Two Birds, One Bucket

In college, I created a few small pieces which drew on imagery from airplane boneyards for source material. I had always wanted to see one of these places in person but never had the chance, money, or reason to do it on my own.

Working for a small independent jet engine repair shop refurbishing engines that were no longer being manufactured meant we needed to build spare parts inventory. These were gathered from unused engines with little life expectancy for their life limited parts that were no longer in service, typically sold cheap for their parts. The company would send me to perform borescope inspections to air fields, airports, and broker storage sites in and around Florida and the U.S. to gather information on the status of engines before purchase. My job was to find everything wrong with the engine so we could negotiate the selling price down. I was used to being asked to go on a “field service” regularly by this point so when my manager asked if I was interested in taking an assignment, I didn’t hesitate to say yes before he even told me where.

We arrived in Roswell NM late at night. Uber had not made it out here yet and no taxi services were running, luckily I had the foresight to schedule a ride with the local taxi company for off hours pickup ahead of our arrival date. One lonely cab showed up to meet us at the airport as scheduled. As others tried to catch the cab, the old woman in the drivers seat called out my name and said we were the only fare she was picking up. Needless to say, we didnt want to leave these people stranded so we shared the cab with other passengers who were traveling in our direction while other people had to wait for the fare to be completed before the taxi made it’s way back to the airport for them. I imagine the taxi made mutliple trips to and from the terminal that night. Roswell is a very small town so it’s a quick trip from one end to the other. You can see the entire thing from the air as you begin the approach toward the airport.

Since we arrived in darkness, I was not able to see much of the landscape when pulling up to the gate after landing. Upon exiting the airport terminal, and while we waited for the cab, we saw an old American Airlines jet parked near the perimeter fence in a state of dissassembly and not much else in the darkeness behind it. Little did we know the surprise that awaited us in the morning.

The next day we caught a ride back to the airport from our hotel so that we could pick up the rental car. Since Roswell is a small town with a small airport terminal, we didn’t expect to see anything interesting. I was wrong, very very wrong.

The inspection was not scheduled until the following day so all I was able to observe was what could be seen through the perimeter fence. In the distance I saw one of my bucket list items emerge in front of the horizon. Hundreds of old unused planes lined up in an airport field that seemed endless. This was my first time in an airplane bone yard, well at least near one. I hadn’t gained access to the airport just yet. We had to wait one day for the scheduled field service date. Luckily I planned ahead, I knew that there was a very special place an hour’s drive south of Roswell. It was another bucket list item of mine and I would be dammed if I didnt take this chance to visit it. We hopped in our small rented Ford Fiesta that morning and drove the hour south. The desert landscape was a very steep change for a couple of Floridians. We saw the quintessential southwestern desert imagery like cacti and dry river beds but other than that, the drive was pretty plain yogurt, boring.

Arriving at our destination, I couldn’t contain my excitement. But there was nothing visible except the Guadalupe mountains and a long winding road past the main entrance.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park located just outside of Carlsbad NM. This cave system is known for it’s incredible gypsum and limestone formations and is still being explored to this day. I had seen documentaries of the things contained in the darkness within the mountains so naturally I was anxious to get in there. So we proceeded knowing that this sign didn’t exist for no reason. We drove past more dry river beds and small canyons as the road snaked through valleys and made it’s way up to the flat tops of the mountains. A small building emerged as we reached the end of the road. I didn’t know what to expect so this was pretty underwhelming at the time. I didn’t know how wrong I would be until we went underground. Fair warning, cameras suck at low light environments so some pictures may be a bit grainy. Tap the images to scroll through gallery, swipe up to see full size image.

The cave was a accessible two ways. Enter through the elevator shaft from the visitors center (cheating) or entering through the mouth of the cave to walk a few miles to the cave lobby 700 feet down into the mountain. We went through the mouth, few others followed suit. The cave opening looks like a depression in the distance, unassuming and well hidden. As you approach it using a small foot path, it opens up to an amphitheater where we would watch the nightly bat flight swarming out of the cave later that evening. The foot path snaked itself down very steeply into what seemed like an abyss. As you walked further into the cave, you were able to feel the temperature drop and the humidity rise. The smell of guano wafted through the cave entrance until you passed the main cave where the bays slept. Deeper into the cave, large rooms opened up and limestone formations appeared. They looked like giants that were frozen in time and trapped by their earthly encasement. Beautiful formations that took thousands of years to form protruded from the ceiling and ground in what looked like a scene from a movie. The park service had installed lights in all the main access caves which helped to highlight the most impressive formations. There were sections of the caves that were strictly off limits, either because they were too dangerous for novice cavers, very fragile, or were unmapped. The parts that were open were enough to keep us busy for days but we had mere hours to do as much as possible. We walked as much of the caves as we could while still trying to take in the views and appreciate the natural art within. At one point, while walking with a ranger, they sat us down and asked us to be very quiet. They shut off the lights and we were in total darkness. The cave had a voice. It spoke in that moment of darkness and told us its secrets. The dripping of water could be heard coming from all around, each drop pulled calcium from the ceiling depositing it where it landed to continue building the formations that we saw on our way to that moment. Wind still moved within the cave; soft humms could be heard coming from narrow passages between cave galleries. It was peaceful. A soft verbal warning and the lights came back on. The ranger smiled as she saw some of us come out of a trance like state and continued with the tour. The hours dissapeared while were underground. Pretty soon the caves would close for the day as the park prepared for its nightly ritual.

The sun was getting low in the sky. And the rangers were directing us to the amphitheater to watch the bat flight. Unfortunately photo and video were strictly prohibited and enforced. We all sat very quietly as thousands of bats took flight and swarmed out of the cave. We watched as the bats streamed from the mouth of the cave in what seemed like a perfect spiral. You could hear the flapping of their wings as their leathery wings propelled them higher into the sky. We left halfway through the bat flight because we knew the drive back would be in total darkness through the New Mexico desert, it seemed shorter this time around.

On the Runway

The next day we were to meet a technician from a reclaim company that took old commercial jets and resold them. We followed his truck through the rows of old unwanted planes perfectly lined up as if they were waiting for something.

Each plane reaching the end of its service life with their airline was ferried here to be resold or taken for spare parts. Much like the engines we worked on, the planes were no longer being manufactured so anyone still operating and working on them relied on spare parts from unused or unusable aircraft. This is what I had drawn in my sketchbooks before, its something I wanted to visit at some point in my life. The airplane bone yard where planes go to die. A few pieces came out of this theme in college and it was never explored further because I was graduating.

Seeing aircraft in various states of dissassembly and disrepair was definitely a draw for me. We parked under an old cargo DC-10 while I performed an on-wing inspection on the neighboring MD-80.

A new series of sketches came from this trip which has not yet made it to a ceramic medium. While I do plan on starting a new series of jet engine themed pieces, these will most likely take a back seat until I’ve worked out the kinks in the sketches.