At 5:30 I was solo and I wanted to recon the west side of the AO a bit more. Old Prescott, Glen Eagles, JRP, Ridgefield with some detours to see how it might work for shorter distance loops.
Some decent short runs / hills on this route on a wide road with no traffic on Glen Eagles. Also plenty of ambient light in that neighborhood for winter runs. Still it is just dark enough and there is just enough traffic that a headlamp is a really good idea for this AO.
NMS – 9/11 nineteen years ago. YHC was on a business trip at our R&D HQ outside of Minneapolis and was rushing to breakfast at the Hampton Inn when one of my work colleagues told me a plane crashed into the WTC. In the prior weeks there were some light / prop planes that were going too close to cities – cant remember where, maybe DC and NYC – my first that is that this was just a over-hyped news report like we had at the time. Then er watched the second plane as it plowed into the tower. We went over to the office and turned the news on and saw the first tower collapse. What chaos.
Apart from the tragic circumstances, this set in motion some incredible logistical challenges for people to return to their families. As the Tech Lead running a development project at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, my team was on site. Most of the team were in more reasonable driving distances in DC and Raleigh, but one team member lived in Rochester MN and was trying to figure out how to get home. Since we were really flip flopping locations and could give each other updates on what it looked like. He ended up starting Wednesday to make the 21 hour drive – one way in a rental. While planning on doing the drive in the opposite direction, Thursday around noon flights slowly opened back up and I decided to stick with flying. MSP was chaos, and after switching fights ten times due to reroutes, and delays, I finally got back to RIC. And in the weird way the world works, despite all different flight numbers and routes, I only got home 30 minutes later than originally planned. I was just happy to be back with my family – and clearly we would never view the world the same.
