Holiday week Edith's Gap work party

[Dan T]

What do you all think of putting together a holiday week work party to clear out that patch of trees and brush in the center of the LZ?

Some of the posts I've seen indicate that the land owners are amenable to it. I know a lot of pilots have time off between the Christmas and New Years holiday. It could be a good time to get outside for a day or two. A couple chain saws and a couple hundred club dollars to rent a brush hog could make fairly short work of it. It would be really nice to see more HGs flying it.

Any interest?

Dan

PS: Thanks to Rich E for suggesting that we post my original message under a new heading.

[Rich E]

I am in!

Rich

[krryerson]

I'd be up for helping out too.
Knut

[rlweber]

I believe Bill Mason, the owner, may own a bush hog. He told me that he was going to bush hog the field for us, which he did. He may be willing to do the bush hogging if we do the hand work. I think he would respond very favorably to an inquiry.

[sailin]

I would be up for this and excited about it as well. Did anyone talk with Mr. Mason the other day when it was flown?

thanks,
Jon

[dbodner]

Could be fun. Long-term I don't think we want to give up on the other LZ that's been identified but which requires a major clean-up. But, now that Brian has demonstrated a HG landing in the current LZ, I'm that much more psyched about landing there, too.

[Dan T]

It looks as if we have enough people to get this done. In an effort to get things started permit me to offer up the following suggested schedule of activities and request for volunteers.

1) Identify specifically what we intend to accomplish: Brian Vant-Hull has posted an image of the LZ in the thread entitled landing a Hang Glider at Ediths Gap. Could a volunteer who has flown the site and ideally already spoken with the land owner circle the patches of vegetation that we'd like to remove and post them here?

2) Inform the land owner of our intent: Once we have identified specifically what we want to do we should let the land owner know and obtain his permission. In an earlier post someone noted that the land owner has also expressed a willingness to brush hog a portion of the LZ. Could we get this firmed up so we know what equipment we do and don't need to bring to the party? Could someone who has already established a relationship with the land owner take this action?

2a) On a related note, one of our members wrote me privately and informed me that these patches of vegetation in the middle of these fields often conceal relatively large rock formations. Has anyone inspected the vegetation patches to determine what if anything they are concealing? If not we might want to do this in advance of the work party. It could limit what can be accomplished with a brush hog. Assuming we don't already know what's hidden inside the patches is anyone willing to go check it out in the next week or so?

3) Arrange a specific work party day: It should be a day that is acceptable to the land owner as well as one that works for most if not all of the potential volunteers. I've previously suggested the week between Christmas and New Years but it's just a suggestion, what works for you all? Could the person who is checking with the land owner also find out if he wants to participate in the work party and if so when he is available?

4) Confirm the location and availability of the debris disposal site: Will the dump be open on that day? Does anyone know where it is?

5) Arrange for pizza and beverages of a type suitable and acceptable to the land owner for the end of the day celebration. I can bring a pickup truck and run into Luray during our last debris removal run.

There are a number of you who are more qualified to lead this effort than I am. If you know the land owner, live nearby, or simply have both the time and the desire to lead this effort, please feel free to volunteer.

Thanks for stepping up for this. Let's make this site H2/P2 suitable.

Dan T

[jmcclave]

Dan,

Thanks for organizing this. I am willing to pitch in.

Jim

[Dan T]

I'm getting some offline input that indicated that Friday December 27 is a good candidate. How does that work for the volunteers?

I think we are looking to remove the two patches immediately to the right of the yellow line in Brian's aerial shot and the one just to the left of the tail of the yellow arrow. Is this correct? Can we get one of you computer guys to put some circles around the intended clearings and post it here. That way we will all know what are plans are and we can share those with the land owner. We don't want any surprises there.

Thanks,
Dan

[dbodner]

I've numbered the clumps. Let's see if the image loads correctly.

I think Dan is suggesting removing numbers 2,5, and 6. Is that right?

[Rich E]

27th works for me

Rich

[Dan T]

Thanks Dave,

Actually I was thinking 3, 5 and 6. Number 2 is next to the road and I figured it would be out of the way as well as the ones on the far right. I also assumed (incorrectly) that the land owner wouldn't want us taking out more than is necessary. I spoke on the phone with the land owner, Mr. Mason, yesterday. It turns out that these patches are actually residual "trash" piles from the initial land clearing effort. They will consist largely of tree residue piled on top of rocks. If I understood Mr. Mason correctly, he'd be ok with us clearing all of them.

He thought that it might be difficult to clear these piles without the aid of a bulldozer. We need to take a look and see if this is a job that a bunch of volunteers can reasonably accomplish in a day with chain saws and hand tools. Any volunteers?

Mr. Mason also told me he's ok with a work part on December 27. He said he may have guests at the house but that it wouldn't be an issue.

Dan

[deveil]

I've had an overly aggravating first half of the week that semi resolved last night, so when I saw Dan's post it looked like a good opportunity to tune down with a drive in the country and at the same time do something useful. I talked to Dan and should be able to find out something today.

[deveil]

Well, 'had a good time zooming the twisties the whole length of Fort Valley road, so that worked out a lot of psychic kinks.

All of the clumps/copses/impediments-to-navigation are more or less three to four foot high mounds of dirt and rock overgrown with scrub trees and nasty briers.

Cutting down the trees would be beneficial overall. No need to haul anything anywhere, just chop it up into pieces and leave in place, no harm, no foul.

Cutting the uppermost spot, #1, would be a boon to pg's, given that the wing is way up there off the ground.

Cutting 5, 6 and 7 would give hg's a more forgiving approach but wouldn't alter the approaches/flight path. 'probably be able to /dive/bring it down to the ground sooner.

3 and 4 would give more room for screwing up over all.

But yes, cutting them all would be worth the effort, no doubt there.

The brambles - nasty, nasty stuff - would just grow back next year and other than making way to the trees, cutting them wouldn't alter things much.

The dirt/rock mound of #1 would be worth considering for removal. It's not Nearly as big as the others and would open the landing path for pg's and maybe allow hg's to consider a new approach.

The size and mass of the other edifices is significant and would no small undertaking by any means - not small undertaking for bulldozers that is.

This is but one man's opinion.

Motivation is everything and one man's mountain may be another man's mere molehill.

[brianvh]

I also concur with removal of pile #1. If you have a helacious tailwind during an uphill landing it might make too good of a target. Plus it may even allow HG to land upwind if said wind is strong. And the PG won't complain, I'm sure.

Waaiit....why are you folks even discussing removing anything? I dang-blasted proved it's land-able as is. Friggin' pansies....

[deveil]

Let's see, there's that supposed Restricted Landing Field Award (self anointed?). Then I recall something about "Airplane Restrictive Boarding Processing due to Embedded Screws/Metal Plates-in-Bones". And, oh yeah, wasn't there a Tree Landing Due To Restricted Situational Awareness While Attempting a Restricted Landing Field Commendation?
<grin>

oops: "Off Topic!"

[deveil]

I figured you'd be embarrassed if that was left to stand there all lonely and by itself.
dropping into there as the first timer took confidence - nice job.
gary

And it's probably best that I state for the record that I have no reason to believe that any of that is true.

[dbodner]

Gary, I think you're saying that attacking the growth on TOP of the mounds would amount to a significant improvement. So, while flattening the mounds with earth-moving equipment would be ideal, it's far from necessary.

[deveil]

Almost. Taking down the trees would give everyone greater latitude, at the least a significantly greater margin for error.

Taking out the mounds would actually be an improvement of significance, but the work i.e. expense would also be significant. It could be worthwhile to get an actual estimate, perhaps on a per mound basis - you never know til you know.

The trees on that piece of land would have been cut and removed then the stumps and debris would have been dozed into piles. They do this because of the work/expense of hauling everything out or even pushing it all to the side. And if it's to be a pasture there would be no justification for that expense.

The stumps and such would decay and all the residual dirt and rock remains in haphazard fashion. If it were all simply dirt it perhaps could just be spread around, but that itself would still be a lot of work. Anything else would have to be removed somehow, and there's no way of knowing what is actually under the surface. It's probably a lot of rock.

I just picture in my mind the work they did at High Rock Lz then extrapolate it to what's in this field. Like I say - a Lot of work.

But, again, motivation is everything.

[deveil]

I went there to get/give an overall general impression. It's up to those intending to fly the site to decide how best to expend resources on an lz.

[Dan T]

It sounds like we can accomplish a lot with a bunch of warm bodies, a few chain saws, some loppers, a bunch of sturdy gloves and an arm full of pizzas.

Let's mark our calendars for Dec 27.

If you are able to bring and use a chain saw please let us know.

Thanks everybody.
Dan T

[brianvh]

Given that mound #1 is small but strategically located, wouldn't it be possible to attack that one dirt pile with a few shovels and a wheelbarrow? I didn't walk up to look at it, Gary, what do you think?

(And though the restricted landing field award was not self anointed, I think as the first single surface to return to the mountains after double surface had completely taken over, too much was made of my supposed skills. The recent landing was done in a single surface one size larger than normal. Basically a parachute.)

[deveil]

whew! glad you took that with good humor.
g

[deveil]

Lots of work, most likely more than will be accomplished in a day, so the degree of success will be heavily dependent on a good turnout. And while the work is heavily chainsaw-centric and dependent, as in "Now is the the time to step forward" there's Puh-Lenty of work to go around.

That's my contribution to drum beating.

[deveil]

There he goes with the shovels and wheel barrows again.
might as well use spoons and cereal bowls.

almost forgot that snipe.