Fixed wing aircraft

Poor Julio sure needed to do a lot of fixing on those planes in the last 20 years. As long as Chuck still works at Roost-Air, he definitely has job security, and even guaranteed overtime, for the foreseeable future. Having worked for a flight school I have fixed all of these items myself at one time or another, except for the wing strut. It always amazed me what things students manage to break on these old C-172’s.

But what is even more amazing is that these planes are still flying today. Every now and then I spy the occasional plane I used to train on when I’m in the old neighborhood. And those planes weren’t exactly new either back when I got my first ratings 26 years ago!

I bet Cessna, in their wildest dreams, didn’t imagine the original 172’s still being around 50+ years later, LOL.

Mike

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One comment on “Fixed wing aircraft
  1. JP Kalishek says:

    I’ve seen a non-fixed wing 172. Flying a pipeline, the pilot had a bird strike with a Turkey Vulture. Also it was non-fixed wingtip. Lots of Duct tape (I gave the pilot a lesson using my Sprintcar wing repair experiences) got him to his home airport.
    I’ve also seen a non-fixed landing gear Piper Cub. heavy winds that day made the landing a slow ground speed one, so when it touched, the damage was pretty limited to that the cracked portion had already caused. I happened to be watching its approach, and the Pilot didn’t know he had bad gear, or he’d have declared, but I had an angle that showed it looking a bit whonky. He set it down near the numbers planning to use the taxiway to get out of the way for the airliners, but ended up closing the runway for several hours.

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