Sun Bird

In January 2009 i went to work with Andrew. It was a fantastic day; I collected seashells, and watched the crows surf the currents. This time it was my turn to take Andrew to work, not as a bystander but as a volunteer crew member. I needed to finish up a rare plant survey in the prairie.

After we readied our bags with water and snacks we headed out to the site. We opened the gate and drove in to park on the historic road, and just as I was turning to park I heard a loud noise: a Jet I guess. Then I looked out my window and what I saw was no jet. It was an enormous bug-like helicopter, the kind that lifts giant buckets to put out forest fires, the kind that picks up heavy equipment as if it were weightless, the kind that has giant hydraulic legs and blades more than 20' long. It was headed right towards us, and apparently landing. It was positioning itself, in my rear view mirror, to pick up our truck and take us away.

I turned on the truck and pulled forward. The rational side of my brain kicked in and realized that they had been doing training runs with the air cranes by the river all year and whoever was manning this beast might not have much experience in emergency landings. There is no other reason I can imagine for a metal bug to land on private property less than 60 feet from humans in a vehicle, it must be an emergency, I thought.

The Grasshopper touched down, and we watched, climbing out of the truck for a better look. Then we looked for earplugs, and watched some more. I could see two tiny white helmets in the glass eyeball. Eventually one of the men climbed down and started toward us. There was no need for him to duck, the blades were nearly 2 stories above him.

The scruffy round-faced man in a helmet and flight suit headed towards us in slow motion. I hesitated to meet him half way. I was admittedly afraid of the bug we were just almost swallowed by... and I didn't have a helmet.

Is this your property? He yelled in my direction with a smile.

No, this is a conservation easement and the owners live just down there.

We're probably your favorite people right now he said gesturing at the beast behind him, the rippling grass and the source of the deafening noise. We have a short in our computer monitoring system. We'll be outta here as soon as we get that taken care of. We nodded. Conversations are pleasantly short when talking over the noise of a helicopter. He headed back to the bug.

After 10 more minutes or so, the bug lifted off the ground, and banked hard away from us. The wind hit me and knocked me backwards, the ground turned into waves. Then they were gone, and sound of the bug's wings faded.

This is all very strange and once-in-a-lifetime or less sort of situation. Except that it isn't. This is the second time a helicopter has tried to land on my head. I'm starting to think I have some sort of helicopter homing device implanted in my body. My dad suggested I start keeping one eye to the sky.