The 2018 Argentina Campaign for Airbus Perlan Mission II has begun. Sending a glider on an expedition to Patagonia is a monumentual undertaking. If you don’t bring a spare with you then the campaign may end early. There is no Amazon Prime or overnight shipping. But the container is a fixed size and the Cobra special built trailer takes up most of the volume.
The nose of the trailer must be raised so the tail will be lowered, otherwise it won’t fit into the container. We must take extremely heavy steel legs and chain hoists to raise and lower the container in Argentina, in case a crane is not available in Patagonia. The trailer must be secured with heavy duty ratcheting straps to stabilize through 10 crane operations (one way), on the ocean, through the Andes mountains, and over rough roads. It takes a winch plus manpower to get the trailer up the ramps since the container sits on railroad ties. Once the trailer is inside the container it takes hours to secure it.
Eight team members have diligently worked at packing the necessary equipment we will need in El Calafate. Over a week of prep work was followed by a final few days of intense effort. Thanks to Michael Batalia and Roger Tanner for coming to Minden. Ed and Linda Warnock drove some telemetry items to Minden last week. And thanks to all Mindenites – Morgan and Sandra Sandercock, Stewart Tattersall, Tim Gardner, Jim and Jackie Payne for full time efforts the past week. Thanks to Hartrodt and HamburgSud for their continued help in shipping our baby. Thanks to Connolly Crane company and Doudell Trucking for once again starting the next chapter of our aviation adventure. As the crane and the truck with our “baby on board” departed Minden, the Sierra skies bid farewell to their favorite glider with lenticulars to celebrate the upcoming Patagonia wave season.
There is a brief 1 minute YouTube video at https://youtu.be/r2k0QQryJDs
Perlan Soars! Jackie
