AOPA Pilot Magazine - February 2013 - 14

LETTERS
Proficient Pilot

true confessions

BY BarrY Schiff

Up, up, and away in a beautiful balloon
in 1959 i applied to the Federal Aviation Agency, predecessor to today’s Federal Aviation Administration, for a
lighter-than-air rating limited to hot-air balloons. The
rating was issued and has been on my pilot certificate
ever since.
True Confession No. 1: Until recently I had never been
in a balloon. I had never even been near one.
Such a statement obviously raises eyebrows but is
true. I had been reviewing the requirements for various ratings and discovered a quirk in the regulations,
one that I could not resist putting to the test. The next
day found me waltzing into the local General Aviation
District Office (GADO) and asking politely for a balloon
rating. The inspector behind the counter was flummoxed. “How,” he wanted to know, “can you expect to
qualify for a balloon rating when your application indicates that you have no experience in one?”
Being the smart ass that I was, I triumphantly
pulled out the regulation showing that any commercial fixed-wing pilot wanting a balloon rating could

I even thought about cancelling the flight,
but the fear of losing a significant deposit
overrode my fear of heights.

bArry schIff

has written more
than 1,600
magazine articles
and currently
is writing his
fourteenth book.

have one simply for the asking. Unable to accept at face
value what clearly was shown in black and white, the
inspector retired to a glass cubicle and called the FAA’s
regional counsel for an official interpretation of that regulation. I couldn’t hear the conversation, but I could see
the inspector listening intently, shaking his head in disbelief, and finally hanging up.
“Looks like you’re right, kid. Stand by while I have
a balloon rating added to your certificate.”
My new balloon rating became the talk of the airport and an easy way to win a bet. It wasn’t long before
other pilots began applying for their balloon ratings. Our
GADO became deluged with requests until an urgent
order soon was handed down from FAA headquarters:
“No more balloon ratings shall be issued to pilots without balloon experience” (or something to that effect).
Fortunately, those of us who beat the deadline were
“grandfathered” and allowed to retain our ratings.
I always felt guilty about “being” a balloon pilot for
more than 50 years without having been in a balloon.
The reason that I had never flown a balloon is because…

True Confession No. 2: I have a fear of heights (acrophobia); there was no way that I would be willing to stand
in basket suspended in midair and peer over its edge.
Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Based on my own
informal survey taken over many years, it seems that a
relatively large percentage of pilots suffer from a fear of
heights. It’s an interesting fear in the sense that we are
not affected by it when we fly. This might be because
we cannot easily fall, be pushed out, or give in to an
impulsive urge to jump. Stand on the edge of a building, though, and that fear can become debilitating. Given
my own fear of heights (other than when flying), I had
always suspected that I would be riddled with nervous
anxiety during a balloon flight because I perceived that
it would be so easy to fall, to be pushed out, or to yield
to an impulsive urge to jump.
Fast forward to the recent AOPA Summit in Palm
Springs, California, where there was an opportunity to
purchase dual instruction in a hot-air balloon. Having
felt somewhat fraudulent for brandishing a hot-air balloon rating throughout my career without ever having
been in one, I decided it was time to log a balloon flight,
acrophobia or no. I confess to sleeplessness the night
before my scheduled flight.
As the sun appeared from behind the horizon and
gave warmth to the Coachella Valley, my instructor,
Dave Lynch, explained the process of laying out and preparing the envelope for flight. He demonstrated how a
fan is used to blow ambient air into the envelope, known
as a cold inflation. Hot air from the balloon’s burner is
then used to complete the inflation. The 77,000-cubicfoot Firefly envelope gradually lifted from its horizontal
position and began to rise from the desert floor like a
slowly awakening beast.
We clambered into the basket, where Dave handed
me a pair of gloves and taught me how to use the burner.
Before I had time to worry about my fear of heights, the
gentle giant was slowly floating into the calm sky. More
blasts of hot air had us climbing to and then leveling off
at a hundred or so feet agl. An occasional two- to threesecond blast of the burner kept us there.
Fear of heights? I experienced none. I felt only inner
peace and a sense of rapture. There also was a realization
that it had been a monumental mistake to have deprived
myself of such joy for so many years.
AOPA
WeB

“Strange how so many True confessions
Long-EZ
pilots share this char- Barry Schiff does not have acro- Thank you for providing an
acteristic. I cannot get phobia (fear of heights) but accurate article describing
up on my own roof or a fear of edges. If he had true the tragic events that led to
beyond the sixth or acrophobia, he wouldn’t have the loss of John Denver and
the flying career he has had. As his Long-EZ (“Safety Pilot:
seventh rung on any my psychiatrist brother-in-law Landmark Accident”). As an
ladder.”
explained to me, acrophobia is owner of a Long-EZ, I hear the
Howard Kave,
AOPA 1206353
New Windsor, New York

www.barryschiff.com

18 | AOPA PILOT December 2012

David Fisch,
AOPA 965311
North Las Vegas, Nevada

14 | AOPA PILOT February 2013

Rod Machado will receive a lot
of grief, but it couldn’t be more
on the money. I have been a CFI
for 36 years, flown in the military, retired from a major airline,
and now have the privilege
of being an FAA flight examiner. I was 29 years old and had
2,500 hours when I got hired by
American Airlines. Now I’m 63
and know what takes to be an
asset on the flight deck of a 121
carrier. Put your time in, young
man; pay your dues; and you
will be rewarded. I was.
Dan Unger,
AOPA 4680611
Saint Clair, Michigan

David Werdegar,
AOPA 3702700
Naperville, Illinois

same question concerning this
accident over and over. In my
24 years of flying, I believe the
Long-EZ is one of the safest airplanes I have ever flown (I have
around 15,000 hours in everything from gliders to 767-400s).
I recently took my EZ down to
the Cayman Islands and hope
to fly much, much farther in
the future. This relatively small
group of owners has great pride
in these extraordinary flying
machines. Long-EZs have flown
around the world many times
and hold numerous records to
prove it. I am proud to be part
of this flying community and a
member of AOPA.
Mike Turner,
AOPA 1130771
Acworth, Georgia

We welcome your comments.
Editor, AOPA PIlot, 421 Aviation
Way, Frederick, Maryland 21701
or email (pilot@aopa.org). Letters may be edited for length
and style before publication.

HANGAR TALK

could keep up with. Recently
I saw an ad for CFIs for a couple of big schools in California
that train ab initio students for
major airlines. The highest staring salary was $19 an hour for a
CFI-I ASMEL. That’s not much
money for a person that has
invested more than $60,000 in
learning a skill.
I found a constant-dollar calculator. I entered $7 and the
year 1967. The 2012 constantdollar equivalent is $48.48. That
kind of salary would be a big
incentive to draw people into
the CFI field. The cost of flight
training was serious money in
the 1960s, but it paid at a rate
that made it worthwhile. The
pay problem continues after
flight instruction apprenticeship. A pay scale published for
the largest small-package carrier in the country only pays
$1,800 a month for a new first
officer. Are they serious? A firstyear hair stylist makes more. My
handyman wants $500 a day for
his services. All pilots love flying, but we have to be well paid
for the position. I am happy to
see that smart people are not
investing their money without
hope of fair compensation.

an irrational fear of heights. His
patients have trouble riding in
elevators, let alone airplanes.
The fear of edges (which I
also have) is a rational survivor holdover from prehistoric
times when a healthy fear of
edges such as cliffs kept your
genes in the gene pool. I can
spend hours upside down in a
Pitts S–2A or Stearman hanging by my shoulder straps with
my only concern being do I
have enough cash for this? But
I canceled my introductory
parachute jump when I stood
two feet off the ground in the
open hatch of a Pilatus. I also
will not look over the edge of
the railing in front of my room
facing the open courtyard of a
Hyatt Regency Hotel. Neither
will my buddy who flew F–4s
in Vietnam.

The words “secret
no-fly zone” are
enough to make
any pilot nervous.
So when ePilot
Editor SARAH BROWN
heard that a pilot
had been arrested
for flying in one—
and charged with breach of peace in
a silent, motorless glider, no less—she
was concerned (“BREACH OF PEACE,” page
58). It turns out pilot Robin Fleming was
flying legally in nonrestricted airspace,
but that didn’t spare him a night in jail.
“The whole situation seemed even more
absurd after I met Fleming,” Brown
says. “His friends at the gliderport were
baffled that such a mild-mannered and
careful pilot could find himself having
his mug shot taken. ‘That boy has never

had a ticket,’ Frank Reid told me. ‘He is
the most laid back and gentle person I
have ever seen in my life.’”
When BARRY SCHIFF
produced the children’s recording,
Buster B-T, in 1961,
he never thought
that he would have
the opportunity to
fly one (a Vultee
BT–13). He expresses
gratitude to the Commemorative Air
Force for preserving historic warbirds
in airworthy condition and finally giving
him that opportunity (“SHAKING THINGS
UP,” page 50). “It is an honor to fly the
airplane that provided basic flight training to more pilots during World War II
than any other,” he says.

http://www.barryschiff.com

AOPA Pilot Magazine - February 2013

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