Where not to crash your RC airplane
Tiny white planes and defoliated cotton fields should not mix
This month there was an incident that taught me an important life lesson. When crashing one’s RC airplane, it is most effective to do so while flying a white aircraft over a defoliated cotton field. It may not seem like much, but this level of attention to detail ensures that the ensuing search will be much more of an adventure.
After spending nearly an hour wandering along the rows with some folks from the club, we were nearly ready to give up. Then, all of sudden, the search party was joined by a low flying electric motor glider. One of our fellow pilots had put on his FPV goggles and assisted us in the search. He quickly caught sight of the T-28’s tail and repeatedly buzzed the location until I was able to make my way over to the crash site.
It turned out that we were searching over a hundred yards away from where the plane had actually gone down. This may not seem like much, but from the perspective of a fairly small plane in a thousand acre cotton field, it might as well have been on the other side of the planet. Ultimately the plane, and all requisite parts, was retrieved and the damage turned out to be far less severe than expected.
Another way to look at it: simply an inefficient agricultural process
Crashes are inevitable part of radio control flying, however I came up with a story to make myself feel better. I choose to think of this as the first deployment of my experimental flying cotton picker. This is my personal effort to revolutionize the crop dusting industry by allowing them to expanding their operations into the harvest season.
Although a small bundle was successfully collected, far more aircraft will be required for a complete bale. Further tests will be necessary for efficiency to be improved.
