PETE RETURNS A HERO FROM PAGO PAGO
Peter Lamy was proud to tell the team he winged his way to and from Pago Pago in the jump seat of the oldest 747 freighter still flying. Some carriers such as American Airlines with their twenty plus year old MD 80’s have maintenance programs in place whereby their vintage aircraft fleet is literally “mutton dressed as lamb”. That is not the case with freighter aircraft who serve a more practical role in aviation. The Kalitta 747-100 Pete spent nearly twenty fours hours in the air with, would if it could speak, have some great interesting tales to tell. Freighters and even well maintained ones like the Kalitta 747-100 are workhorses and should any problems arise with the aircraft, practical solutions win over ahead of cosmetics. The pilots’ seats are as old as the aircraft itself and there is no such thing as it being sheepskin covered. If the toilet door rattles, the aircraft is not going to be grounded for three hours while maintenance crew tackles the problem. The aircraft is not washed once a week so it looks good,
In the olden days freighter aircraft were narrow bodies. DC 8’s and 707’s. In the nineties, apart from the African continent, the 707 disappeared and today, apart from South America and that miserly outfit UPS, rarely a DC 8 is seen flying the skies. As we start our second decade of the new millennium, Connie Kalitta’s 747-100 will probably (UPS still has a few) among be the last to fly the skies. Our industry came to life because of the 747 freighter and nearly forty years on we remain in awe of its capabilities. Pete said this trip to that South Seas jewel, American Samoa, is the highlight of his twenty-seven career in transportation. He started with Flying Tigers in 1982 when they were replacing their DC 8’s with 747-100’s and in the very near future the only 747-100’s he will be seeing will be visiting their graveyard in the Mojave Desert.
Pete is a hero to us because his adventure started at midnight last Thursday boarding the aircraft at LAX arriving in HNL at 0600 hours to supervise the loading of relief goods for Tsunami ravaged Samoa to arrive. He arrived in Pago Pago at 2000 hours Friday night, assisted with the unloading of the aircraft and supervised the loading of 200,000lbs of gourmet pet food which Del Monte Foods had promised their customers would be delivered and on their shelves by this coming Friday. It took him just seven hours to turn the aircraft around and at 0300 Saturday morning in the middle of a tropical storm, Pete secured his seatbelt for the nine hour flight back to HNL. Today he is watching the last of the charter flight freight being loaded onto delivery trucks. Pete arrived a hero in Pago Pago with a plane load of much needed emergency goodies and returned a hero delivering thirty-two main decks of critically required pet food on time and with not one carton wet or damaged. Peter epitomizes and sets the bar for the can do spirit that exists within CII. For that, above everything else, Peter, you’re our hero!
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