[GH85Carrera]

Dang, working for a living can be sure interrupt a weekend!

We had a project pop up and like most, they want it right now. Our airplane was down for the annual inspection, and that means we take all the camera equipment off, all the personal items, and everything that was not factory delivered. The inspection was done and we had to go fly the project. So I had the remount the camera system, and get the computer hooked up.

The software for the camera system has several upgrades and I had never flow with it. So I went with the pilot on a mission to the Red River, the border between Oklahoma and Baja Oklahoma. Oh,by the way the winds were at 18 knots at ground level. So a very bumpy takeoff and a real roller coaster ride until we got through 4,000 feet. Then it was smooth at 4,500 feet all the way down to the site.

The project was flow at 3,000 feet so it was a bull ride and lots of bouncing around for the photo mission. The crosswinds were as high as 45 MPH at a 45 degree angle to our flight path. Keeping the wings level and flying a straight line, in all three dimensions was tough on the pilot. Then we popped back up through 4,000 feet to 6,000 feet and all was smooth and nice and cool.

As we made approach and descended to land it got real bumpy. Landing was exciting and the 182 did not want to touch the ground. The 20 knot head wind was a keeping us in the air with ground effects. We landed and put in $260 in fuel and packed up and went home. Phew. I got home at 4:30, and started processing the project.

The real pain is they are using plant coordinates. Argh. So spit on the ground and that is the start of the world. No relation to anything a GPS or any other map has at all. Just make it fit to they plans. We need to charge extra for that crap.