The Aerial Horizon
Forget where your feet are and simply enjoy the view.
A Place with No Name
In between the natural landmarks that define our path, we are given a glimpse at the magnificence hidden in the unmarked portions of our charts. A place with no names, no signs, no highways or byways…we marvel at the patterns and textures that make the “in between” seem more interesting than the named places along the path more traveled.
Welcome August
Welcome August; you look a lot like July. A storm on my wingtip as another day replaces the dawn, fleeting memories wisp into my mind…In our youth, we chased clouds and danced on their billowing surfaces, reveling in the sensation of speed, enjoying a good jolt of turbulence as we finished a steep turn and ran into our own wake, bouncing through the air as we hunted at 200 feet over the open ocean, then flying through rain showers to rinse the salt off our windscreen, and everything, everything beginning and ending in competition…And now, we smoothly turn away from the weather, we search for smooth rides, we fly as high as we can to conserve fuel, and yet we still enjoy the sense of speed, the competitions that never really ended, the camaraderie of the sky, and the warm electric sensation as we witness another dawn breaking over the aerial horizon.
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In the Morning Light
Looking upon Monument Valley in the morning light, the sensation of witnessing something holy pervades as the light veil of cloud recedes and the long morning shadows slowly walk across the desert revealing the color of earth.
Streaking in the Clouds
Under the weather and again we are in the light of day. In the distance a thin veil of water billows and swirls in the downdrafts, its textures illuminated by slanting rays of sunlight penetrating from beyond. In places the shower appears as virga streaking from beneath the cloud and disappearing in the desert heat while water vapor seemingly rises from the earth to join the vanishing streams.
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Webs of Development
Like a delicate net cast across the earth, trails and dirt roads link wells and drilling sites that dot the New Mexico landscape in a continuous web of development. The network of wells expands to the horizon without regard to the terrain, appearing densely packed on canyon floors and plateaus alike.
Stretching the Shroud
Soft and smooth, innocuous at first glance, apparently calm and stable…but from underneath that calm, a tumult rises stretching and pulling at the overlying shroud to reveal a rapidly growing energy laden storm.
Towering Transparency
A summer evening in Kentucky…Transparency lends greatness to an average size storm, its shadow commingling with streams of light to multiply the effect of its height.
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Carolina Storms
I find myself flying at night a great deal this summer and marveling at the dynamic forms of storms in contrast to the stillness of the evening sky. Distinct and colored by natural light within and without, each storm displays a unique and perishable character that expresses itself in energetic convulsions before subsiding and fading into the darkness.
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Solace in the Face of the Storm
The hours of monotony, the hectic pace of airport traffic, the security lines, the maintenance delays, the turbulence, the crackle of radios, and the sense-numbing roar of air as the aircraft cuts through the sky all consume space in our minds and our senses…But for a moment (truly only for a moment, so we must pay attention), everything stops. Rising vapor, rumbling air, and transient light all seem to freeze and in that moment we find warmth and solace in the face of a storm and all of our concerns and distractions evaporate into the stratosphere…and then the light vanishes leaving space for whatever may come next.
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Nexus
It was that sort of night over Tennessee where in a maze of thunderstorms, the sun began to set, illuminating every molecule of water vapor in the sky…First the storms came alive in the brilliant orange of sunset, then as we approached the terminator, our Brocken Spectre met twilight and scattered back in the colors of sunset and accented by the overflight of passing northbound jet. A heavenly nexus of weather, color, and light.
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Evening Swells
Swells form as the sky seethes, not knowing whether it should rise of fall, but in the roiling coils of indecisive streams of vapor…there is action…turning and tumbling, rising and falling. Each passing ship further disturbs the air and applies new energy to the scene.
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Lighting the Way
The low sun reflecting off the surface of the Columbia River lights the way to the sea.
Amid the Turbulence, a Breath
Jostled by turbulence and the concern that some nervous flyers might be a little too concerned about the distant lightning, we escape the darkness and turbulence to catch our breath in the glory of a summer sunset…the threatening weather looming off to starboard absorbs the warmth of the evening light and time stands still, lightning pauses, turbulence subsides and we revel in the last light of day.
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Echoes of Earth
Wandering northward along the highway, we follow the Echo Cliffs as they twist and rise. Rocky pediments occasionally broaching the surface of the desert floor before receding again into the earth, each an echo of an ancient movement of rock, earth, and elements.
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Signs on the Horizon
When we emerge from under the shadow of one storm and, witnessing the field ahead, the only words that come to mind are, “well, this is going to be interesting…” We are in the throws of summer. It is never the same thing twice and it is always interesting.
Obscured
Unlike a celestial fireworks show that might be scrubbed for the obscuration of a passing cloud, the spectacle of our earthly fireworks goes on night and day, in any weather…the passing obscuration adds a new texture to the scene, providing a mental challenge as our brains attempt to fill in the missing pieces of the scene.
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Abstract Landscape: Death Valley
Like left over chalk dusting the classroom floor, the warm, dry, swirling colors inspire us in the abstract…not because of what we see, but because of the mystery of what was before…as all moisture evaporates from the landscape, we are left with meandering lines of chalk rope, twisting and untwisting before dissolving into the desert floor.
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Mexican Morning
Morning light streams into the mountains of northern Mexico, illuminating the shadows of ridge lines and bringing the mist to life as it massages the valleys and stirs along the upslopes. Vaporous beauty in the stillness of the calm morning air.
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Wave in the Sunset
Amid the ambiguous lines of sunset above a soft deck of stratus clouds and the marine layer, a crisp line of cloud hangs over the coastline, so clearly defined that it seems alien to the soft evening sky, resembling a digital sound wave more than floating vapor…roll the night music.
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Rain and Radiance
Rain in the Appalachians, but through the gloom of the shadows, light streams radiantly through the vaporous skies above.
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The Aerial Horizon – Photography
The Aerial Horizon 