EAA Sport Aviation - March 2011

decision to launch into light rain, 3 miles’ visibility, and 800- to 1,000-foot ceilings. I tucked in on Nel’s wing (you do not want to lose your leader in low visibility close to the ground) and stayed there.

I could tell Nel was doing a lot of maneuvering to get set up for the initial point (IP) and to get the timing perfect. I could see him using a hand towel to wipe the moisture from the inside of his canopy. He then gave me the hand signal to cross under to his right wing, such that I’d be able to pull up and away to the west—the missing man—upon command. Nel then gave the “two minutes out” call to Milon, our man on the ground at the ceremony with the handheld radio. At the appointed time Nel said, “Pull…now!” I couldn’t pull up because of the low cloud cover, so I just pulled away and flew west—for our pilot/buddy Neil.

Often, when you have to make tough pilot decisions, you think back to other aviation decisions you’ve made over the years, some good and some not so good.

Nel then entered traffic at the local airport closest to the ceremony. I fell into the trail position, and we landed, taxied to our pre-briefed parking area, shut down, and rolled our canopies back. First thing Nel said was, “What did we just do?” He was talking about the scud we’d just been running. And then he said, “Couldn’t have done it without the GPS.” He had pre-programmed the IP into his GPS, which gave him the lead-in point for the ceremony we couldn’t see from the IP. I’m always one to pop off at my hangar with, “GPSes are for sissies.” Well, okay, except for this day. My bride then pulled up in the car and whisked us to the ceremony.

At the ceremony, the flyby was much appreciated. And it fit nicely with the aviation display that Neil’s bride, Betty, created: It had lots of Neil’s aviation memorabilia: his logbooks, an EAA Sport Aviation magazine opened to the column “Flying Buddy” (August 2008), and a military flight suit with dry toast (mentioned in that column) sticking out from the lower left leg pocket.

We honored our flying buddy. He’d have liked that. He’d have also understood if we canceled because of weather. We didn’t do anything dangerous: We always had ground contact, knew where we were, and had an out. The marginal part

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