The 520; How it all started

While in AA I met a member that was a retired LAPD airship pilot. It didn't mean much to me, as being in AA is always the primary focus, not one's job. He moved to Idaho so I didn't think much of it; I saw him a couple of times. Back then, if most of my life, I didn't think much about anything else but school and work & staying sober.

Additionally, my Dad was a plan and copter mechanic, in the Air Force, and always had a model airplane project going in the garage. As far back as I remember, he would take my brothers and I out to the Sepulveda dam to fly his planes and at night he would take us over on Vanowen to watch the last of the planes land and take off. If the wind was right we would sit outside and watch the planes come over to land. 

One night, around 2010 or so, Mack and I were watching Law & Order, when we heard a helicopter overhead and someone on a speaker say, Stay right there. We went outside and there was the police helicopter overhead shining a light down on a new apartment building being built on 6th and Cypress. My first response was, Wow! I had no idea, even thinking back [I know now] to August of 2002n when my room was lit up, that Burbank had a police helicopter. It's normal now for many cities to have a helicopter overhead monitoring things as well as providing ground support for patrol officers.

Then, in 2014 I started seeing the airship all of the time, in fact, they were usually the last police I would see before I fell asleep. It makes me feel safer that police are in the sky watching over everything, including me.

I have other stories, but I think what the police pilota do, coupled with my Dad's love for aviation, and my love for flying makes way for my fascination and awe of them ... and the helicopter whose back end looks like a hot dog lol.

So, this Sunday, after 19 long years I will get my 2nd tattoo of the MD 520 series helicopter. I found the underneath of airship on Facebook then applied a tattoo effect which yielded what looks like a US flag. I'll come back and post the final result.