Jetliner Pilot Enjoys Smaller, Nimbler Planes

ERMA — Pilot Greg Stringer, of Egg Harbor Township, doesn’t get a chance to do rolls or spins when he is in the captain’s seat of a Spirit Airlines jet, but in his spare time in his own aerobatic plane, a Bucker Jungmann, he flies through the wild blue yonder in fearless maneuvers.
Stringer was taking part in the 2008 Wildwoods Acroblast, billed as an “aerobatic competition and boardwalk fun,” June 27-29 at the county airport.
His German-designed biplane was built in Spain in 1952 and is painted bright yellow in Swiss training colors.
“This is what a Luftwaffe pilot would learn to fly in, in World War II, said Stringer. “The design goes back to the mid-1930s.”
He has been flying the Bucker since 2003. The Bucker has an open cockpit, which Stringer compares to riding a motorcycle or driving a convertible car.
Stringer describes the small plane as agile and very advanced aerodynamically for the era in which it was built.
The letter “RV” on the tail of the plane denotes it is capable of inverted spins. While Stringer has not yet done an inverted spin, he said he does fly loops and rolls.
Pilots who want to learn this type of flying can go to an aerobatics school. It also involves a lot of practice, said Stringer.
The weekend competition has different levels of skill: primary, sportsman, intermediate, advanced and unlimited. He said some pilots will do a couple of loops and rolls and some simple maneuvers while others will fly “very complex, wild gyrations.”
Stringer flies in the sportsman category.
Advanced aerobatic pilots will fly a known sequence and then an unknown sequence given to them the night before the competition. They also fly freestyle maneuvers the pilot makes up on his own to show his ability and the plane’s best qualities, he said.
Judges watch the competition from a tent near the runway. Stringer said aerobatic pilots try to make lines of symmetry when pitching vertical lines or 45-degree lines.
When doing a loop, making it round is a big challenge, he said.
“From the airplane, you can’t see how the maneuver is turning out,” said Stringer.
When flying a loop, the airspeed lessens as the plane climbs and “kind of floats across the top, and “pulls real hard coming down because the airspeed is constantly changing.”
While all this is going on, the pilot must make sure the airplane stays on course.
Ascending or descending on a 45-degree angle is a challenge, said Stringer, since the pilot is using the horizon in the distance to determine the attitude of the plane; if it’s a hot day, the horizon might be obscured by haze.
The aerobatic pilots fly in a “box:” a course created over the airport, which is marked on the ground. Judges will give pilots a penalty for straying out of the box.
There is also a top and bottom in the box as far as altitude limits with the more advanced pilots flying lower, said Stringer.
“You’ll be upside down diving at the ground and you’re looking for those box marks to determine where you’re at and how much room you have,” he said.
The wind is also a factor, changing when climbing into higher altitudes, said Stringer.
He said the aerobatic flying is totally different than the time of flying he does in a commercial jetliner.
Stringer said the aerobatic skills help him fly the Spirit jet a little bit better.