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 Corn
By Nick Scholtes
July 20, 2001
I left work early and went to the local airport. I am
getting checked out in a Katana Extreme, which is a powered sailplane. I
had a lesson scheduled, and it was wonderful. After the lesson, I headed
home, and was greeted there by my wife Stace, my daughter Morgan, Alex Varv, and
wonderful conditions for PPGing. I gave Stace my "look".
This look says something like this, "There's only a very few nights each
year that are PPGable after work. And while my first choice would be to
spend time with you and Mo, Alex is here and he really wants to go flying and I
can't let him down."
 Stace
knows the "look". She simply said, "Have fun."
Stace is a wonderful wife (pictured left). Back when I learned to PPG (by
myself), she was there learning with me. She knows more about PPGing than
most pilots, even though she doesn't fly herself. She also knows a lot
about farming, the local area, and other stuff that would prove to be important
tonight.
 Alex
(pictured right) and I began preflighting and chatting, and speculating about
how the conditions would be tonight. There was a base wind from 210
degrees at about 4 knots, with gusts up to about 10 knots at times. The
density altitude was reported as 2300'. We speculated that it might be a
little bumpy.
I preflighted the 'Cruiser. I had flown 1.75 hours the previous night, and
since I get 2.75 hours on a full tank, I guessed that I had one hour left.
For the last few weeks, myself and the locals (Fred Edmiston, Walt Hines) have
been flying 29 minutes and 59 seconds after sunset. The night before, as a
matter of fact, I literally couldn't see the ground on landing and asked Walt
and Fred to help me find it. Eventually, of course, I found it. Anyway,
the current time was 7:30, one hour from sunset. I looked at the one hour
of fuel and decided that tonight I wouldn't fly until dark, I would just fly for
a little while and land before sunset. That should be enough fuel.
Besides, I was too lazy to pour more fuel into the tank, and I also didn't want
to carry the extra weight on launch.
Launch was actually somewhat eventful, as I tried a running-reverse that didn't
work out. My flying field is my pasture, which is surrounded by a 4-rail
cedar fence to keep the llamas and goats in. After the first attempt, I
had probably 200' left to the fence. I tried another inflation but the
wind was extremely light. I used up another 150' on that attempt.
With 50' left between me and the fence I felt a nice cycle come through and
pulled up. I cleared the fence by about 2'.
 Alright,
let's FLY! Alex launched uneventfully and the two of us proceeded to fly.
The majority of the flight was the kind of flight we usually have, wonderful but
certainly not worth writing about. As the sun set, we were about 3 miles
west of home and over a gravel road that has no power lines along it. No
power lines is a rare feature of roads in the area, so this road is used by us
for launching sometimes when the wind is westerly (my pasture doesn't provide a
very nice west launch) and also it is used for some epic foot drags. So
down I went.
I have recently gotten into the habit of doing what I call "extreme"
footdrags. These are where you don't actually get out of the seat, instead
you remain fully seated and if you do it right, your feet drag in front and the
back/bottom of the cage drags in the back. It's pretty cool and takes
kinda' precise control. As I dragged along this gravel road I thought
about how cool it must look from above, with the dust being kicked up by my feet
and the prop. I saw a piece of gravel ahead that was bigger than all the
rest, maybe 2" in diameter or so. I gave it a kick. "Shot
and a goal!" I yelled, which is a common expression when Morgan and I are
playing together. The rock skittered ahead of me and started to bounce.
As it bounced, it slowed down, and the bounces got higher. I caught up
with it and watched as the last bounce disappeared between my legs and under the
seat. "WHACK!"
Suddenly the ever-so-smooth SkyCruiser was not very smooth. The first
thought that went through my head was, "Darn, there goes my record!"
I don't have a record, really, but I have (had) a statistic I was proud of.
In my six years of PPGing, I had never broken a prop. I throttled up and
climbed a little. The vibration was present, but not terrible. I guessed
at how bad the damage was, and my guess was that it wasn't too bad. I went
to full power. The Top80 achieved the ever-amazing number of 9700rpm.
"Hmmm," I thought, "it's broke but it's nothing to rush home
about. I'll still keep flying." Besides, it was truly an
awesome
sunset, and I always like watching the sun dip below the horizon. Before long
I'll have to turn the strobe on........
Alex and I flew another mile or so and I decided to go down and smell the corn.
Corn gives off an odor this time of year that is wonderful, and flying down low
and kicking the tassles and smelling the corn provides me with an ecstatic
feeling. Corn is also a truly amazing
thing to behold. Modern agriculture has produced hybrid versions of corn
that are phenomenal. When I was a kid there was an expression we used.
"If the corn is knee-high by the 4th of July, you'll have a good
crop." Today's corn is head-high by the 4th, and by July 19th (last
night) it stands a full eight feet tall. The density of the corn is also
impressive. Today's rows are spaced 16" apart, and within a row each
plant is placed 4" apart...............
After going down low and enjoying the wonderful corn smell, I squeezed the
trigger and began to climb. The sun was down and I thought it might be
time to turn the strobe on. As I climbed through about 40'AGL, the sudden
silence and the gentle surge of the wing told the story.
The Top80 had sipped the last remaining drops of fuel.
My wing/motor descends at 300'/minute, power-off. From
50'AGL, that's 10 seconds till touchdown. In the few seconds I had, I
scoped out my options. To the west about 300 yards was a creek, to the NW
about 200 yards was a tiny little access road that the farmers use to get their
ATVs to the creek to do some fishing. To the south about 1.5 miles was a
road, and to the east about 1.25 miles was another road. Other than that,
it was corn.
I decided that my best option was the tiny access road to the
NW about 200 yards. I turned into the wind, and my world instantly became
green.
 Truth-be-told,
this isn't the first time I've gone down in the corn, it's the second. The
first time occurred about 4 years ago. I still tell local pilots the
lesson I learned from that incident: The height of each cornstalk is so uniform,
and the stalks are placed so closely
together and the tassels all blend together, so that when you approach the top
of the corn from the air you get an optical illusion that the top of the corn is
actually the ground.
On my first entry into the corn I performed a
most-wonderful full-flare landing onto the top of the corn. After the
completion of the flare, the ceasing of all forward and downward motion, I
proceeded to plummet eight feet to the ground. I found it interesting the
way certain words can be uttered. In that case, I uttered the leading
"F" of a popular expletive at the instant I
started to fall. The middle part of the word seemed to be screamed for an
incredibly long time, until finally the "K" was forced from my lungs
by the impact. Anyway, after learning this lesson, I've told many pilots
the simple solution: Don't do that. So I remembered my own advice
and I didn't flare this time. But, I learned a new lesson. The new
lesson is, "Land going WITH the rows at all costs, even if it's cross-wind.
Don't land ACROSS the rows."
The pasture from where the adventure began
I landed standing up, unhurt. The wing was laying on top
of the corn a few feet above my head. The radio crackled to life. It
was Alex. "Nick, are you OK? What happened?"
"I'm OK Alex. I ran out of gas."
"Wow, that was really stupid. Why don't you stand
up? I can't see you?"
At that minute, it occurred to me that Alex was a city-boy,
and he didn't understand corn. All 5' 7" of me was standing up, and I
was completely obscured under the 8' tall corn.
"Nick, look at where I am, I'm directly over the road.
Walk to where I am."
"Alex, I can't see a thing."
"What do you mean you can't see a thing?"
"Alex, I can see about 2 feet in front of me, 6" to
either side, and I can't see above me. I'm in corn that's 8' tall.
I'll try to get myself out. Go home and get Stace." And with
that, he left to go and get Stace.
I was alone. Kind of. Within seconds I was
accompanied by approximately 18 gazillion mosquitoes. The humidity was
unbelievable. I was sweating so bad my glasses were soaked, and they were
completely fogged up. I have 20/800 vision, so without my glasses I'm
worthless. Right now, with my glasses I was worthless.
Being in a corn field is such a disorienting experience it's almost indescribable.
I knew that when I landed I was headed south. I noted that the rows were
going east-west. I took the 'Cruiser off and set it down. I spent
the next 5 minutes pulling the wing out of the corn.
When I was had it balled-up, I looked for the 'Cruiser.
"Now where did I put that thing?" It was gone. I had lost
track of which way was north or south. I knew the rows were east-west, but
I didn't know which. In just 5 minutes I had become completely
disoriented. Then I heard it. It was a coyote, and he was pretty
close. I'm very familiar with coyotes. I have goats and chickens on
my farm, and coyotes love them (they're delicious!). I also have llamas,
which are a natural enemy of coyotes. Most nights, we can hear a pack of
coyotes sitting a few yards away from the fence, waiting for a llama to stop
paying attention so they can come in and get a goat or a chicken. In the
10 years we've had the llamas, we haven't lost a single goat or chicken. But
local farmers lose goats, sheep, and even calves all the time. I knew that
if there was a pack, they could easily take me down. A chill ran up my
spine. I've got to get out of here.
It's almost dark......
I decided I would systematically spiral outward looking for the 'Cruiser.
Within 10 minutes I had found it. By now it was almost completely dark.
The radio crackled to life. "Nick, I'm back and I'm looking for you.
Hold up your strobe."
I gathered up the wing, and strapped the 'Cruiser on my back. I started
walking down the row, toward what I believed was the east. Before long I
came to a section of the field where some standing water had stunted the growth
of the corn. It was only 3 feet high in this section. I could see in
some directions, but the rolling hills of the field prevented me from seeing in
other directions. I held up the strobe. Alex couldn't see it.
"Alex, you've got to find the access road down to the creek. I'm
going to try and walk to it."
It seemed as though not only was I out to get myself this night by making
various mistakes, but Murphy was also taking a crack at me. I had left my
glider bag back at home for Stace to repair a broken seam. So I had no way to
stow the glider. I had balled it up as best I could within the constraints
of the cornfield. But it was truly a handful. Every 5 feet or so, a line
or the cloth would catch on a corn stalk and I had to stop and untangle it.
Also, the corn rows are about 16" apart. The 'Cruiser cage is about
50" in diameter. As I walked down
the row, the cage plowed down four rows of corn. To say that it was
difficult walking is an understatement. Walking across the rows was
virtually impossible.
Stace arrived and tried to vector me out of the field She knew the dangers
of me being in the field too long. She and I both knew that if I left my
equipment, chances were pretty good that we wouldn't find it again until fall.
The rest of the "rescue" was pretty uneventful. I soon
discovered that I couldn't practically cross the rows, so I decided to just walk
down the row until I got out, however long that took. I was sweating
profusely, my glasses were fogged, the mosquitoes were having their way with me.
Oh, and I also discovered another interesting thing about walking through a corn
field. The corn leaves lay flat, with the flat part facing the sun.
They are very thin, with the thin edge facing me.
As I walked, I would literally get paper-cuts from the leaves.
The sweat would then seep into the cut and the pain was amazing. This just
wasn't any fun at all.
Eventually, with considerable vectoring from Alex and Stace, I exited the field.
I looked at my watch. 9:58 PM. I went into the field at 8:35 PM.
I had been in the field for 1:23, I had walked about 1.25 miles with a Sky
Cruiser on my back and a wing loosely bundled in my
arms.
I was so glad to see Alex! This had been a truly bad experience, one that
I wouldn't want to repeat.
So, the moral of the story is:
1) Carry enough fuel (How many times/ways can this be said?)
2) A corn field is NOT a good place to land once the corn is over your head.
I recommend NOT landing in a corn field from now until harvest.
3) If you must land in a corn field, don't flare on the tassels
4) Land going with the rows
5) Always carry a radio and cell phone.
As John and Martha King, from King Aviation Schools would say, "Keep the
dirty side down, the pointy end forward, and stay out of the corn!"
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