"That right, sergeant," I responded. "I'm headed for Langley Air Force Base."

"Does that mean you'll be going anywhere near Pittsburgh?" the sergeant inquired. "I'm asking because there's a young Army man in the waiting room over there who's trying to get home on emergency leave. Would you have room for him?"

"Sure," I agreed. "I'm leaving in about ten minutes. That should get me in the Pittsburgh area in a couple of hours. Bring him over so I can add his name to the flight plan."

It took just a moment to modify my flight plan to include a stop at Pittsburgh. "What's your name, Corporal? I'll need to add it to the paperwork."

"Corporal Wilson, sir. That's James T., and my serial number is ... " the nervous young man hastened to add. "I really appreciate this, sir. I've been trying to get home from my assignment in Korea to see my father. He's bad sick and I don't know how much time I have to see him. My last hop got me here from Nebraska and I've been stuck for two days."

"Well, Wilson, we'll have you home in a couple of hours. The weather looks good and conditions in the Pittsburgh area are not bad, except for the heavy haze. We should have you on the ground before sundown."

The young soldier grabbed his duffel bag and followed me across the ramp towards the little Navion. It was now an aero club plane, but several years ago had been a U.S. Army courier craft, designated an L-17. Its silver and black skin glistened in the late afternoon sun.

"It looks kinda small, sir," the apprehensive corporal remarked. "The plane that brought me this far was a big four-engine transport."

"It may be small, corporal, and it isn't very fast, but it will get you there. We'll have a smooth ride today according to the weatherman. Just stow that bag on the back seat and climb into the right front. I'll be with you as soon as I complete my preflight checks."

Navion 2995C was an old friend, my favorite of all the aero club planes. Her stablemates included a Piper Tripacer, three Cessna 150's and two 172's, plus a couple T-34 former military trainers. 95C was a reliable, rugged and comfortable bird that could carry five people and lots of baggage.

A little after 5:00 PM we lifted off and turned eastward. The sun was behind us and so was the wind. We zipped along at 150 knots groundspeed. I leveled off at 9,000 feet.

Before takeoff I told my passenger that I'd be burning fuel out of the auxiliary tank beneath the back seat, before switching to the wing tanks. That 15-gallon tank was not connected to the fuel quantity gauge system, so the only way to be sure that all of its fuel was consumed was to wait until the engine sputtered. A quick switch to the wing tanks would return the engine to smooth operation. At level-off I began to feed from the auxiliary tank.

Just as we crossed the Ohio-West Virginia state line the engine sputtered. Casually, I reached over and switched to the wing tank, but not before my passenger nearly panicked. He had forgotten my earlier explanation of what to expect. All he knew was the engine was sputtering and we only had one.

"No sweat," I calmly assured him. "See? Now that we're on the wing tanks the engine is purring like a kitten." He looked a bit dubious, but gradually relaxed.

We got to the Pittsburgh area and found ourselves flying above a thick layer of haze. You could only see the ground by looking directly below. The low sun angle didn't help much either, for to the west the glare made visibility worse and to the east it was getting dark. I headed for the VOR bearing to take us over Allegheny County airport. It's about seven miles from the AGC VORTAC.

We were still at 7,000 feet and almost directly over the field before I finally saw the runways. A quick call to the tower got us clearance to enter traffic for a landing on runway 27, right into the setting sun. I sure didn't want to head east very far, for that would make it difficult to keep the airfield in sight. The haze was thick as soup.

I requested a high overhead-in approach and since traffic was light, the tower approved.

That meant I could make a near-vertical descent, keeping the field in sight, by dropping the flaps and coming down like an elevator. My passenger was a little uneasy as we began the rapid descent, a pretty steep one, I'll admit. But I sure didn't want to get too far away from the field and have to hunt for it in the muck we were entering.

Down we went, like an elevator, through five thousand, four thousand, three and two thousand we dropped. I re-confirmed my approach and landing clearance with the tower, telling them where we were and that I was on final for a straight-in now. We barely left the airfield boundaries throughout our descent and handily touched down just past the end of the runway. Airfield elevation is 1252 feet and the runway is 5500 feet long. That's more than enough for our little craft.