Up A Tree, Now what?
Update: 10/26/04
Art
returned on Sunday armed with enough PVC pipe that his truck looked like he
was going on a plumbing job. Art assembled 3, 10 foot lengths of 1.5
diameter PVC pipe using couplings and duct tape. He fashioned a hook at
the end of the last section of pipe and attached it with a few screws. Once
his SkyHook was assembled, he could easily reach the parachute cords and pull
it down.
A photo of this coming soon.
10/21/04
Art D. went to recover Flight #
7008 in Northern Arizona above Payson today, trying to beat the winter storm
that was blowing in. Art drove within 600 ft of the coordinates, got out
of his Jeep, expecting to walk right to the SOG has he has done 7 times in the
past for SSRS.
As he approached the SOG target zone, he thought something was wrong. Every other time, the coordinates provided by Space Data have been "dead on" according to Art. But this time he felt like something was wrong, but just could not place it. As Art arrived at "ground zero" he saw no SkySite or its bright orange parachute. As he scanned the open forest around the landing site, he saw nothing.
Then standing exactly at GZSOG (Ground Zero SkySite On Ground), as if he knew all along, he slowly started to raise his gaze upward. His heart sank as he stared straight over his head. There 35 feet above him was the SkySite, snagged by its "chute" on a limb. Being a Ponderosa Pine, there were no limbs with in 15 feet of the ground to even attempted to climb.
Besides violating Rule #1 of the "rules" in the ROC (Rules Of Conduct) (1. Never put yourself in any dangerous or life threatening situation for SSRS and or the recovery of a SkySite.), Art is not much of a climber. So he did the next best thing. He started to toss rocks, sticks and anything else within grasp. For over an hour, Art tried valiantly to knock the SkySite from its perch, without success.
So to document it, he returned to his truck and grabbed his camera and snapped this photograph. So sometimes the SkySite will be there and so will you, but just not close enough to take it home. So you might want to be prepared for this situation and take something to help get this down.
So be creative, but try not to damage the SkySite in the process. And no you cant just cut down the tree!
Mark J. Phillips
SS Recovery Services LLC