West

The South Dakota badlands are still tinged with the pink of a lingering sunrise.

The Missouri River is behind us, ahead lies Rapid City and a 10-hour wait before it's time to load up with freight and head for home.

Next to me is a rare treat; an employee has hopped a ride from FSD to RAP so I have a passenger and somebody to talk to. Except he is asleep so I am, effectively, still alone. 

I envy his sleep. My alarm clock rang at 3 a.m. and I was at the airport by 4 to complete the pre-flight in time for my scheduled 4:30 a.m. departure.

As luck would have it, my freight arrived late and I didn't fully wake up the 310 until 4:50 a.m.

I love the way this airplane comes to life in the morning. It rumbles and belches just enough smoke to conjure images of a proper airplane: Round engines and open cockpits and all that romantic crap.

Thankfully the engines are no longer round but are incredibly reliable, the cockpit is enclosed and well heated and I have a fine array of instrumentation in front of me. But still, for a moment on a chilly fall morning it could be 1950, or 1940 or 1930. Beautiful then, if you're the sort who can ignore the abysmal safety record the “golden age” of aviation produced.

The taxi out was a challenge. The pre-dawn condensation kept building up on both the inside and outside of the windscreen leaving me nearly blind straight ahead, so I opened the door on the right side of the cockpit and the storm window next to my seat on the left and tiptoed to the runway.

Run-up complete and the defrost fan on high but still I could see nearly nothing so I waited a few minutes in hopes the fan would eventually clear the mist from the windscreen as I watched patches of ground fog form and steak past my side windows.

The streaks of ground fog worry me. If they continue to build I might not have enough visibility to depart but because of the condensation I can't quite see ahead well enough to be comfortable.

Enough is enough then. If I sit here it will be well past dawn by the time this damn windscreen clears, no matter how many times I wipe it with the paper towels I've scrounged from the bathroom. And I am supposed to be well west of Sioux Falls by dawn.

So I key the runway lights up to their highest intensity and taxi out, taking care to look out the side window to ensure the runway is clear and then making sure that an equal amount of lights appear on both the left and right sides of my fogged-over windscreen.

I let the H.S.I. settle down then carefully set the heading bug so it is perfectly aligned with my course. I can see well enough out the side of the airplane, just not straight ahead.

And with that bit of preparation, I am off.

I concentrate on keeping the heading bug perfectly aligned with the runway heading and before I reach 80 knots the slipstream has blown the outside of the windscreen nearly clear and the airflow into the cabin has improved enough that the defrost is starting to clear the inside of the screen as well. At 92 knots I pull back and I am flying.

Glory be, I can see.

It was, and I knew it to be at the time, a silly decision to even attempt the takeoff. A more prudent pilot would have cleared the windscreen – even if that meant waiting until dawn - rather than try to pull off such a stunt and I am frustrated at my lack of professionalism.

I let the beauty and romance of the morning get the better of my judgment and luckily this time it worked out. I am, sadly, as Ernie Gann so accurately put it: Helpless before the opportunity to take a chance.

Still, I knew it could be done with a reasonable degree of safety so I went for it with only my life and my license in the balance and considering it a fair risk. It is not a show of skill, only of weakness.

At Sioux Falls I dropped some cargo, picked up some more along with my passenger for the morning and headed for Rapid City.

We depart late, thanks to the delay with our couriers and my own dalliances before leaving Anoka.

I don't know the official distinction between “Midwest” and “West” but for me it is the Missouri River.

Stunningly beautiful as it meanders through the Dakotas, the Missouri is a dividing line. To it's East it is nearly all green fields and level ground. To the West the land is more arid, more rugged and far less populated.

From the air, a vantage point I am fortunate enough to enjoy today, the distinction is clear. We fly over yellow-tinged fields from Sioux Falls to the Missouri and from then on the land below is browner, harsher, far less populated and the washes and plateaus that symbolize “the West” become more pronounced.

I sit, spellbound, watching the strange land below me turn pink then orange then yellow then brown as the sun rises behind us and wish I was home, surrounded by trees and water for these are the things I have grown used to and taken for granted.

The Black Hills rise in the distance as we descend into Rapid City. My passenger is awake now and chatting away.

We land and the courier remarks on our lateness. What can I say? That I took off without seeing, that his counterparts in Anoka were late to begin with so it is their fault and that we had headwinds the whole way out?

Or do I say that a few minutes either way makes no difference to mankind and that I wish he could have seen the beauty of the badlands at dawn?

I shrug and say “well, we're here now.”

And we are.