Two Scoops and a Skip

The "Skip" portion of today's coverage is, of course, centered on Dago Red pilot Skip Holm. Holm handily won today's gold heat race while keeping a comfortable distance ahead of September Fury and its pilot; Mike Brown. What does Brown have left? Does Voodoo have something interesting under her dress? Will Merlin's Magic reap the benefits of a front runner blowing up? Who has how much throttle left for Sunday?

Knowing just a little about Dago Red Crew Chief Bill Kerchenfaut's racing strategy, fans understand they will run Dago just hard enough to stay in front. Why run it harder than necessary? You first have to finish in order to finish first. The only real threat Dago can see is from Mike Brown and September Fury, but can he keep the souped-up R-3350 cool enough at high power settings? Another threat, but at a discount, is Strega. Unfortunately, the Merlin powering the racer an unknown quantity. Tiger cruised through the silver race today to bag a win at 413 mph... Fine for today, but tomorrow everybody is coming to Stead with their boots cinched up tight. Can the Mix-And-Match Merlin make 135 inches? Will it live for the entire race at that power? 

There are rumors bouncing around the pits; but there is one that I believe in. The Tige will put some 'hammer' to Strega tomorrow, Mix-And-Match Merlin or not. The engine under the bonnet is somewhat of an unknown... Tiger has gotten to know the engine just a little during ground runs, a quick test flight, and today's silver race. Only himself, LD Hughes and Danny Martin know what the engine is capable of, so we'll find out tomorrow.

Scoop One

What really happened with Miss America? The fans know this much; pilot Brent Hisey had his engine self destruct, and he put the aircraft down a bit sideways on runway 32. The aircraft sustained major damage, but Hisey was thankfully unhurt. He took the time to sit down today and recount his experience.

"We were trying to run a larger motor this year than we had before, and we have the utmost confidence in it. It was a -9 lower end with a -9 blower, and it had Allison rods, Roush pistons and 620 heads and banks. We were very pleased with the engines, and it ran very well on the test stand. Through all of the preliminary flights and right up to the catastrophic failure, everything ran fine. Everything seemed very good. I was commenting to myself during qualifying; we were on the second qualifying lap at 100 inches and 3,200 rpm. I thought how smooth and cool the engine was running."

Then there was a loud "boom" from the engine and the racer began shaking. Rather badly, too.

"There was smoke coming off of the sides of the engine, and oil coming on the windscreen. Something catastrophic had happened... I was probably doing about 400 mph coming around six and seven. I pulled up to get as much altitude as possible, and left the flaps up to keep the airplane clean. Then I put the gear down because I thought I had the diagonal - 32 - made. Then the oil; pressure dropped, and the prop went flat. The airspeed dramatically decayed.

You know, we practice engine out, and we're always doing that at idle. But when the blades go flat, what a huge airbrake that prop is. So I put the nose down even further, Then it was an issue of geometry. I was trying to maintain enough airspeed to make it to the end of runway, and I turned towards 32. At the end, in the turn to the runway, I could feel the left wing... The airspeed was so low, I could feel the airplane begin to roll. So my only survivable course was to go straight ahead into the desert.

From the time of the first impact, there was enough oil on the windscreen hat I couldn't see out the front. All I could see was sagebrush going by the sides. I never hit my head on the canopy; the straps were on pretty tight. 

During the bumpy ride, Hisey felt the airplane get airborne again. When it hit, the right gear sheared off, the wing dug in, and it spun around. "That part happened very rapidly," he said. "Then it was very quiet..."

The good news is that the team have already begun the search and acquisition of parts and components to get Miss A back in the air as quick as three to six months. Some improvements and changes might be made, but fans will have to wait and see what Hisey has planned.

Fifth Little Indian?

September Pops tried to fly again today in the bronze heat race; one that he would have easily walked away from, even though he was starting from last place due to a DNS the previous day. At any rate, the new engine wasn't being cooperative with pilot Randy Bailey, and he aborted his takeoff about 2,000 feet down runway 8. The problem occurred when the two L-39 chase jets began their takeoff roll as a flight of two. Bailey got his racer over to the cold side, but the jets had to get off the power and on the brakes to avoid a more serious problem. A collision was averted, but the case was made so that flights of two should not be allowed to take off after race aircraft. Bailey taxied in and shut down, while the jets went back, took off, and quickly joined the race flight coming down the chute

It wasn't clear if September Pops will make it into the show tomorrow or not. As of this afternoon, the cowls were still on and nobody was working on the airplane.

Second Scoop

How many people have survived a midair collision and lived to talk about it? However many it is, add Bill "Rhino" Rheinschild and Art Vance to the list. The problem occurred during the join up for the silver unlimited heat on Friday. Several of the racers turned to join the pace aircraft way early. The resultant join up was chaos; airplanes back in the pack had already joined up while front runners Furias and Risky Business were catching up.

"There wasn't enough room for us to get into the formation, so Dennis (Sanders) moved over and made room for us. When Art came in, he came up underneath me and we hit. What happened was we didn't follow our proper procedures. When you don't follow the procedures for join up, you're going to have a dangerous situation. That's how the two airplanes got together. 

"I wasn't even certain that we had hit. I asked Dennis, and he wasn't certain. He said he didn't see anything come off - any metal flying around or anything. So we went and started the race and had a real duel with Art. He did a great job out on the course and it was difficult to pass him. It was an honor to win the silver race, especially given the high intensity of a midair, then ten minutes later winning the race."

And That's About It

The message today was - safety. RARA and the participants ran a safe race today with thought given to yesterday's events. It seemed that the pilot made an effort to tone the flying down - maybe just a little - to ensure a safe event. Not that they don't do that as a matter of course, but it has been an extremely tough week here at Stead.

A refreshing change is a noticeable lack of airshow during the day's events. In years past, race fans have made comments that the airshow got in the way of the racing. With fewer acts this year, the daily schedule seems to run better and on time.

All Stories and Photos Copyright by Scott Germain - WarbirdAeroPress.com 2002. All Rights Reserved.