Chapter 42

Dan 2.0’s turn:

My desk phone rang. I picked up. “3Sigma. This is Dan Granger. How can I help you?”

“Mister Granger, this is Sid Elmendorf with Plains Electric Co-op in Kansas. We met at that Atlanta trade show last year. I need rescuing.”

“We make a point of rescuing a lot of people, Mister Elmendorf...”

“Sid, if you don’t mind.”

“Okay, Sid. How can we help?”

“We got a new tie into the grid. It’s not working right. We have a little combined cycle plant and we get a feed from those wind folks in west Texas and we’re losing our tie and islanding our system. Last month we almost lost our whole system.”

“Ouch,” I said.

“Yeah, ouch. My engineer just bought a new set of protection and control equipment for our tie. I need to get it installed ASAP. And he says he’s not up to it. He’s good, but not that good. I have a couple of acquaintances in the business that say you guys are that good.”

“I like to think so,” I said. I didn’t want to sound cocky. We ARE that good. “How soon? And money.”

“Can you get us fixed up, cost not to exceed, say, two million?”

“I’m thinking probably around half of that if you’ve already got the equipment.”

“I got the money already allocated. I’ll have my beancounters call your beancounters. Now. Schedule. If I dump this grid, I’m killing the lights to the governor’s grammaw’s house. I’d really rather not do that. I’d have to move to Missouri or something equally devastating.”

I sighed. We’re loaded. “Send me drawings. Documentation for both sides of your tie. Your infeeds and outfeeds...”

“I’ll send you the whole system study,” he said. “I think four technicians, if they’re any good...”

“Some of the best in the business,” I bragged. “And the guy that’s going to go there and set them up is an engineer with years of field service experience.”

“Okay, then. My heartbeat’s getting stable now.”

“Well, Sid, I’m gonna have to see how we can man this job, but I can get you a load of technicians up there in two days. We’ll work out the details of the programming while they install and commission the hardware.”

“You’re my hero, you know...”

“No, just a poor ol’ Cajun in the wrong place,” I laughed. “Lemme get things rolling. Gimme your email. I’ll send you a link to upload your data if it’s electronic. Or an address to overnight the paperwork.”

“Done, buddy. Here...”

Next step is to walk into Alan’s office, breaking the news to him. That’s a pushover. I know how he’ll react. Our careers track too close. And I know about the transportation thing. We have to tell Cindy. Cindy, who’s named that twin Cessna ‘Songbird’ after the plane that starred in the Sky King TV series of the Fifties and Sixties. Lord only knows where she got the videos. Doesn’t matter.

Legality? Cindy’s still only a private pilot, but her flying is ‘incidental to the business’ so we’re on the safe side of the razor’s edge of federal regulations. As for her skills, nobody here questions them. Wally’s run her through the mill in the 402, right up to the point of loading up almost every seat, including the two we had to buy because our one-dollar airplane only came with six. Full fuel, all the seats loaded, Wally in the right seat, Cindy in the left, and if she messed up, she wipes out the company because there’s her Dan sitting right behind her, looking, waiting HIS turn at the controls, Stoney in the seat behind Wally, and here’s my Nikki sitting beside me, then Alan and Terri.

That’s a lot of faith there, in Wally’s prowess as a mechanic – he and his other mechanic keep our aircraft up – and Wally’s prowess as a flight instructor, and we get up about eight thousand feet and...

“Looking for nine thousand,” Wally said over the intercom.

“Roger,” Cindy replied. “Heading 180...” and Wally’s hand reached and flicked the left throttle back to the stop.

We’d been warned. “Your job is to provide weight. We’re doing this at altitude, so if something REALLY happens, we have plenty of time to straighten it out.”

So I heard a “Whoaaaa!” from Terri in the back seats and Cindy saying. “Left engine loss. Nose back up to the horizon. Right rudder. Bank into the right engine. Gimme the engine loss checklist.”

In a minute we’re stable.

“Not bad. Not bad at all,” Wally said.

So, yeah, Cindy can handle it. I wish Dan 1.0 could go with her, but he’s in South Carolina for this one.

The next morning Jason and I are looking over the client’s drawings.

“Pretty standard physical installation,” Jason says. Jason knows. He’s been doing this for a decade, and he, like the rest of our Auburn graduate engineers, has passed the state exams making him a certified ‘engineering intern’, working on the four years experience needed for legal status as a ‘professional engineer’. You need that legal status to sign off on work and to do business as an engineering house. I, Alan, and the other Dan have our PE licenses. The truth is, though, that Jason’s eminently capable as an engineer and one would be foolish to NOT respect his observations.

“Sid says they’ll have all the materials on site for the installation. We’re working on the implementation.”

“Piece a’cake,” he said.

So we’re rolling. We’ll fly four techs up there, along with test equipment, get them set up, and things will happen.

Cindy’s turn:

Getting excited here, and a little nervous. This morning Alan and Dan 2.0 called a “quick meeting” of the partners, and some techs.

“Folks, this is a weird opportunity. There’s a little utility out in Western Kansas that has a problem. They’re being force-fed a bunch of wind energy from Texas, and it’s raising hell with their load-and-phase matching gear. And don’t get me started on the idiocy of wind energy as a commercial source.”

“Anyway, they have new equipment coming in a couple of days, but not nearly enough hands to get it all installed and tested. We’ve never worked with them, but they called us based on several referrals, and they’re offering a big premium for quick response. You guys aren’t opposed to making a little money, are you?”

Everyone was grinning and nodding affirmatively.

“OK, let’s begin. Most of you need to pack for a week. Jason, please get with me in a few minutes for an equipment list. Cindy, can you go wind up the rubber bands on the 402?”

I grinned, showing admirable self-restraint, but inside I was squealing “YES!!!”

“Cindy, Jason, I’m pretty sure you’ll have to stay overnight the first night, but probably not more. Then come on back, and around the end of the week, I’ll go back out with you and wave my PE stamp, if we need it.”

“Now, let’s all get moving, make lists, and make sure we have a good handle on the other projects. We don’t want to screw our active clients. Remember, it takes an infinite number of “attaboys” to make up for one “Oh shit.” We can’t afford to let any of the other projects slide.”

Woo-hoo! Time to go pack, and get with Wally to check out Songbird!

That last step was a simple phone call. I also picked up a list of equipment and started working out the weight and balance calculations for the plane. That’s an app on my iPad. We wrote it, almost for fun. I punch in the weights for full fuel, the six human bodies, sixty pounds of luggage apiece, and the tools and test equipment.

“You LOVE this, don’tcha, redhead?” Wally asked.

“Gee, Wally,” I laughed. “Realsies! And Jason’s gonna be in the right seat, so he can handle the checklists and the gear and flaps and let me fly. You’re not worried, are you? Really?”

“Nope. Yep. Student. Little sister. Proud of ya, so yes. Be careful.”

“If I wanna hotdog, I won’t use THIS thing. Flies like a box truck.”

“That’s the other side of the equation. Make sure you stay ahead of the plane. You know...”

“I can’t run it like anything else I’ve flown,” I said.

“Yeah. Do that.”

Right after breakfast we had everybody and everything on board. I’d met all the techs we were bringing for the job. After all, we all work together. They know I fly. I gave ‘em the pre-flight briefing. Advised them about buckling in, reminders about the headsets and intercom. Locations of barf bags. “You puke on my plane, you’re gonna meet a bucket and sponge.”

Don’t misunderstand -- I LOVE flying, and there’s a lot of “romance” in flying Songbird. After all, this was my first real “commercial” flight in a twin, and at first, I felt like I was really doing “big stuff”. And it was Songbird’s first real paying mission for 3Sigma.

But flying is flying, at some point. And about an hour into the flight to Wichita, the romance was beginning to fade a little. The actual job is up at Newton, Kansas, but Wally told me to use Wichita Mid-Continent. It made sense because of their services, availability of rental trucks, and hotels.

Couple of hours later I’m on the ground in Kansas, four hours of multi-engine, pilot-in-command time. Completely nominal, right up to that smart-ass Burt Stanley, one our senior technicians, flopping out the door and kissing the ground, videoed by another tech, Dickie Hollis.

“There goes your ‘plays well with others’ bonus,” I huffed.

“I love ya like a sister, Cindy!” Burt laughed.

“You come from Arkansas,” I tossed back. “‘Sister’ leaves entirely too much latitude.”

“Y’all play nice,” Jason laughed. “Cindy, don’t rag on my technicians.”

“But HE started it...” I whined.

I supervised the refueling of our plane. One of our rental vans showed up. Burt signed for it, we loaded everything in it, let them drop me and Jason off to get our rental car and the other van. I had Jason drive us to the client’s offices. Called Dan and then Susan.

“You didn’t kill my husband, then,” Susan chirped.

“Nope. His knuckles never even got real white. We should be back tomorrow before sundown.”

“Tell ‘im to call me when he gets in the hotel room.”

“Call Susan when you get to the hotel room,” I said to Jason.

“Tell my darlin’ wife that I love her.”

I punched the speaker button. “You tell ‘er.”

“Hi, baby,” Jason said. “We cheated death at the hands of that redhead again.”

“JASON!” Susan and I BOTH squeaked at him.

“I love ya, cutie,” he said.

“Love ya, too, babe. No partying with those...”

“You know that bunch ain’t gonna party,” he countered.

We had our kick-off meeting with the clients. I was just a bit amused. I ... Well, Jason LOOKS like the kind of engineer you’d expect to see heading up this effort, so we’re all in the big conference room at their main office.

“I’m Jason Ellerbee with 3Sigma. These are my technicians...” He introduced each of our techs. I sat a bit out of the main flow, all quiet and demure.

“And the young lady in the corner is Doctor Cindy Richards.”

“Wai-wai-wait a darn minute,” The oldest guy in the room said. That’s Mister Phil Jones, their substation supervisor. “Doctor?”

“Cindy, please introduce yourself.”

I stood, all five feet four inches of me. Smiled. Took a deep breath. “I am Cindy Richards, I have a Master’s in electrical engineering from Auburn University, and I just got my doctorate in physics, also from Auburn. I’m a research associate with the National Laboratory in Los Alamos and have fellowships with MIT and Texas A&M...”

“And she’s also the pilot who flew our team here,” Burt added helpfully.

“Which is mainly why I’m here. Jason’s our lead engineer on this project. I’m just the taxi driver.”

“But you came up here...”

“Two of us in the company have ratings to fly our company twin engine plane. The other is my husband and he’s on a project in South Carolina.”

He shook his head, turned to Sid, who’s the chief engineer. “Sid, dammit, you’re supposed to protect us from these surprises.”