Now You're Talking...
Dear Editor:
Loss of Flying Fields
I am writing in response to a newspaper article that I read recently. It's too bad that I didn't keep a copy for you, as I'm sure you would have found it interesting.
Before I get to that, I would like to say that I wholeheartedly agree with many of the articles that Model Aviation has published in recent months concerning the alarming rate at which flying fields suitable for RC and Control Line, for that matter, are being lost. Fortunately for Control Line, it only requires a fraction of the space that RC does and that may account for the tremendous comeback that Control Line is now enjoying in densely populated areas, such as where I live. We, as modelers, must do everything possible to maintain a strong public image if we want to keep what we have.
The recent incident involving the Goodyear blimp is a good example of how the press goes into a shark-feeding frenzy whenever something like this happens. This "modeler" made the 6 o'clock news on NBC and set model aviation back 10 years.
Certainly, flying fields are lost to development and such and we don't have too much control over that, but they can also be lost to foot-in-mouth disease that some individuals come down with when being interviewed by a newspaper reporter. Their comments end up on the front page for all the world to see.
The RC "Combat" Incident
I'm referring to an article in which members of an AMA-chartered club bragged to the reporter about how wonderful it was to belong to their organization. I'm not going to identify the club, because as far as I'm concerned, they've already greased their own skid. All the usual malarkey about friendship and camaraderie was covered, but the one thing that got my attention, and a lot of other people for that matter, was the part about an activity which they referred to as "combat."
According to these individuals, "combat" is where two or more remote-control aircraft chase each other all over the sky while trying to cut each other's streamer. It was noted that it required great skill and "courage" to avoid a mid-air collision.
I would like to mention that this was taking place on a military base with an active flightline nearby and helicopters flying every which way from time to time.
Anyway, the newspaper reporter expressed concern over it and he was told—this is a quote from the article—that all of the full-size aircraft in the vicinity were only "dots on the horizon" and that there was nothing wrong with what they were doing.
Safety and Public Perception
In my book, standing out in a field with a bunch of other "courageous" individuals and twiddling levers on little black boxes is not "combat." Never has been and never will be. Portrayed in that manner that ended up in the newspaper makes all of us, I mean everybody, look like arrogant boneheads who care little what people think.
Maybe it never occurred to them, but all it takes is a battery connector to become dislodged or the antenna to get cut by another plane's propeller and their "gold-stickered" gizmo suddenly ceases to respond, and God only knows where this new "flying bomb" will come down. At the speed that some of these RC guided missiles are capable of, and with a partial tank of fuel, just how far can one go? One mile? Five miles? Your guess is as good as mine. That "dot on the horizon" is now a very real target. And even with those so-called fail-safe features, what kind of guarantee is that? That baby is coming down somewhere. Perhaps the only courageous people that day were the newspaper reporters and spectators who played witness to this fiasco. I hope they were wearing helmets.
For the record, I have already had people who know what I do come up to me and ask if it's really such a good idea, this "combat." The average person has no idea what Control Line Combat is all about and, as far as they're concerned, a model airplane is a model airplane—period!
Believe me, our organization, Pinelands Combat Team, runs a tight, safety-first, by-the-rule-book operation. Vince Mankowski, the AMA Executive Director, can more than verify that. You see, Vince is also an avid CL Combat flier. I have had the pleasure of competing against him on more than one occasion at our contests. But the average newspaper reader doesn't know that, either.
I do not know what the official AMA policy is regarding this RC "combat," but I do know one thing, and that is if I were the base commander of the military installation in question and I happened to read that article along with my coffee and Danish and didn't check on it, I would have the president of that model airplane club in my office that afternoon, and if he didn't supply some very good answers to my questions, he and his "legion of doom" would be history!
Closing
As an ex-RCer who has no intention of ever returning to the rat race that Radio Control has become along with its come-to-top mentality, I can only shake my head in wonderment at people who obviously feel that they have a "field for life."
If all this sounds like I'm concerned for the flying privileges of the group of individuals in the article, I'm not. Not by a long shot.
What I am looking out for are my own interests, because like the blimp situation, a tragic incident here will also make the 6 o'clock news, and the ripple effect from that could very well spell the death knell for all model aviation in this area. Perhaps more responsible people within their organization will also realize this and take the bull by the horns before it's too late.
Fred Stetter AMA 132031
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
