The way we work
A dying breed in the air

Font Size:

By Steven Martens | Sunday, August 27, 2006 11:26 PM CDT | () comments

Kevin E. Schmidt/QUAD-CITY TIMES Reynold Harksen checks over his aerial spraying plane just off the runway east of Low Moor, Iowa. Harksen received the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award from the Federal Aviation Administration for reaching more than 50 years of safe flying.

CAMANCHE, Iowa — Reynold Harksen foresees a day in the not-too-distant future when the sight of airplanes swooping down to make low passes over fields of crops will be another thing of the past.

Harksen, 71, the owner of Harksen Aerial Spraying for 33 years and a pilot for more than 50, says improved technology, such as the tall-wheeled “high-boy” sprayers now a common sight on rural roads, are making crop dusting obsolete.

Adding to the problem are the increasing costs of fuel and insurance for his plane and for liability. Harksen said he never used to carry damage insurance on his plane, especially if he had more than one plane on hand for use in spraying the fields.

“If I had an accident in one plane, I could get out and get in the other one,” he said. “And if I had one where I couldn’t get out, why have insurance?”

Harksen said he usually sprays about 15,000 acres per year at $6.50 to $7 per acre, but the cost of fuel, insurance and upkeep of his plane take a big chunk out of that.

He cuts costs by doing much of his own mechanic work, helped occasionally by a friend. His wife, Kay, does the bookkeeping and his son, Scott, does the work on the ground of loading the insecticides into the plane.

Harksen got his interest in planes from his father, who also owned a plane.

“I took my college education money and bought an airplane and started flying,” he said.

But he hasn’t passed the flying bug along to his kids. Scott did fly for a while, but then lost interest in it because he had been around it all his life and the novelty wore off, Harksen said.

“I really didn’t want my son in on the spraying anyway, because I’ve had a lot of close calls,” he said. “I’ve been lucky.”

Those “close calls” resulted in some forced landings, but no serious injuries. In July, Harksen received the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award from the Federal Aviation Administration in recognition of more than 50 years of practicing and promoting safe flying, a distinction Harksen boils down to receiving an award for still being alive after flying for 50 years.

“I know I have more than 20,000 hours in the air, and I’m still learning,” he said. “You learn from your close calls. If you have a close call, you don’t forget that.”

Although aware of the ever-present dangers of flying, Kay Harksen doesn’t worry much about her husband’s safety.

“I’ve always had faith in him that he was a very good pilot,” she said.

As a hunter and part-time taxidermist, Harksen also uses his piloting skills to help conservation officers from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. Harksen said he has taken conservation officers up in his plane to do deer counts and to look for bright lights at night in the fields below, a sign of deer poachers.

Over the years, he has taken many children and others up for rides in his plane. He learned the secret to getting them interested in aviation is to not keep them up there too long.

When people go up in a small plane for the first time, the view is very exciting at first, he said.

“They’re just overjoyed with what they see,” he said.

After a while, the initial excitement of the view wears off. That is when, for some people, air sickness kicks in, Harksen said. He said the key is to let them enjoy the view and sensation of flying, then get them back down before the nausea has a chance to ruin the experience.

“Have fun, but don’t push it too much,” he said.

Steven Martens can be contacted at (563) 659-2595 or smartens@qctimes.com.