A never ever

So tonight something happened that could only happen in an Alaskan Summer.

We took 41ish people to Kenai (Soldotna really), which is 3 hours south of Anchorage.  So we started our journey at the airport, took them out to China King, which is an all you can eat buffet of, you guessed it, Chinese food.  Well we started our trip and a little after we got on Seward Highway which heads South out of Anchorage Tony and Bud were getting some dinner with there 20ish people and were about to be heading our way.

So the plan was for us to arrive in Soldotna and drop off our group and take a midnight flight back to Anchorage.  Well it was raining all the way down to Soldotna and the clouds were a little low. so we didn't really know what to expect for flying out.  Well after dropping the group off we arrive at the small private airport and the pilot, Bob (I think) meets Scott and says that the runway lights are not working and because it is raining and we are losing light, we would have to leave now.  He said he felt bad about leaving our two other team mates but we had to go.  So as Scott rushes us to the plane and informs us of what is happening and it all sinks in, we are going to have to leave Tony and Bud in Soldotna because the runway lights were not working, so we could take off safely only with the little bit of daylight left.

So as we frantically are trying to get a hold of Tony or Bud to see where they are we are getting ready to taxi to the runway and fly on out of there.  We eventually get a hold of them and they were an hour off, so we told them what was happening and that they would fly back in the morning the next day.  So... we take off at what time... 12:22 a.m. YAH... unreal i know.  Only in an Alaskan Summer do you have enough light to take off at 12:22 a.m.  

But as we barely make it out of Soldotna we have a pretty bumpy plane ride because of the turbulence but our pilot was amazing.  And as we reached the airport, some strong winds flung us around like a rag doll, but the pilot just eased our plane to the most smooth landing i have ever experienced.

So we got out of the plane, loaded up the six passengers who were heading down to help out with a project called Salmon Frenzy.  And we went home.

The moral of the story is never doubt or go against a pilots gut. Never ever ever pressure or doubt the person.

Thanks pilot Bob, who works for MARC (Missionary Aviation Repair Center)