Kudos to those that donated sweat to the parking lot and bailout area. Parking lot is smoother than I’ve ever seen it and the bailout is downright luxurious.

Since he was the only one to not sink straight to the LZ, it was decided Jerome was using orange magic. Probably counts as cheating.

Definitely good to keep in mind. The last 2 weeks, with their really nice, high conditions, definitely put us in the big boys’ playground. Head on a swivel.

Also – some weird aircraft activity today. Saw a helicopter cruise right over the 750 (I was at Cloud), and around the same time, saw a squadron of small prop aircraft buzz right over the Crestline launch.

AJX is using cellular (it’s not WiFi since the WiFi at AJX has been, historically, unreliable – the Crestline station is the only one using WiFi since there’s reliable WiFi and since the cellular signal strength up there is terrible). Sounds like AJX switched over to the 2G network when the 3G shutdown happened (on the 19th), as the SIM provider (hologram) allows devices to automatically switch between networks (depending on whichever provides the strongest signal).

It’s possible that upgrading the directional antenna on Marshall (not sure if the frequency range for 2G is completely different than 3G – if it is, the antenna should be replaced; if they are in the same range, then perhaps just a better antenna with more gain) or pointing it at a different tower in the area would do the trick.

A couple of us were in radio communication with the pilot and with Gene/AJX while he was working on his gear. We also relayed his GPS coordinates to the LZ.

As sunset got closer, we recommended to him that he come back for his gear the following day and start hiking down, and also gave a suggested path down to the road. Gene drove up as far up the road as he could but the gates were locked and no one on duty at the station to provide access.

Just my opinion, but I think we did all we could, and communication with both the pilot and AJX were good (even though not everyone in the LZ was up on the situation it sounds like). Perhaps he could have dropped what he was doing much earlier to start hiking out (likely the best move in this situation), but pilots in the air were in no position to make that assessment for him. Looked pretty thick from where I was sitting, but I couldn’t assess if he had a 20 minute hike or a 3 hour bushwhack ahead of him.

I think Tom’s suggestion of a radio in the LZ is a great idea. It’s come up before but hasn’t gotten traction for some reason. Even if it’s not on all the time, maybe just turning it on in the event of an incident (after the frequency for response has been made known) so that folks on the ground can monitor easily?

Ditto. More fun on a weekday than should be allowed. Had a few moments of “weird,” and lots of aircraft looky-loos. Thanks, Jerome, for the great photo.

Checking my logs, I had my personal best max altitude yesterday (8668′ MSL) and flew for just over 3 hours.

Regarding the reserve deployment – it was lucky that the pilot happened to ask on launch what frequency we would be on. If he didn’t, I don’t think anyone would have known he was down. I don’t think anyone saw the deployment (he radioed it in after he landed), and even after flying directly over his position many times with him trying to describe his position, none of us could see him, his wing, or his reserve in the thick brush. Definitely pays to be on radio (even if there’s only one other person on the other end).

Muchas grassias to Dan and Tim.