Listen to the Spirit, and other such lessons

Steve made plans to go to an aviation trade show in Florida Thursday through Sunday, January 21-24th. He purchased on-line the booth rental ($300), and made hotel and car rental reservations. He had to be in Sherman, TX on Wednesday, January 20th for a county hearing regarding back tax business for airplane sales in 2007-2008, so he was going to fly our airplane from LV, NV to Sherman, take care of the hearing, then fly to Florida and back the next week.

However, as we got closer to the date, the weather was not looking good. Lots of rain and storms over the mountains between us and Florida, and other such dire predictions, so Steve thought about flying commercially. Those prices for tickets, at the last minute, as you all know, are quite pricey, so he considered flying the plane Sunday after he spoke in church, and beating the storms. That was the plan.

Saturday morning he got up, ate breakfast and turned on his laptop computer to check emails, etc. His lap top would not turn on. NO lights at all! He even drove to Fry's Electronic store and looked at buying a new lap top and could not do it. He returned home, wondering what he should do. He decided he would leave here on Sunday, fly to Sherman, do the hearing, fly to Florida and when he got there, go to a Best Buy or the like and buy a new lap top if he needed it.

Sunday after we both spoke in our Sacrament meeting, he drove to the North Las Vegas airport, got the plane out and loaded up with everything he needed, fueled the plane, tried to call the tower and the GPS would not turn on. He finally gave it up, taxied out and took off. He was just over Lake Mead to the southeast of Las Vegas when the engine started sputtering and he started losing altitude. He was at 11,000 feet so he had plenty of "glide" time. He called the nearest airport tower, Boulder City, NV, and told them he was having engine problems. They cleared all traffic for him to have priority landing, and were prepared for an emergency if it happened. By the time he landed (about 15 minutes later) he was able to get the engine to run a little more smoothly, and landed without any problems.

Fortunately, my brother Len was at the house when Steve called (my mother, who is visiting and I were at choir practice), and Len drove the 40 miles to Boulder City and picked him up. Steve made the decision that night that maybe he wasn't suppose to go to the trade show in Florida, and booked a commercial flight from LV to DFW to attend the hearing. (At this writing, the hearing was successful. The judge allowed the dismissal of the back taxes owed on the airplanes and the buyer will get a refund. He won't get all his money, so here is praying his heart is softened enough that he doesn't file a law suit against Steve - as if it is Steve's fault? Pray for that, please.)

The next day Steve was able to sump pump the debris out of the gas tanks on the plane, started it up and ran up the engines, checking it all out, took off and did a couple of circles until he knew that all was well, then flew the plane back to North Las Vegas airport and put it back in the hanger. "Bad gas" was the problem. But Steve is a genius and was able to fix it himself.

This is a lesson he/we have learned: when the promptings tell you not to do something and everything keeps happening to prevent it, listen! I am so grateful he is safe and everything is working out.