Thurston County Miniature Aircraft Assn. Float Fly
Each year, the Thurston County Miniature Aircraft Assn.(TCMAA) holds a float fly at Lake Isabella, Shelton, Washington. This year's event was held on Saturday, July 21. Earlier in the week, there were some dramatic thunder and lightning storms along with some heavy rain. Everyone kept fingers crossed for a good flying day—and we got one. Although there were some clouds in the sky and an occasional gust of wind, all in all, the flying conditions were good and there was lots of sunshine. Members of the Lake Nahwatzel RC Float Club, a local Shelton club, joined with the TCMAA pilots for a great day of flying and socializing. There were 17 pilots flying a mix of gas and electric aircraft. Pilots had plenty of time to socialize at lunch and throughout the day.
Among the beautiful aircraft to fly during the event was Thom Martin's E-flite DHC-2 Beaver. Another E-flite favorite was Gordon Osberg's twin engine Deuces Wild. More than one pilot flew the E-flite Pulse XT. Dick Robb entertained the spectators with flights of a Balsa USA Phaeton 90. As in former years, a favorite at the event was Mark Anderson's realistic World Models 1/3 Cub. One of the most amazing planes to fly was the tiny UMX Carbon Cub, that is distributed by Horizon Hobby. The Carbon Cub is a great flyer and features the new AS3X Technology by E-flite.
There were a few problem flights during the day. Some planes had to be retrieved by boat. One special delivery of a downed plane was made by friendly water skiers. Gordon Osberg retrieved his plane with some expert casts with a fishing pole rigged with a tennis ball at the end of the line.
All pilots are looking forward to the next float fly to be hosted later this year by the Nahwatzel club.
Gallery
About the Images
The images were taken with a Canon Rebel T3i. I used a Canon 100mm macro lens for the images. I set the camera to shoot at a shutter speed of 1/800. All images received simple processing in Photoshop and were saved as low-resolution JPEG images that were optimized for the Web.