Updated Photos are now on the site under gallery! Thanks to Harry Cummings for taking all the pictures too!

I wanted to thank all who came to pull as well as those who came to cheer this last Saturday, September 24, 2011! The Plane Pull was an incredibly fun event and, I believe, even more enjoyable than any of the attendees thought it would be. We arrived about 1pm for our scheduled pulling time of 2:38pm to find the event jam-packed with people of all ages with smiles on their faces. You could tell those who had already participated with their teams by the “rope-smudge” on one side or the other of their team t-shirt, but none of them were holding their backs or limping…so I felt confident.  Once we made our way back to the pulling area (after stopping at the Sheetz wagon for a caramel mocha smoothie for $2. Not a plug, they were really good), I was immediately taken aback by the sheer size of the plane itself. However, seeing teams of…shall we say “inferior size”…yanking away, my confidence grew even greater. I knew we were in good shape when I saw Mike McKenna, who looked like one of the Nasty Boys of WWF fame, looking intense and ready to pull the thing himself. What I did not expect was the camaraderie among the teams! A group next to us was short and recruited several Moose members to help pull for their team with the bribe of a free Copy General t-shirt. We took it as a way to help, but also as reconnaissance for our own pull. The Copy General (plus some Moose) team garnered a time of 14.6 seconds. Not bad, but disappointing to some of us as the current top score was 7.3 seconds by the Chesapeake Sheriff's Office. With some additional strategy of rope-twisting and pulling on “Ready” instead of “Go”, your league of Moose Muscle-men and women grunted and groaned their way to a score of 10.283 seconds! That put our team in sixth place out of 64 pulling teams.  Many High-5’s and chest bumps followed as this was easily one of the best scores since the mid-event break! One of the other aspects of the event was a team weigh-in. I don’t feel bad about posting this as no individual weights are measured, but we had more than 3 TONS OF MOOSE at our disposal. The plane didn’t stand a chance.

Other than the above-mentioned experiences, a couple of other enjoyable observations from the event:

• As this was an event for Special Olympics, there were many Olympians attending. The joy that they expressed at just about everything and everyone was a great reminder of why we were all there and made the event even more personally rewarding.
• A lot of additional events were going on as well that truly made it a whole-day-of-family-fun experience. There were planes on hand to walk through, vendor tables, a Classic Car Show, bounce houses and inflatable slides, and a Bus Pull for the kids...come next year and enjoy!
• The Fairfax County Police Department was one of the first teams to pull and could not get the plane to budge. Once they were shown proper technique by the event organizers, they had the fastest time until the 4 time Champion Chesapeake Police Department got their hands on the rope.
• Conspiracy Alert!! - Team FedEx had the slowest pulling time of the day (surprising since we were pulling a FedEx Cargo Jet) until the team from UPS took their places at the rope. For "some reason" the team could not get the plane to roll an inch for almost a minute. Many in the crowd had a feeling the plane still had its brakes on. While there was no admission of guilt, the pilot laughing in the cockpit did nothing to counter this theory.

Thank you again to all participants, those who came to cheer us on, and those who contributed. Your financial, emotional, spiritual and medical support helped us to "pull" this all together for a great cause.  We managed to raise over $2400.00 dollars in donations for Special Olympics this year. We fully expect to make this an annual event and, considering our time in the first-ever showing of the Centreville Moose Lodge, I believe we could even challenge for the title down the road.  Click on photo for larger image!

Since the last newsletter was published, we have delivered another 124 food items.  At the time of this article, we have another 100 or so items to deliver in December.  So, our members have donated over 1,600 this year, which is definitely a record high.  Your donations are sincerely appreciated.  Thanks to all our wonderful members of the Centreville Moose Lodge for continuing to support our food drive.

The food is being delivered to the Saint Vincent de Paul (SVDP) Food Pantry located in Chantilly, VA. The Food Pantry is open the third Saturday of every month.  In October 2011, the Food Pantry fed 136 families – a record high!  Items most needed by the Food Pantry include canned meat, macaroni and cheese, ramen noodles, coffee/tea, cereal, canned vegetables, canned fruit, canned pasta, boxed pasta, cake mixes, soup, juice/drinks, and diapers of all sizes.