The "pres" flies into and out of the airport where I'm based when he visits the ranch. So, when I want to go fly, we have to share the facilities. Of course, he gets first dibs on them, but today my share was just next to his.
When I arrived at the airport this morning, I found Marine-One parked about 60' in front of my airplane, which is in a T-hangar. As I entered the "people" gate to the ramp, I stopped and asked one of the marines there to go talk to the guard who was walking around Marine-One with some awesome-looking firepower (I wanted to be safe rather than sorry). I got a thumbs-up from the guard to enter the area and my airplane, and so began the pre-flight. Shortly thereafter, the pilots (or maybe techs) decided to do a run-up in Marine-One. The wind was already strong from the northwest, but Marine-One added to it. I held onto my hat and re-chocked the airplane to keep it from moving until they finished (a couple of minutes). Then I asked one of the marines to let the guard know I was ready to pull the airplane out of the hangar and got another thumbs-up. Soon I was on my way out of the area on a pre-activated (on the ground) VFR flight plan to Lancaster, Texas, (LNC), where they have a great price on 100LL and a nice little restaurant in the terminal building.
While the line-guys at Lancaster fueled my airplane, I got a snack and coffee to go. For the return trip, I filed IFR to ensure a smooth entry to the TFR. As I approached home base from the northeast, the traffic monitor (ATD-300) alerted traffic at 2 miles, 900' below. Northwest of the airport was a group of helicopters on their way to the ranch. It was a pretty sight. The tower reported my airplane as traffic to them, and I entered the pattern, made the turns and landed into mostly a headwind of 14 gusting to 22. As I taxied away from the runway, I reported "clear" and asked the tower if I really only had 10 minutes to be out of the ramp area, as the published time of the departure TFR was then. He checked and came back with "20 minutes."
I noticed that now all of the gates had guards on them. There were three armed guards at the other end of the T-hangars, and they looked very interested in me when I picked up a pitot cover from between the hangars and replaced it on the airplane that lost it due to the wind. I waved at them and they became less interested as I made my way to the people gate.
After exiting, I parked across the street to see if I could get a glimpse of Marine One returning. As I waited, I was pleased to note that there were signs that security is much better for this operation than I had witnessed when the president was first flying in here. They are doing what you would think they should do, and naturally, I won't say what that is. Marine One came in from the other direction and I only saw the rotor blades near Air Force One.
Sharing the facilities with the president is not a big deal...certainly not as bad as going through one of the security checks for a commerical flight. His security is more like common sense than what you experience with the TSA (just my opinion). You CAN fly when he is around, but you have to follow the TFR rules and use your own common sense.
