The Perlan 2 wings are on! We are getting ready for Airbus Perlan Mission II – Campaign 2018. Again we awoke to fresh snow and icy roads at the end of July! But today we wanted to make progress towards flying in the Patagonia wave. So we scraped windshields and used those studded snow tires. There’s so many facets to conducting a high tech remote wave soaring campaign.
The balloon crew inventoried supplies, accepted delivery of oxygen, helium and nitrogen, and tested equipment. The telemetry crew assembled their antenna and started the test of their equipment. The rigging crew made sure the wing holder and rollling metal saw horses were assembled. Not all jobs are high tech – I spent the morning cleaning the hangar kitchen. Jim made sure no slush was left near the hangar door tracks to freeze overnight and create an ice jam.
After lunch we checked the wings very closely for any travel damage from the 8 week trip. Happily all was well. Mike and I cleaned all fittings and put fresh cold temperature grease on all of them. Then it was time to pull the wings out of the trailer, roll into position, and insert into the fuselage. It actually was one of the smoothest assemblies we have ever had. Jim and Morgan put the main spar pins in to secure. We took time to celebrate with a rigging crew photo from Dr Dan. Stewart was on to another task by then. Mike and Morgan connected the control hook-ups. More prep work tomorrow! Perlan Soars! Jackie
