July 2004 – Herrick Home Page

July 28, 2004

I DID IT!! I CAUGHT THE GREEN FLASH! I had never thought I would ever see it such as this, and I caught it on camera!!!! Pam saw it too and was punching me on my arm, “Did you see that” she asked over and over again!

Here is the sunset as it unfolded:

Sunset, on Sunset Beach, Treasure Island Florida, July 28,2004; 8:19 PM

Little boy enjoying the surf 8:23 PM

Sun setting 8:26 PM

The Green Flash!

The Flash – detail!

For a good explanation (and eye popping pictures from telescopes) see http://mintaka.sdsu.edu/GF/

I have waited 30 years to see this!

July 25, 2004

Got this from Jim:

OK, Boys and Girls… Before riding off into the sunset, perhaps we should reflect a bit on the simple virtues of the past. Take a gander at our American Virtues at:

http://www.catsprn.com/cowboys.htm

July 24, 2004

Happy Birthday David! Tried to call but get a busy.

We spent the morning getting dirty:

Pam took this picture of part of our crew!

A small part of our mess.

It looks like I am the choir director!

Jim is home he is coming over for chess in the morning!

July 21, 2004

Jim is doing better, we played chess last night in his hospital room – he beat me two out of three games!

Pam had a scare, she and I had been working all summer on a major presentation she was to give yesterday, today and tomorrow. She took it to school Monday. Her computer froze up! Then her IT person tried to back it up and lost the entire presentation!!!!!! We had tried to back up the presentation but the Apple is different. When you use search, it tells you that the program is there, but not where you can find it! The presentation uses many smaller files, but if you cannot find the smaller files (with unknown names) you cannot move the entire presentation to a safe place! Monday night she and I recreated the whole thing. It took 7 hours but it went off without a hitch yesterday! It still is not backed up, but after the third presentation she will again try to back it up. I wish her IT person luck in backing it up. I am glad Pam is getting a new computer – and it is going to be a Dell!

Note from Don:

I picked this up from a hang-gliding newsletter I read. Weather is a big thing for pilots. We get this report from Britain…
———————–
With all the news on TV lately about the extreme weather conditions affecting the East Coast of the US, the mud slides in the Middle East and South America, along with the dire predictions made by such films as The Day After Tomorrow, we shouldn’t forget that Britain has its fair share of devastating weather too.

I’ve attached a photo [gone] illustrating the damage caused to a friend’s home from a storm that passed through Southern England the other night. It really makes you cherish what you have, and reminds us not to take things for granted.

———————–

Don

Cell: (408) 718-6527

And check out David’s BLOG. his house is coming along!

July 19, 2004

Dad and Betty came down last weekend. Pam made lunch (I only grilled the chicken) and we played on making Roger Bansemer’s puzzle:

Dad and Betty having to get one more piece in before leaving!

Jim is a lot better he swallowed some mineral spirits. It almost killed him (heart went into fibrillation, lungs scarred). Now he is fighting for his life, but his nurse says he is winning. He has been in for a week and is still in intensive care for his lungs, his heart seems to be OK.

July 10, 2004

Motorized hang glider that came by the other night just at sunset:

Note from Dan (quite the adventures!!):

Hi John and the rest of the family

Just wanted to drop a quick note about activities in Bar Habba, Maine.

I’ve been doing quite a bit of flying lately. So far, two Angel Flights
this month. One was Bar Harbor to Portland and back. No big deal but it
was in instrument conditions (thick layer of cloud deck between me and the
mother earth) and requiring instrument approaches both ways. The second
one was yesterday, Friday, from Bar Harbor to Boston, Boston to Bangor then
back to Bar Harbor. What a flight. When I left Bar Harbor a line of
thunderstorms had swept through west to east and it looked like it was
clear to Boston. However, below Portland another batch of t-storms sprung
up and the Portland controller handed me off to Boston with a warning that
this new line of “cells” were ten miles ahead and the Boston controller
would give me vectors around them. After signing on with Boston, I waited
and waited and waited and finally the controller asked me if I had weather
reporting equipment on board. Telling her no, she then had me make an
immediate turn to the left and it took me out into the ocean a few
miles. After going around a large band of t-storms, I landed on the
shortest runway at Boston parallel to a runway where two big jets were
landing at the same time. I picked up my patient and headed for the same
runway the big jets were landing on. They directed me to a taxiway half
way down that runway and this gigantic jet (from my perspective) landed in
front of me. They asked me to go out onto the runway, telling me there was
another jet on a four mile final approach behind me. As soon as the
landing jet got off the runway, they ordered me to take off with no delay
(and I didn’t delay) and got off just at the jet must have been touching
down behind me. It was a hectic day in Boston and I was glad to get out of
there and headed back to Maine. Again, I was vectored around a line of
t-storms in the Portland area and again flew in the soup up to Bangor and
dropped off my patient. He was happy to feel the ground as it was very
boring (scary for him probably) not seeing the ground (or anything) for an
hour or so. I returned to my home base in Bar Harbor and got tucked in
between two corporate jets bring the Martha Stewart types in for a weekend
at their summer cottages. The controllers wanted to get us in to Bar
Harbor in a hurry as the cloud deck was coming down so I flew the fastest
approach I’ve ever flown. Usually I fly an approach at 90 knots and this
time I did it at about 120 knots. Following a swinging needle on the
dashboard and trying to stay on the glide path was a challenge. I popped
out of the clouds at 700 feet above airport and landed as quick as I could
so the next guy could start in. Always a thrill to see the airport in
front of me where it suppose to be when coming out of total white out
conditions in the clouds. That was a five and one half hour flight in
total, two and one half hours each way to Boston and a half hour to Bar Harbor.

Today I had a leisurely four hour flight in the back of a Civil Air Patrol
Cessna 182 while we tried to locate a EPIRB.

(The emergency beacon ships
use to signal they’ve sunk) I’m a Second Lieutenant in the CAP and
“volunteered” to ride along on this mission. We were told that we had an
eight mile section of the ocean and land around a little island known as
Egg Rock just southeast of Bar Harbor to search for the signal of the EPIRB
or look for a sinking vessel. I was the spotter on the plane and we were
using the directional finding equipment on the plane and talking to ground
crews. We located the EPIRB in a pile of trash behind someone house in a
town called Otter Creek. The battery on the EPIRB was past the expiration
date so the owner took it out of his fishing boat and threw it in a trash
pile.

The scenario down on the ground went something like this…. An airplane
circles low over the area over the guys property for a couple of hours.
Then, two white, windowless government vans covered in antennae pulled up
on this guys property. About ten men in military camouflage uniforms
jumped out carrying more antennas, pointing them in all directions and
then headed to a spot behind the guy’s garage. When they asked him about
the EPIRB, he claims he didn’t know it was still working. The military men
jump back into the vans and leave with the EPIRB telling the guy that
they’ll be in touch. The guy’s probably not sober right now.

As some of you know, Trevor graduated from Southern Maine Community College
in May. He has an associate degree in Law Enforcement. He is working at
Pirate’s Cove this summer. He recently flew to Florida for an entrance
test to attend a an Law Enforcement Police Academy in the St. Augustine
area. He scored a 97 out of 100 so he’ll probably be accepted. He plans
to drive to Florida in October and start school as soon as possible. Once
though school, he’ll be able to select from any of the Police Departments
in Florida who want him and he’ll come back to Maine. We’ll miss our baby.

To help fend off the empty nest syndrome, we are currently looking at
buying a piece of land and building a house on it in Trenton, just off Mt.
Desert Island (and next to the airport). Still in the negotiating stage
for the land though.

Guess I’ve rambled on too much and if I know you John, you’ll edit
this. Hope you are feeling better.

Love to all

Dan

July 7, 2004

David’s home is taking shape: David’s BLOG

Note from Don:

Thanks John for the excellent photography work you did. The other pilots really appreciated getting a CD with their photos just hours after they were taken.

The slide show is of pictures John took during three flights I made in Yosemite valley on 6/25 – 6/26 – 6/27. The launch is from Glacier Point across from Half Dome and the landing is in a meadow to the west of Yosemite lodge. The park allows pilots to fly only before 9:00 AM each day in order to limit problems from crowds of spectators. The problem for us pilots is that at this early hour there is virtually no thermal activity so our flights are short (10 minutes or so). But despite the short flight, the scenery is incredible and it is an unforgettable experience to explore the valley from a vantage point that few tourists can. It was extra special for me since John was able to join Stephen and me for this trip.

Don

July 2004

Happy 4th!

Click here for a slide show of Donald’s hangliding.

Some pictures of the 4th:

From David: