Eat your heart out EAA!

[Snowyibook@me.com]

I work for era aviation the same airline that is profiled on Discovery channel. I get to see the Tweto's every once in a while as they come through the Fairbanks airport I though everyone here would enjoy this recent pic I snapped with Jim.

I love my Job!1334

[Todd copeland]

Great picture! I love the show, and I have heard they are great to work for.

[Seerjfly]

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[Hangar10]

Cool! I love that show too.

[CarlOrton]

Real down-to-earth folks. Met them at AirVenture this summer. Fame hasn't ruined their lives yet, so they were a pleasure to talk to. No rush, no bother, etc. First class all the way.

[Chad Jensen]

Very cool! Thanks for sharing the pic!:cool:

[MickYoumans]

Flying Wild Alaska is one of my favorite shows. The Twetos seem to be really laid back nice people. As much as I love the show, I'm just glad I don't live up there and have to fight the bitter cold and unreal crosswinds. Oh yea...you can keep the muktuk and stink flipper too. It does not look or sound appetizing at all to me. I'm happpy right where I am here in Georgia. We set a record high last week of 77 one day. We have had awesome flying weather all of this fall and should continue to be no problem through the winter either. Thanks for sharing the picture.

[Joe LaMantia]

Friday Night at 10PM I'm glued to the Discovery channel watching that great family TV show! I had the pleasure of spending 3 weeks in SE Alaska in May of 1997 and met a lot of really nice people, the Twetos are typical of the nature loving, hard working Alaskans I met back then. Thanks for posting that photo of Jim!

Joe
:cool:

[R Lunde]

I've watched two episodes of this show and frankly I'm a bit surprised at the support for it on this thread. From a pilot's perspective, it certainly must be clear that the show is falsely dramatized. With nothing against Era or the Twetos, the depiction that Discovery puts forward is of an airline that is constantly about to miss critical deadlines and whose planes are perpetually malfunctioning. If things were really as Discovery wants us to believe, but for their superhero pilots, Era would not be the renowned carrier that it is because they would be entirely unreliable and their planes would invariably plunge into the Bering Sea several times a year. The reality of successful air commerce cannot withstand the amount of drama and emergencies Discovery packs into each episode.

One episode focused on a Caravan pilot who was having electric trim problems. Most anybody who has flown a plane with electric trim knows that they can be prone to failure or misbehavior. If the trim is doing anything uncommanded, it is a simple matter of disengaging the electric trim and using the manual control. That's what the pilot did in this case, but not before the narrator had discussed the dire consequences of runaway trim and how close the airplane came to crashing to a fiery demise. Also, in a CGI illustration of trim controls, nobody caught that they'd mislabeled the rudder and elevator.

The days of the bush pilots blazing uncharted sky trails are over. Alaska has one of the most robust aviation infrastructures in the world. Most Alaska flying is relatively routine, but it is still interesting and there are plenty of examples of exceptional situations in the great white north. It's certainly worthy of good TV, but to depict constant imminent disaster is irresponsible to Era and all of Alaskan aviation and even GA in general. Aviation is a fragile subject with a still-skeptical and uninformed public. It should be represented with a bit more reverence than an episode of American Chopper.

[Joe LaMantia]

Yes, there is a lot of "drama" created that stretches real life, it's a "reality TV show". This is where TV has gone with "hundreds" of channels competing for viewers. The point of these shows is to sell stuff, which is accomplished by getting a large number of people to watch. We have a show called "The Aviators" that maybe a bit closer to the kind of image we would like to promote to the general public, but you need some "nonsense" to capture a large audience. I grew up with "Sky King" which is hardly a realistic depiction of aviation. There are very few TV shows that deal with aircraft that don't involve "drama" of some sort, a drug deal, a kidnapping, or some kind of rescue come to mind. It nice to see shows like "Buffalo Airways" and "Flying Wild Alaska" that "star" real people even if there are a some "contrived" situations.

Joe
:cool:

[Seerjfly]

.

[Todd copeland]

I am really surprised at how people have to be critical of everything. Yes, I have noticed the over dramatization and inaccuracies, and even some real mistakes in the editing of the show which reverses the order the pilots perform some tasks. So what! The show is fun and entertaining and will probably get more people interested in aviation. That is a good thing. Beyond that, there are some good lessons of self reliance and plain old "get it done" attitude that people are moving away from these days. When the CEO of a company loads his own aircraft, it's a company I have respect for. The Family seems to have good values and I think they are a good role model. I could care less about the so called negatives that some here are mentioning....

[Louis]

I've only seen a couple of episodes of the show since I don't have cable but I must admit it was fun seeing such familiar people and places on national tv.

There was some dramatic silliness that left me shaking my head. I will say, however that between what I've seen flying in Alaska and the stories I've heard, there are many stories far more dramatic than what that program shows that you will NEVER see on tv.

I've been flying out to the villages since the late 80's and have seen many changes. Most homes out there now have satellite tv. Shows on tv tend to depict urban America, which unfortunately has the effect on many villagers, especially among the young, to give them the impression that they're "nobody's living in the middle of nowhere". I think that show has the potential to show folks out there that their lifestyles are actually quite interesting, and the many folks watching the show can see that. From the tragic suicide rate in the villages anything that can improve those folks self image is a good thing.

http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/chevak-watches-student-built-lsa-takes-flight Airplane projects in Rural AK are a good thing too!

[sgillila]

I guess that's the rub with reality television: without the sensationalized content it likely wouldn't make the networks desk. I guess we just have to keep in mind that they likely aren't targeting pilots as their primary audience and enjoy the show for what it is. I'm always surprised by the number of non-pilots I meet that believe we still run the same chance of a successful flight as the air mail service did in the 1920's. If the majority of folks knew how consistently and safely most small aircraft flights were executed with, especially those of organizations like Era, there wouldn't be much hype to the show. I enjoy the show for the personalities and the gorgeous vistas that Alaska provides.

That said (just my opinions) I love the pic and definitely eating my heart out :-) I would love the meet the Tweeto family in person! I also hope that the show has the effect on native Alaskans that Louis mentioned in the earlier post, that would be a great benefit.

Regards,
Scott

[Louis]

Great points. I agree with both you and Mr. Lunde: It is a good thing when the media portrays aviation as interesting and exciting but when it crosses the line to "reckless and dangerous" it isn't very helpful. My job is flying air taxi in AK. I am a rather boring family man and if my job was "dangerous" I would never be allowed to do it.

Things have gotten a lot less stressfull flying schedules to remote villages. Most runways are long enough for larger aircraft. Much more weather information is available. Webcams are especially helpful: http://akweathercams.faa.gov/ (now the daylight hours to see the picture are a bit limited) More and more village airports are getting GPS approaches also. GPS has been the biggest game changer. Before GPS with few navaids available you really had to know the country to navigate to a village in low visibility. Many of the villages out on the tundra are really hard to find even in CAVU. Now you just follow the line right to the runway and the things will even tell you where the terrain is.

When I started my first flying job (before GPS) I was warned by my boss that all my passengers had more hours flying in that area and would know the country better than I did. He told me about the "Eskimo ADF" which means you watch your passengers and when all their heads turn at once you probably just flew past their village. If I said that never happened to me I'd be a liar.....Louis

[R Lunde]

Very cool about the Eskimo ADF, Louis. Good to see you on this board as well as the Aeronca list.

Cheers,

-Ryan

[Anymouse]

He told me about the "Eskimo ADF" which means you watch your passengers and when all their heads turn at once you probably just flew past their village. If I said that never happened to me I'd be a liar.....Louis

Yeah, I've got a story or two about that myself.

[Louis]

Very cool about the Eskimo ADF, Louis. Good to see you on this board as well as the Aeronca list.

Cheers,

-Ryan
Good to see you here as well. It looks like this board is starting to take off. Look me up if you wander back up this way....Louis

[nfdlpilot]

I love this show, and although I don't have cable, someone records it for me. WooHoo!! It is educational as well. I was surprised to learn about how hard life can be there, and how depressing at times. Kudos to the Tweetos and others for putting up with the cameras so we can all learn about it.