“Now, here’s the problem, Nate,” I began, adopting the tone of someone explaining the solar system to a chicken. “As you may or may not be aware—living here, no offence, in the back of beyond—the U.S. immigration system has some deeply rooted problems. To sum it up: it sucks. Big time.”
Nate, the FBO (that’s Fixed Base Operator), nodded slightly, as though trying to decide whether I was serious or just on the verge of a public meltdown.
The airport Nate was babysitting was a masterpiece of government overreach, conveniently situated in the middle of nowhere Wyoming, near the microscopic village of Thermopolis. With a runway stretching over 6,000 feet and 100 feet wide, it seemed ready to welcome international jumbo jets. Only it wasn’t accommodating any of those. In reality, the runway mostly welcomed a handful of rancher-owned Cessnas, Pipers, and scrappy homebuilts held together by duct tape and a prayer. Then there was the crop-dusting biplane, which was so ancient it might have been present at Kitty Hawk—the Wright brothers testing site in North Carolina— to take notes.The only thing older? Probably its pilot, who looked like he’d been grandfathered in from an era when horseback was cutting-edge technology.
Every so often, an emergency flight would roar in during the dead of night, delivering the unfortunate remains of a car wreck to the nearby hospital. Twice a year, the Wyoming Governor would grace the area with his presence, stepping off his governmental jet in cowboy boots and an ill-fitting hat to “connect with the people”—usually when an election loomed and a rodeo or round-up offered prime photo ops.
The rest of the year, the airport served as a playground for cottontail rabbits, prairie dogs, and the occasional coyote. Unless the FAA had a top-secret plan to transform this facility into a global aviation hub, it was hard to see this as anything but your tax dollars circling the drain.
Not that any of this bureaucratic absurdity was my concern. I’d come here mostly out of curiosity, intrigued by whatever brilliant idea Nate might have cooked up and hopeful for another glimpse of those gorgeous Super Cubs.
An opening excerpt from What Could Possibly Go Wrong? Chronicles of Chaos and Courage remains available here. The full book can be ordered here.
John next to his Flying Tigers tribute.
Captain John Newkirk — descendant of Flying Tigers legend — standing by his warbird tribute that looks like WWII and a rock concert had a baby. Subtlety? Left on the tarmac. This machine screams history at 200 knots, and John’s the maestro of the noise.
John’s Flying Tigers plane alone
John Newkirk’s Flying Tigers tribute plane — a rolling museum piece with an afterburner. Shark teeth on the nose, history on the wings, swagger in the paint. Marcel Romdane stumbled into Wyoming expecting beige skies and got this: a WWII fever dream with a propeller.
LEFT IMAGE
“And lo, I climbed into the cockpit — and it was good. Wyoming, 2022.”
This wasn’t just a plane. It was a religion with wings, and Scott was its reluctant prophet — a man so calm he made cadavers look chatty. The Super Cub? A minimalist masterpiece forged from tubing, fabric, and contempt for modern avionics.
I, of course, was the heretic: loud, impulsive, allergic to checklists, and fuelled by bacon, arrogance, and aviation-grade delusion. Yet here I was, grinning like a lunatic under grey Wyoming skies, seated in the same flying relic Scott used to eradicate coyotes and bureaucracy with surgical grace.
We were polar opposites — I was chaos in a flight suit, he was stoicism in boots — but in this airborne chapel of bad decisions, we shared one truth: the Super Cub is life, everything else is noise.
RIGHT IMAGE
Nate and Hennessy, in their natural habitat: concrete, chaos, and the vague smell of WD‑40 and wet despair.
This is Nate. Half-man, carburettor. The kind of guy who can rebuild a broken alternator blindfolded while arguing with his ex over speakerphone and hosing down a hound named Hennessy—who, judging by that dead-eyed stare, had long since given up on dignity or dry fur.
Nate wasn’t just a mechanic. He was a mythical creature of diesel-scented resurrection. Where most people saw rust, Nate saw potential. Where I saw a hopeless pile of parts, Nate saw “just needs a shim, a prayer, and maybe a donor liver.”
His brain operated on frequencies normal mortals couldn’t access—somewhere between "NASCAR pit crew" and "wiring diagram shaman." The man had more tools than social skills, and frankly, I respected the hell out of that.
Sure, he thought I was unhinged—and to be fair, he wasn’t wrong. But in a place where people whisper to livestock and drive trucks that predate the Cold War, we somehow clicked. Maybe it was the shared chaos. Maybe it was the mutual understanding that none of this was going to plan, and that was perfectly fine.
And as for Hennessy, that long-suffering dog with the expression of a retired war general forced into bathtime—well, she was the perfect mascot: tough, tolerant, and permanently damp.
IMAGE LEFT
Nose-first into the tarmac: because who needs landing gear when you’ve got denial and a God complex?
It was a lazy Wyoming Sunday when Nate called with the kind of casual chaos only he could deliver.
“Some clown just plowed his plane into my runway without dropping the gear. The asphalt looks like it got assaulted by a cheese grater. Wanna help clean it up?”
When we arrived, the scene looked like a runway had mated with a belt sander. The Mooney’s propeller was now a modern sculpture in the genre of ‘aeronautical regret,’ and the landing gear? Pristine, flawless — because it never touched the damn ground.
The pilot, meanwhile, was deep in the five stages of I swear I pushed the lever, trying to verbally undo gravity while standing next to a plane that now resembled a wounded gazelle on its last breath.
Nate offered his diagnosis with all the empathy of a DMV line manager on overtime:
“You forgot to put the gear down. That’s it. Case closed.”
And honestly, he wasn’t wrong.
The runway lights survived. The prop did not. And I, once again, found myself ankle-deep in someone else’s aviation apocalypse — a front-row spectator to incompetence, hubris, and the gentle scraping sound of aluminum dreams being sanded into oblivion.
This wasn’t an emergency.
This was Sunday in Wyoming.
IMAGE RIGHT
Piet’s Plane & the Pretzel Prop: a romantic tragedy in three acts.
Act I: Forgetting the landing gear.
Act II: Attempting denial.
Act III: Getting billed by Nate and probably murdered by your wife.
Piet—if that was his real name—planted his aircraft with all the finesse of a falling vending machine. By the time we arrived, the propeller looked like it had been through a blender set to “shame.” Miraculously, once jacked up, the landing gear extended smoothly, smugly, as if to say, “Don’t blame me, you clown.”
The aircraft was, technically, towable—but not by air. By highway, maybe. By marriage? Unlikely. Because while the FAA might let you off with paperwork, hell hath no fury like a spouse who funded your midlife aviation disaster.
We parked what was left of Piet’s pride on the apron, pocketed $30 each for the privilege, and mentally prepared for the arrival of the wife, who by all accounts made tornadoes look merciful.
Nate handed me his share with a grin:
“Don’t worry, I’ll invoice him something biblical.”
And thus, Wyoming gained another monument—this time not to aviation, but to overconfidence, financial decisions made without spousal consent, and the eternal truth that landing gear only works when deployed.
IMAGE LEFT
“Your tax money at work. Or at least at idle.”
There it stood—gleaming like an expensive lie—the state-funded jet of Wyoming’s top hat-wearing bureaucrat. I’d stumbled upon this marvel while elbow-deep in the oily innards of my decaying Range Rover, wondering if I’d make it home without a fire extinguisher or divine intervention.
Every few months, this airborne PR stunt would touch down, carrying the Governor himself—freshly pressed, cowboy-booted, and photogenically detached. He’d flash a rehearsed smile, attend a livestock auction, shake three hands, and vanish before anyone asked why the town still had more tumbleweeds than working Wi-Fi.
The rest of the year? This runway was a wildlife sanctuary with a control tower that served mostly as a sunbathing spot for prairie dogs. But when campaign season hit, boom—public aviation became the stage for rodeo backdrops and empty promises.
This wasn’t connectivity.
This was cosplay governance in a pressurised cabin.
Because nothing says “I care” like burning $12,000 in Jet-A to wave at a few ranchers and pretend you understand poverty from the comfort of an executive seat warmer.
IMAGE RIGHT
“Left: My future in spinal trauma. Right: My present in financial ruin. Both proudly sponsored by delusion.”
This charming portrait captures the exact moment Wyoming tried to roundhouse-kick my aviation ambitions with a rusted farm implement.
That red relic on the left? A communist-era tractor so ancient it probably helped plow the road to Chernobyl. That was the FBO’s generous offer: mow weeds, dodge prairie dogs, and earn a herniated disc in exchange for a plastic seat, a $0/hour pay-check, and the soul-numbing glory of seasonal obscurity.
To the right? My decomposing Range Rover—an overpriced British coffin on wheels—still reeking of desperation, diesel, and the regrets of three continents. That mechanical parasite had already stolen my dignity and half my bank account. But today, it was simply the backdrop to a new and particularly idiotic career crossroads.
I had just launched myself out of it like a caffeinated hostage escapee, sprinting toward a yellow Super Cub like it owed me child support—completely unaware that the pilot would soon ruin my life with one cursed sentence:
“The USDA’s looking for low-level bush pilots…”
What he meant was:
“You seem reckless, foreign, and legally vague enough to survive our aviation meat grinder.”
And so began the fork in the runway:
- One path led to tractor-induced back surgery and awkward fertilizer small talk.
- The other? Straight into airborne madness, eternal visa purgatory, and near-death via a DEI hire from Utah’s Attorney General’s Office who couldn’t tell an immigration form from a McDonald’s menu—let alone process a work permit without detonating my legal status like it was an unsupervised fireworks stand in July.
Naturally, I declined the tractor gig with a polite smile, citing back pain and an allergy to agricultural equipment older than NATO.
Because when you’re standing between a Soviet-grade mower and a dying British luxury vehicle—
the only correct answer is:
“Hold my Amarula and watch this.”
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