Mississippi Delta Crop Duster pilot RT: 8 min

it's standing in the of the river standing at 20.25 FT and that's up 410 of a foot since [Music] yesterday [Music] you find more Drifters I guess in in dusting and spraying than than you do in most professions because it it kind of uh invites you know that kind of personality sometimes you'll just be around the hanger working or something and the farmer will just drive up and say can you spray this afternoon that bat's going to have to come out and go back through the other the organic phosphates methyl parion made from the same base as nerve gas as a matter of fact that's where it came from from World War II nerve gas for some reason this particular farmer uses a lot stronger doses I guess he's thinks he's got resistant insects or something power spray in it I wouldn't use that much cuz I've never heard of a of a weevil that took a pound of methyl per acre to kill so you should have rubber gloves on and protective clothing and stuff like that when you're hand on these chemicals I was sick about uh two weeks ago and it was totally my fault I got a pretty heavy exposure to it I was cleaning out a Hopper it was exposed pretty heavily to the to it in the concentration that we put it on the field which is pretty strong and you get headaches and your vision gets blurred sometimes fever and all that sort of thing I think just about everybody that flies around trees and wires has hit Limbs and maybe cut cut wires run trees or something like that if they if you never cut a wire run into a limb and they fly around them then they're not getting close enough we have flagmen that stand under it all day long right in the midst in the where where it's being applied and don't doesn't seem to bother most of them now will move out of the way in other words they'll let you line up on your swamp and then they will walk out of the way before you get to [Music] them [Music] [Music] of course there is a lot of concern now about pesticides affecting the ecology and I don't think that antiu causes is going to cut down our spray because I I I feel certain that that uh they'll come up with acceptable substitutes if the pesticides are using now are banned once they start getting insect infestations then usually they start on a spray program where they'll spray every uh few days usually about 5 days between sprays you'll have some insects that are resistant to the spray that'll be left over and within just a few days you'll have another population so maybe in one season you'll spray the same field 13 14 [Music] times I think all Pilots get some kind of uh enjoyment flying close to the ground and in and out of of fields with obstacles and that sort of thing it's it's Unique feeli knowing that that if you do make a mistake that there is a certain amount of danger in it of course keeps it interesting and keeps you from getting too bored with it pesticides are uh by nature of you know of their job they are toxic of course there are some drawbacks to uh to using the pesticides that we have to use but that the the benefit we get from them outweighs it in other words it's by use of the pesticides is lesser too evils the way I look at EG foring crop dusting is a you know it's I do I do it because I enjoy doing it and uh some I I think somewhere down in Central America I'd like to fly with a good mechanic a good loader and make maybe 50 cents an acre for as pilot pay and have a a house on the beach and all that sort of thing for

Channel: Don Guy

Views: 335,913

Keywords: Crop Dusters, Mississippi Delta, Cotton growing, Greenwood Mississippi, short documentary, Don Guy Director Cinematographer Film and digital video director and cinematography, Don Guy, college Film and, Short Film (TV Genre)

Id: 5q5ADURTie0

Length: 6min 52sec (412 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 19 2013