Was anyone wondering what happened to the helicopter during the Sun Run earlier this month? I'm assuming folks on the short run thought it was following the long run and vice versa. The truth is that we were being detained by the US Air Force. Let me explain...
This was the first time I had hired a helicopter for an event. I asked my colleagues Matt Trulio and Pete Boden where to begin. They sent over a couple contacts and I made some calls. The pilots I spoke with just needed to know the date, where to land and how long we'd be flying for. Seemed pretty simple to me. We booked a R44 for two hours of flight time to chase Sunsations from the north end of the lake to Detroit and back.
The day of the run came with some weather challenges. Our pilot had to pull some strings just to be allowed to leave the airport in a downpour of rain. Coming from Oakland Airport, he was right on time landing at Cabana Blue Lakefront Sports Bar & Grill at 1:00PM.
We delayed the start of the run 30 minutes for weather to clear and then took to the sky as 75 Sunsations hopped on plane and headed south.
Everything was going according to plan. Cloud cover to help with the mid-day sunlight and calm water that allowed the smaller boats to keep up with the pack. We got our opening shot of the full pack running (below) before we started picking off boats one by one swooping low for 10-15 seconds on each boat's starboard side. We knocked out about a quarter of the pack before everyone powered down at Metro Park.
This is where things got interesting. Metro Park was a much longer idle then we anticipated. After circling boats in the channel for about 20 minutes, we knew this was going to take a while. The decision was made to put down the helicopter for 15-20 minutes to save fuel.
There is a small piece of lakefront property that Pete and I landed on last summer while shooting Skaterfest, so we headed there. As we came in for the landing, the pilot didn't like the approach. It was too tight and we weren't trying to do anything uncomfortable. It was time to find a different landing zone.
The pilot radioed the tower at Selfridge Air National Guard Base. The base is right next door to Metro Park. After a brief conversation, the tower cleared us to land in the south east corner of their air field. Or so we thought. We landed and waited about 20 minutes before receiving a text that the boats were back on the lake. We fired up the engine and the pilot began his preflight checklist. No more than a minute after firing up the helicopter officers were running toward us waiving their arms. The tower came over the radio and asked us to shut it down. We were all a bit confused at this point.
Three Air Force Officers made their way over to us after the rotor ceased. It looked like they came out of nowhere. When they told us where we had to go, it made sense that we didn't see a car or truck. It was about a half mile walk through an overgrown field to make it to their trucks. We began the walk in the August mid-day sun.
The officers escorted us back to airfield headquarters where the fun began. Pete, our pilot and myself were separated for "interviews" on what had happened. We were still a bit confused as we didn't think anything had been done incorrectly. After an hour of interviews and another hour of paperwork things began to clear up.
Turns out you have to have prior clearance to land on a military base. Also turns out the air base tower misinformed us of our landing. They thought we were trying to land at Metro Park, not the air base.
If it wasn't for Air Force Leadership being present on the base that day we probably would have been let go after a warning. Instead we were the lucky recipients of a training exercise for the US Air Force. I must say they were very kind and enjoyable to talk with, but the couple hours we were there led to us missing the rest of the run.
Eventually we made the long walk back to the helicopter and flew back to Cabana Blue. Matt Trulio was waiting at the bar with a few tequila shots for his weathered crew.
So if you're looking for photos or video from the helicopter, I'm sorry to disappoint. It's just more of a reason to do this again next year... without a landing at Selfridge Air National Guard Base.
BD
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