"Tree-Smacking with Darryl's Butterfly"

Suffering from some sort of cranky indifference over the weekend, I passed on traveling to Breezy Hill for our annual memorial fun-fly to our late/great buddy, Darryl Wilson.

After a few hours of sitting in my chair like an old man waiting to yell at kids to get off his lawn, I noticed that the wind had really dropped, and decided to bring out the Dynaflite Butterfly Darryl had built several years before his passing.

I'd charged it up the previous night, on the chance that I might feel more sociable on Sunday, so it was just a matter of strapping on it's wings and going for it.  I KNEW I wasn't at the top of my game, as far as flying, but just went for it, and got a reasonable flight that was right on the verge of being fun.

After a successful return, out came the Go Pro cameras and their selfie sticks, and the Butterfly was refueled for another round.  In spite of my freshly mowed yard, I chose to hand-launch from the cow lot, as the wind was now rapidly picking up from the southeast.

This went well, with the O.S. .25FP hauling the motorglider through the downwind turbulence of the back barn.  I flew only a few laps, with a couple loop sessions before the rising wind convinced me to bring the Butterfly home.

Instead of going for the wonderful tall grass of the cow lot or pasture, I elected, as I'd done in the previous flight, to "shoot the chute"...that somewhat narrow approach to my front yard between the powerlines and cedar tree.

When the breeze is up, this approach can be a little dicey...having to keep power up for control of the plane, AND knowing when to cut it to keep from going through my living room window.  I let the Butterfly get too slow, and when it entered the chop and rotors from the cedar tree, it started wallowing around, with me about a half-second behind what was happening.

I SHOULD HAVE jammed power on and climbed out (ever mindful of not letting it hit the wires on the left and shutting down power to the subdivision), but continued to fight it with my slow reflexes as it went after the cedar tree like an angry chihuahua.

The impact wasn't very violent, as the plane's groundspeed, against the wind and my wobbling, was negligible and the Butterfly just sort of stopped and fell to the ground.  Amazingly undamaged, the only real trauma was the loss of one of it's Go Pro cameras (ALWAYS search the crash site for material and debris before carrying the mess back to the bench!).  The camera fell of the wing, and was lost in the tall weeds for about half an hour.  It was finally located (as I knew it would be) embarrassingly close by, having even recorded my stomping around as I searched for it.

So, all is well, and I really ought to drag it out again for some practice/polishing of my gradually degrading flying skills!















https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqWtLGqEffA