Did the same stuff in a Beech-18, Aztec, and a 310R between Buffalo NY, a bunch of towns in upstate NY, and Chicago MDW in the early 80's. Great memories......hellacious weather!
I few night mail and freight in the 70s. 2000 hours in Beech18s. First worked for an operator out of Malden, Missouri. Few several routes: Memphis to Tri Cities; Tennessee, out of Malden: STL, LIT, AWM, MAW; Carbondale to Midway and return; Tampa, Charleston and return. Five engine failures. Did not kill myself, although I tried at times. If you can fly a Twin Beech. You can fly most anything. It was the one airplane that required more stick and rudder skills than any other airplane I ever few. Forty two years and nine type ratings. Taught me a lot, loved the machine. Grateful for the experience.
Yep....all my tailwheel time was in E 18...and I always had trouble with the boss Never put freight past the first door jamb,strap it down...stay out of the mountains.did wall street journal to salt lake city from Hayward ca. Not safe
All these stories, no matter how bad they're experiences were, make me wish I was around for this. These are real pilots who had to make real decisions every flight and weren't given easy tasks. They were given a loaded airplane and told to figure it out, it's unheard of in today's world especially with people that have only been flying with GPS.
Loved the story! Did the same for a northeast based cargo outfit at the same time. Aztec's, Navajo's and Seneca’s. The guy I worked for could sell scales to a fish so it was pretty much the same. "you can check the weather all you want , you’re going anyway". And the T-storm advice is right on, either 3000 or 43000, did the same. I probably saw him in Teterboro, I did nightly runs into there before heading to Buffalo or Pittsburgh, I wouldn’t trade it for the world as well. Our secret weapon was NorthStar Lorans - remember them? Keep the stories coming!
I was a Canis Freightus Air Cargus Nocturnas back in the mid 70's to 1980. All my time was in the Twin Beech, Turbine Beech (Volpar), CJ600, DC-3, DC-4 and ATL-98. I've got a ton of stories but I'm not sure if the statute of limitations has run out on the FAR's that were bent, broken or disregarded. It was a great learning experience that couldn't have been duplicated in any other type of flying. Of all the flying jobs I've ever had, including Capt. with one of the majors, it is the one that I miss the most.
