Love and Aviation.
Every year, light-engine aircraft strike Alaska. Then in the fog for the tops of the oil stuck, then the error of the pilot, then the failure of the system, or even in general no one understood anything, but the plane on the bottom of the lake. Last month, hunters found the debris of a plane hanging in pieces on trees, which disappeared in 2008, under the debris human bones scattered by beasts - father and son, were searching for them then for a long time, and found nine years later.
There was a little girl, Sarah, who dreamed of flying. Not like a bird, but like a plane. The fate brought her both past the military and civilian aviation and Sarah got the profession of an accountant. She married, gave birth to a son – all like everyone else, but the dream of flying remained. At the age of 35, Sarah still received a license to drive a light-engine aircraft. The aircraft first rented, flew with an instructor, then without flying the right number of hours and gained experience. Finally, by the age of 40, Sarah and her husband John bought a small used plane of the type of corn for 4 seats. This is where the story itself begins.
Alaska is large, but there is no one’s land. Land, whether federal or tribal, state or city, or private, all have their own laws as to protect this land and the livelihoods on this land in every way to protect. To get out just so hunting will not work, you need to get permission for the season and for the species of wildlife (salo, deer, bear, rye, mountain goat, etc.). D is. Service is offered enormous. You can rent a private hunting cottage for a couple of days or a week or for how much money is not unfortunate, hire a professional guide, rent a small plane or boat.
To make it cheaper, more fun and safer, John invited three friends to hunt. They removed a hunting house on the shore of the lake, purchased food for three days, filled a plane. Under the contract, Sarah sent a hunting expedition to a parking spot on her hydroplane and had to pick them all up on a specified day.
In Alaska, the main competitors of hunters are bears. There are three types of them: black, brown and white. Grizzlies are a subtype of brown bears, they are more aggressive, although brown are far from gammi mice. Black bears try to get away from people, but they like to climb the garbage. Therefore, all garbage tanks in Alaska have "anti-bear" castles, if you don't close the tanks tightly, you can, leaving the house, drink the painting "Three Bears Dinner Without Mashenka" right in your yard. You will pay a fine to the city. If they like it, they will come back again and again. No, shoot at the bottom! The brown and grizzly strictly guard their territory, but they do not hunt people (in most cases). The white are the jeweller of everyone they meet and who will not have time to escape.
John and his hunting comrades could each shoot no more than six deer a day. But the deer, of course, are also not stupid to stand and wait until they are released to the sausage, they still have to be pursued, to approach them, shoot, and hit. The most difficult part is “invisible.” It is very difficult to walk unnoticed on the taiga - there is everything against a person, then the branch under the booth will crumble traitorically, then it is necessary to climb through the bush with a gun and a backpack, then the white man begins to scream over his head: "We are here!" and I want to shoot a throat creature on the spot. The deer will hear and teach you before you notice his white tail, and will quietly go aside.
The second problem, after you shot the deer, is our old friends bears. The black bears will just go after the hunters to eat what they threw out when cutting the carcass. The brown and grizzly go on a shot as an invitation to lunch – the feeder has arrived! Therefore, the hunters either quickly divide the carcass on the spot and quickly remove it from there or take the carcass to the partition site, but also quickly. Here, almost every hunter will tell you the story of the encounter with a brown bear, who "accidentally" broke out on a pit, where the hunters cut the deer twenty minutes after the shot. At the same time, the hunters are happy if the bear just gives them a chance to leave. Tush of the deer gets to the owner of the taiga.
The problem with bears does not end here, they also have a unique smell and hear fresh meat miles away, so they often go wrong around hunting houses and cause a lot of trouble to hunters. One morning, the hunter went out to the wind to do a little need and in the middle of the process, a brown bear came out from the corner of the hunting house, loudly breathed the smell of enemy urine on the territory entrusted to him and grumbled dissatisfied. So the hunter ran around the house, grabbing the pants with one hand and pressing the reproductive organ in the other as a staffing stick. Only the bear did not need the stick, he wanted to take the prize whole with his wet pants. The Olympic Games were prematurely interrupted by fans who dragged the half-dead race favourite into the house. The bear then walked around for a long time, testing the strength of the door, demanding to deliver the offender and throwing the territory. No one went hunting that day.
When Sarah flew to pick up the hunting expedition, the deer’s meat was packed in special refrigerators (such as mini refrigerators made of durable plastic), by the number of refrigerators she knew the weight of the cargo, which was pre-arranged and designed. But there was one, but rather two, namely, two undivided deer bodies. It was overweight and Sarah gently refused to take the extra cargo on board. The hunters tried to convince her, but Sarah refused.
Word for word between the pilot and the hunters was linked by a fence in which John took the side of the hunter friends. Sarah tried to explain that the lake was small and the “run” was quite short, the rise up was sharp, that the Alaskan people ate very high, and if they put on the tree, the bears would have a party with humans for dessert, and a bunch of children would remain orphans at home, including Sarah and John’s son. The four fatigued, unshaken and swirled by the hunt and blood of the man did not want to listen to anything, but Sarah did not take on the extra weight. While the plane was running on the water, the hunters sadly followed the eyes of two lonely deer bodies left on the shore of the lake. Upon his return, John left home for a week and filed for divorce within the following month.
In front of me sits a nice young woman named Sarah. She tells me this story, trying not to cry, but the tears still don’t roll on her cheeks. I do not know how to reassure her, I have nothing to comfort her, there are many months of divorce process ahead of her. I ask, “If you knew at the lake that your decision would destroy your marriage, would you take those deer on board?” “Well, I say, then you did everything right. You have only one life and no one can replace your mother and your son.”
Every year, light-engine aircraft strike Alaska. Then in the fog for the tops of the oil stuck, then the error of the pilot, then the failure of the system, or even in general no one understood anything, but the plane on the bottom of the lake. Something tells me that Sarah will never complete this sad statistic (three times a tree).