Shane, go raibh mile maith agat.
One has to admit though from having been predominantly white (while with BEAS) to taking on a scheme identical to that worn by Denis' 206's was curious!
San Francisco
During the early 90's I would visit San Francisco each year to see my older brother who was ensconced as a senior VP with what was probably the world's foremost CAD software design firm. During my visits I would self-fly-hire an Astar (as they call them over there) from Oakland-based operator 'AstroCopters'. The company was started by an old boy who had made his money prospecting for gold in the hills east of the city and their CP was a delightful character called Will Prater. AstroCopters were the outfit responsible for the aerial filming for the James Bond movie 'A View To A Kill' which featured an airship wafting around the pinnacles of the Golden Gate Bridge.
During that time I cultivated a keen interest in the city - a place with so much activity and so many interesting locations. I discovered that some years prior to my first visit there had been an operator offering tours right off one of the piers in the city's waterfront area. Evidently they did a rip-roaring trade until the city authority, no doubt spurred by irritable residents, withdrew permission for the operator to fly off the pier.
For many-a-year I have been trying to find the name of that early 80's operator and to obtain a shot of their operation.
You can imagine then my surprise/delight when last week Trevor Bartlett came up with this:
Bell 206B JetRanger III N39080 at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco on 19th October 1982 (Photo: Trevor Bartlett)
Finally and at last I get to see this operation which Will and others had told me about. My great thanks to Trevor - who flew aboard this bird but who is unable to recall the name of the operator.
I know that our North American readers are few but .. if anyone has any recollection of this operation which flew out of Fisherman's Wharf in the ealry 80's and if anyone has additional details on what happened with the SF city authorities, your input would be welcome.
Regarding Oakland, this of course was the airfield from which the late great Amelia Earhart launched her two attempts to circumnavigate the globe. The first attempt took place on 17th March (St.Patrick's Day) 1937 flying Westbound and the second, Eastbound, two months later in May. As PPRuNer Epiphany will no doubt recall - Amelia's last contact with
terra firma was on 2nd July 1937 at Lae Aerodrome in Papua New Guinea.
L-R: Paul Mantz, Amelia Earhart, Harry Manning and Fred Noonan in front of Amelia's Lockheed Electra at Oakland Airfield on 17th March 1937
Lesser known (to some) was the fact that Amelia set a number of records in a Pitcairn autogyro including becoming the first woman to fly an autogyro as well as an altitude record (1931) of 15,000ft. At the event recorded below however, she failed to become the first to fly across the United States:
Amelia with her 'Beech-Nut' chewing gum sponsored Pitcairn PCA-2 autogyro at Glendale Aerodrome on 7th July 1931. Earhart arrived believing she had completed the first trans-continental autogyro flight only to discover that John "Johnny" M. Miller had beaten her to it
.
