting the three brooms. It pays to think ahead as there were going to be a lot of people waiting for their turn to clean off their airplane. The departure weather window looked like we had a brief period between 11:00 am and about 2:00 pm to get going. Without the sun helping it was going to be a struggle to get the airplanes clean enough to be safe and we also had to strike our tents and load the airplanes.

I was standing under the wing deep in thought when fellow Katmai owner Joe Rieger walked by and asked me what I was thinking. I told him I thought it possible to thermally deice the wing from the inside with the help of the preheater. I went about getting the stuff necessary to give it a try while everyone watched from a safe distance. I removed an inspection plate in the middle of the wing with another further inboard to provide a good draft. We fired up the preheater (which was located well away from the wing) and put the hose inside the open inspection plate hole pumping the hot air into the inside of the wing. I must say by now I had everyone's attention. Within five or ten minutes all the ice and snow had been removed from the upper surface of the wing and it was ready to go. I hate to claim a first in the backcountry as that is hard to do but even the experienced backcountry pilots there had never seen anything like that. Some even came up and said they would be doing the same thing in the future.

While I was loading up the King Katmai others were still scraping the ice and snow off their wings and it looked like hard work. Once loaded we said our good bye's and headed off for McCall. The clouds were low over the mountain tops and fresh snow had fallen everywhere making the mountains quite a pretty picture. The Katmai group landed in McCall and decided to stay the night. A nice new Motel was right across the street from the airport so we wondered over that way and checked in. The next morning dawned beautiful and we prepared for departure. The flight home was uneventful and with the help of a good tail wind at 15,500 feet I was running a 162 kt ground speed at 11.5 gph.

The trip was great but it's the people that really make it enjoyable. Everyone was friendly and you could not ask for a better group of people than those flying the Katmai's and soon to be Katmai's that attended. On every trip I learn something new and this trip was no exception. The most invaluable piece of equipment I had with me proved to be the on board generator. Every morning I preheated our King Katmai along with Joe and Kari's Katmai and it worked great. In about sixty to ninety minutes it took the cylinders from 17F to 45F and the same with the oil. While everyone else was messing around with their preheaters the generator was easy and quick. I will never take a trip into the backcountry without it. Other big plus's for the Katmai is its great cabin heater as I was never cold in the airplane, its big cargo area for tons of goodies which make life more comfortable in the middle of the wilderness, it's weight in turbulence, it's slow speed maneuverability, its safety and its great cross country capability. Without the ability to fly long distances to get to these great places it just wouldn't be practical. At the end of this trip there was nothing else I thought needed to be done with the Katmai, no improvements to be made as it is a finished and tested airplane now.

[kwmoore]

The most invaluable piece of equipment I had with me proved to be the on board generator. Every morning I preheated our King Katmai along with Joe and Kari's Katmai and it worked great. In about sixty to ninety minutes it took the cylinders from 17F to 45F and the same with the oil. While everyone else was messing around with their preheaters the generator was easy and quick. I will never take a trip into the backcountry without it.
Tina and I don't do winter well so perhaps we'll never have occasion to use preheat, but I'm curious about the following: after you've warmed the engine/oil up in such an environment, how long do you have to start it before it gets too cold again?

[Todd Peterson]

With the temperature as cold as it was I wouldn't want to wait long. I would guess ten to fifteen minutes tops.