The silence of the airplanes
Ah, there’s nothing that makes a person feel so safe and happy as hearing a couple F/A-18s roar just overhead, rattling windows, setting dogs to howl and babies to scream. Even Tom Tomorrow loves them!
Wait a minute.
On the list of love/hate relationships we have in Seattle (see also: rain, drawbridges, the Mariners, Dan Savage, and Sanjaya Malakar), there’s always the Blue Angels, those jets that fly overhead every year during Seafair. They’re fun to watch, but listening to a jet engine screaming just overhead can be just a little unnerving.
Then one of the Angels had an air-to-ground collision incident.
Rest easily, Lt. Cmdr Kevin Davis.
Meanwhile, even the Angels’ most heartfelt supporters had to stop for a moment of sober reflection: the thought of one of the jets accidentally falling into Mount Baker or Mercer Island isn’t a happy one.
No word yet on whether they’ll fly at Seafair this year.
On the one hand, I enjoy seeing the planes–they’re beautiful machines and the pilots’ ability to handle them is impressive. I always feel uplifted when I watch their maneuvers.
On the other, Davis’ death is a good reminder that this isn’t exactly the safest form of entertainment and I just can’t help but think that it’s not exactly environmentally friendly, either.
Zee: Still safer than commercial fisherman and thats entertainment now too =) But seriously, it has always been dangerous, and it really is just the whole blah-ty-blah-blah recruiting tool of the war machine, but, frankly, I’d much rather a recruiting tool like that then some of the underhanded dealings I’ve heard about. Plus, I’m a navy kid so, hey, Go Navy!
Oh, and…
Love/Hate relationship (see also) additions: Bumbershoot (prices vs. event), Monorail (yes. Yes. YES. YES!!!!! No!)[1].
[1] I never realized how much like sex with a broken condom the votes for the monorail were….
If it wasn’t dangerous, it wouldn’t be nearly as interesting.
@ryan: I dunno. If it was 6 guys with remote controlled jets doing the exact same mano…manu… stunts, it’d still be interesting just in completely different ways, like, how do they manage to do that without being *in* the plane.
Fair point. Although, I’m not sure if a team of stunt-flying remote control plane operators would be invited back to Seafair year after year.
I think the Blue Angels are popular for some of the same reasons NASCAR is popular.
@ryan: Well, true, but then, seafair is a pretty big (as in area) event and five guys with r/c jets just couldn’t cover it. Unless, of course, the jets were 1:1 scale replicas and I bet they would be invited back (after all, it’d look exactly the same). I was picturing little 1:6 replicas originally. I bet nascar would be as enjoyable if it was fullsize R/C cars. With nascar, it isn’t the possibility of injury that is intriguing, it is the possibility, as George Carlin (iirc) put it, to see a 16 car pileup and not be involved in it.