A Super Cub with 35″ Bushwheels can land in some amazing places. People often make the comment: “I bet you can land anywhere with those things”. It’s true the 35″ tires can take a nasty bump, but the limitations are equally great. I don’t simply look at an area for land-ability, but for work-ability. In other words is it usable, or just “land-able”. I took this picture this morning and it shows an airstrip that is workable but NASTY! It sits on top of a knob which receives wind from all directions.
Like my old bush pilot mentor Gar taught me years ago, “There are three things that will get you in trouble bush flying, wind, wind, and wind”. On a strip like the one pictured above a 5 mph wind is enough to make or break the landing. The sensitivity to wind is a challenging attribute considering a 5500′ elevation and extremely bumpy nature. It’s the sort of strip that could easily bend metal if one got careless. The center of the strip is the high point, and both ends drop off significantly (it’s only 400′ long). This is challenging because on final you can only barely see the first 150′ and then it disappears over the hump. Getting off the side of the strip is not an option because there are boulders that will quickly end the detour. We flew the 2.5 hours to attempt this strip last night, but the winds were so adverse that we had to give it up. I made our second attempt this morning and we were able to successfully complete the flight. A hiker had badly cut a finger and tendons were exposed, so we were thankful to successfully evacuate the individual and get them to town.