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AN "UNSCHEDULED" LANDING -- WHERE DID THAT TREE COME FROM?
Most long time RCers have seen crashes, smashes & various other disasters; repairs & rebuilding are just part of the hobby. I've built lots of models over the years, but have just lately started to get serious about the flying them. Figuring that I "graduated" from the trainee level where an experienced pilot on dual controls can jump in when something gets a bit "hairy", I put together a "KWIK-FLY" model to sharpen my solo pilot skills.

So a nice day showed up, I grabbed a buddy to check out the plane & took it up anxious to do some outside loops and inverted flying. Did a few take-offs and landings; the bird was really humming along.

On about the fifth pass, I guess the plane was a bit futher out than I thought; all of a sudden a tall pine tree appeared & snatched my plane.

The 150' pine tree wasn't about to let go of my plane, but tomorrow was supposed to be quite windy & maybe the wind would blow it down. As predicted the winds were about 50MPH the next day, so I drove out to where my model was held captive hoping that it had shook loose. But no such luck; it was still stuck high in the treetop.
After several days passed with the model refusing to budge & numerous suggestions on how to retrieve my KWIK-fLY model [like "chop the tree down"], I borrowed some climbing gear, clamped on the tree- climbing spurs, strapped on a safety belt & up the tree I went with a pal manning the ropes. Phew, what a climb!

Got the plane down; engine & radio are both ok; the fuselage is in pretty good shape; wing has two large dings, one about 4" long that goes back to main spar; the tree-climbing pilot is done in -- gonna need a long soak in a hot tub.

Repairs are now finished. Recovered the whole model. The bottom is all black so I added invasion stripes on one side of the bottom wing to get a good look at it in the air. The top of the re-done plane is Chrome with fluorescent Pink . Wow!!!!!



Look out trees here I come. Took the plane up on the next nice day and stayed *F A R* away from the trees. The rebuilt plane performed very well. No trim needed. Took about 5 flights, the last, on takeoff at full throttle, the engine quit after the plane was about 10 feet in the air, so I had to do a real fast landing and it rolled into the Stop Net with not a single scratch. Thanks for the Stop Net that was installed a few months ago; before that I would have hit the barbed wire fence. A NARROW ESCAPE!.


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