At the end of July 2019

July 2019 was quite a month . . . a week or more of ferocious heat (shared with our neighbors in the northern tier of states), then very pleasant days and cool nights. Oh, it did rain some ... washed away half of Louisiana to hear tell of it, but that was nothing until it reached the network news centers in New York and Washington. Oh the humanity! You'd think the world was coming to an end.


Back in January there was a spate of cold - blizzards in the northern tier. Someone, somewhere must have done something really, really wrong to deserve this kind of a swing in weather.

As it happened, an airplane I fell in love with some 15 years ago came on the market. The owner had passed away and the airplane was in the hands of his executor. This was back in January and the aforementioned blizzard was in full swing in northern Indiana where the airplane was hangared. I couldn't get there in the teeth of that awful weather but I reached a deal over the phone to send a deposit to hold the airplane until I could make the trip. Their lawyer was supposed to contact me with wiring instructions to an escrow account. That was a Thursday. I didn't hear from the supposed executor's lawyer on Friday so after breakfast with the airport crew on Saturday morning - photos of the new airplane shared and appreciated - I placed a call to Indiana only to learn the airplane had been sold to someone else! I was crushed.  In a few days I sent a nice note - no hard feelings but if the deal did not go through for some reason to please let me know.

Fast forward to July. I received an email note from Indiana that the airplane was still for sale - was I still interested? I wrote back immediately in all capital letters: Y E S !! There had been a mixup and this time I was put in touch with the real executor of the estate. Needless to write, I was on an airline flight the next morning. 

During the six months between January and July, the FAA Aircraft Registration had expired and cancellation was right around the corner. Those are significant words. Expired certificates have about 90 days of grace during which the airplane cannot be flown while the application for registration renewal goes to the back of a 4-6 week line for processing. Cancellation, on the other hand, means I own a paperweight. This is a big deal. 

Long story short, I checked the airplane out thoroughly and a trusted mechanic who had been tending it for several years did a condition inspection (it's an experimental category airplane). Paperwork and electronic dollars flew all over the place, and we closed the deal through a title company.

Not the end of the story.

A phone call with the FAA Aircraft Registration Branch on Monday reassured me about the paperwork process and I would have my registration in 4-6 weeks. Then the lady on the other end of the line explained that the airplane couldn't be flown on a copy of the application for a registration when the registration had expired. This was counter to what another FAA Registration Branch representative and the title company had told me before we closed the deal. Quick scramble and the airplane took up residence in the back of the hangar.

More next month .. stay tuned.