THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 11, 1996 TAG: 9608090210
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY LINDA McNATT, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 126 lines
MATT CRABBE took a long swallow from a bottle of cold spring water and squatted next to aerial maps spread on the ground.
``Here's a blue house - bright blue. You can't miss it,'' the Isle of Wight County farmer next to him said. ``And here are the power lines. Now, those lines come straight from Surry Nuclear. You don't want to fly under them. Not only will you be fried if you touch 'em - you'll glow in the dark!''
The men gathered around the maps laughed.
The wiry young man from Accomack County has a quick grin when it comes to joking with the farmers standing in the middle of the peanut field.
But when it comes to getting the job done, he's all business.
``I've seen a lot of these pilots fly, and I think he's one of the best I've ever seen,'' Smithfield farmer Dean Stallings said. ``You don't have to watch him long before you're sure he knows what he's doing.''
Crabbe's business is crop dusting. At only 27, he can't recall when his occupation didn't take up most of his summer. And it's grueling work that calls for wit, wisdom and uncompromised skill.
He was spraying locally last week because farmers, after weeks of torrential downfalls almost nightly - an average of from 4 to 9 inches above normal throughout Virginia and North Carolina's peanut belt - simply couldn't get into their fields with tractors.
``It's expensive,'' Stallings admitted. ``But when you don't have no other way of getting it out there, and the worms are chewing away, the cost is reasonable.''
Crabbe, who has followed his father into the crop dusting business, arrived from the Eastern Shore late Sunday evening.
``As soon as the fog cleared,'' Monday morning, he was in the air, Robbie Taylor said.
``And he doesn't stop. No breaks. I haven't seen him eat lunch. He goes until about 8:30 at night. It's relentless. That airplane can't make any money sitting on the ground. And - with the worms as bad as they are - we want him up there.''
Crabbe was called in by one local farmer, and word of his arrival quickly spread. By late Tuesday, he'd already sprayed more than 1,000 acres of cotton, peanuts and soybeans. He had another 300 acres lined up for Wednesday, and calls from farmers who heard he was in the area were still coming in.
Farmers are concerned primarily with worms. This is the time of year they move into cotton and soybeans. And they are concerned with Sclerotinia blight, a peanut-destroying fungus that has in previous years destroyed up to 75 percent of Virginia's peanut crop.
The worms are expected, a routine occurrence this time of year. The blight is caused by extremely wet conditions.
In wet weather like we've had recently, Crabbe can do from the air what farmers can't do on the ground. It's not an easy job. Unfamiliar with the area, he must first locate the specific field he's been hired to spray.
``This gentleman's never been here before, and from the air, things look different,'' Taylor said.
Crabbe, who works for the family business, flies a 1975 Ag-Cat, a small, single-engine, single-passenger plane, bright yellow with aluminum belly and doors that glow silver in the sunshine.
His busiest times, he said, are from mid-May through mid-June, from about now through September. He also sprays for mosquitoes at campgrounds and such.
During his off months, he works for the family's air taxi service, and he sells crop dusting planes for Weatherly Aviation of California.
``Most of the dusters are from out of the area,'' Taylor said. ``They move in during these troubled times. A guy from Maryland is flying in Wakefield today.''
``We go where the demand is,'' Crabbe said.
Crabbe has a commercial pilot's license, and he attends government-mandated educational seminars every other year to keep up on the latest developments in agricultural chemicals.
``Most people just aren't educated about crop dusting or even farming in general,'' Crabbe said. ``They don't realize how regulated we are in the U.S.''
There is little threat to his health from the chemicals Crabbe uses to spray fields. More of a threat comes from curious on-lookers who enjoy the antics of the small plane.
``People like to get out on the end of a field and watch,'' Taylor said. ``The closer they get, the higher he has to fly. With just 2 or 3 ounces of chemicals per acre, the job calls for precision.''
``I've seen crop dusters get so close to the fields they come back with peanut vines on their wheels,'' Stallings said.
In Isle of Wight, Crabbe must take off from a 1,950-foot dirt runway in the middle of the peanut field. Many areas, he said, are better equipped for the planes, with paved runways away from the interference of tractors.
``He uses every bit of his momentum to get it off the ground here,'' Taylor said.
Because the runway is shorter, Crabbe goes up with a lighter load: 130 gallons as opposed to a full load of from 200 to 250 gallons of liquid chemicals. The areas he sprayed in Isle of Wight and Suffolk often were patchier, smaller areas than in larger agricultural zones, like the Eastern Shore. One load of chemicals here sprays only about 50 acres. This job calls for more frequent landings and takeoffs. The plane is cut off only for refueling of the engines.
Crabbe worries most about towers, power lines and ``the helicopters running around here,'' he said, glancing above the field. But he's been lucky. The plane always manages to go up when he wants it to, down only when he commands it.
And on this slightly overcast afternoon, Crabbe has no problem rising out of the field in a cloud of dust and making it quickly to the destination where the blue house and towers of power await him.
Just as he predicted, the sight is a traffic stopper. Cars and trucks on Longview near Bowling Green pull off the side of the road - or they go one way, turn around and come back - to watch the acrobatic little plane bobbing above the green leaves and purple and white blossoms of row after row of cotton plants.
In the cloud-shrouded, setting sun over Isle of Wight County, the plane whips across the narrow fields that straddle the massive steel towers flowing with dangerous electrical garlands.
A nose dive. Spray. Pull up, up and over the lines. Spray again. Pop up and over the trees.
Back and forth, into the sunset and on to another day. ILLUSTRATION: Color staff photo on cover by JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Crop duster pilot Matt Crabbe dives in to spray a field of cotton...
Staff photos by JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Matt Crabbe puts in his ear plugs as he prepares to take off in his
crop duster to spray cotton fields.
Matt Crabbe watches as Phillip Edwards points out the spraying
location.
In wet weather, Crabbe can do from the air what farmers can't on the
ground. by CNB