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autorotation. Finally, when I can clearly see small clumps of dirt scattered by the plow, the nose gently pitches up, making only the blue sky visible. This decreases forward motion and increases main rotor RPM, at which time the nose drops back to the horizon as Carolyn goes forward with the cyclic and up with the collective at about 5 feet above the ground – the maneuver’s endpoint. I think to myself, “That was well done. Some pilots just have the touch.” I hope with all my helicopter time, plus helicopter CFI rating, I can perform just as well on the return trip. Twenty minutes later, we arrive over the short, uphill grass airstrip at which Carolyn and her husband base their helicopter. The San Juan Islands are notorious for their overpopulation of blacktail deer as there are few natural predators and hunt- ing is rarely allowed. In addition, the deer are quite skilled at swimming from one rocky island to another, usually favoring those on which humans have built nice grassy runways. This periodically leads to unpleasant deer and airplane encounters, usually fatal to the deer and occasionally to the airplane’s oc- cupants. Knowing this fact, it is worrisome when I look down at the grass runway to see a herd of deer nonchalantly wandering around and large enough to have fed the entire Lewis and Clark expedition for a month. Given that tail rotors and deer do not mix well, the instruc- tor and I must be thinking the same thing when I hear him ask Carolyn what she intends to do about the deer. She laughs briefly into the mic and says she has the deer “trained.” Sure enough, as she starts the approach, the deer briefly look up and seemingly without a care in the world, slowly wander away from our landing zone. We hover over to the cement pad near the hangar, touch down gently, then the power is slowly rolled off and the turbine placed at idle for the prescribed cooling period. The deer wander back to their original locations. Some pilots quite obviously have the touch. Not once during the helicopter flight, or the earlier CJ trip, were the controls moved suddenly or forcefully by the pilot. Both machines seemed to flow very smoothly through the air to exactly where they were supposed to go. The truth is most of us have to work very hard to have that happen, while others just seem to have the “touch” – and they are often women. Kevin Ware is an ATP who also holds CFI, MEII and helicopter ratings, has more than 10,000 hours and is typed in several different business jets. He has been flying for a living on and off since he was 20, and currently works as a contract pilot for various corpo- rations in the Seattle area. When not working as a pilot he is employed part time as an emer- gency and urgent care physician. He can be reached at kevin.ware2@aol.com. Aeromania Jet Journal September 2019 / TWIN & TURBINE • 31