Big NASCAR race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway today. I left town before it began (thank God), but while I was still there unloading, the place began to fill up for the 1 o'clock race. They came in cars, vans and on rickshaws, it seemed. The line of cars coming up I-15 seemed endless. But that is not why I am writing this. I am writing to relate that some racefans got there in a way I have never before seen. They came in helicopters. The sky was full of choppers. They were being used essentially as taxis for those who could afford $500 a head to fly themselves from their palatial suites in the hotels downtown to the track and avoid the slow drag on the freeway. It's about 15-18 miles from Vegas Center to the track on I-15 in North Las Vegas-- quite a distance at 4 to 5 miles per hour...
Anyway, the sky was roaring with helicopters of multiple varieties. I saw the kind that is a default ship in FS and plenty of the kind with no tail rotor, just an enclosed fan blade back there. They would come in from the west, avoiding the airspace over Nellis completely, then depart the track to the north. I would say the distance maintained between them on the inbound trip was easily 2000 feet at an altitude of maybe 1000 feet. I was told by one of our other drivers that some celebs had hired a chopper for the whole day at $20,000 so they could flit here and there with no traffic hassles. I can see why after taking twice as long to get back to 95N as it usually takes me. What insanity.
Our fine military did not fly out of Nellis today. No doubt the noise of multiple F-15s taking off would drown out the music of the 40 or so 600-hp engines that had the stage today...
That is all...
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