Saturday, June 14, 2008

The Flying Heritage Collection

On the southeast corner of Paine field, you will find the newly opened Flying Heritage Collection. I went today with my son and I was very impressed! They have detailed descriptions of all of their planes and video presentations about the time they were developed. Almost all of these planes fly, and to prove it, today they flew their Thunderbold and their Mustang. They will have will aditional flying demonstrations throughout the summer.

I was impressed by their restored Messerschimdt Komet, a German rocket plane that killed many pilots (both allied and German). I had also never seen a fully restored V-1 rocket plane before (I sure this is one of the few planes that doesn't fly).

My favorite restoration was the Polikarpov U-2, a very simple looking open cockpit bi-plane. This Russian plane was "manned" by woman pilots, who wore thick fur coats to avoid the cold. The plane only carried two bombs so sometimes they had to fly eight sorties a night. They also turned off their engines during their bombing runs to avoid detection! The Germans called them the "Night Witches." They have a video presentation where they interview some of them.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Save the Kretzler House!


This is a photograph taken from around 1912 on the corner of 6th and Main. The Kretzler house is still there and it looks abosolutely wonderful with all the flowers. Enterprise reporter Chris Fyall posted an excellent article with great prictures about the effort to save the house. (click here)
Unfortunately, the owner of the property wants to redevelop it, but that doesn't mean we can't move the house. On June 17th, the council will be discussing a proposal to use private funds to move the house unto a corner of the civic playfield, which the city leases from the school district. It's a very fascinating proposal that uses privately raised money plus money from the current land owner who has a desire to save the house. The Historic Museum, the Edmonds Historic Commision, and Edmonds-South Snohomish Historical Society are all involved in the effort to save the house. I hope they are succesful.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Health Board Report (June)

Batty About Health

I went to the Health Board meeting today. Dr. Goldbaum, the health officer for Snohomish County Health District, reminded us that we are entering Rabies season. Rabies is a primary concern with bats. If you are exposed to rabies from a bat it’s important that you safely catch it. Don’t let it get away!

If you are injured by a bat you will probably need to have rabies shots, which are uncomfortable and expensive. However, if the health district can test the bat, and see that it doesn’t have rabies, you won’t need the shots. Folks have a tendency to shoo bats out of their homes, but if it has exposed you, you need to catch it, and get it tested.

The cost of septic inspections

We had also had an interesting presentation on the science of septic systems. The Snohomish Health District is charged with inspecting septic systems, so that our ground water stays free from organisms that cause disease.

In order to encourage folks with problem septic tanks to seek help, the SHD has kept fees for inspections low. Their philosophy is to be as helpful as possible and only get heavy handed when absolutely necessary. However, septic inspections can be expensive to the SHD, which puts the SHD in bind, because SHD will need make cuts next year if doesn’t get additional funding. Should the SHD raise the cost of septic inspections to meet budget deficit needs, even though this could cause some residents to be dissuaded from getting septic systems fixed? A tough decision is coming up.