Re "The day The Pilot almost wasn’t," Report to Readers column, Aug. 31:

I wanted to say a big "thank you" to all who ensured I had a paper that Saturday morning. Although I wasn’t upset, I got a kick out of the weather page being the cover page. Public Editor Joyce Hoffmann’s report reminded me of a time early in my military career, stationed overseas. Our data support unit had crashed the payroll input product, so another young airman, our section chief and I had to manually type more than 1,000 payroll checks on payday, only to turn around and keep the cashier cage open longer in order to cash them.

So, having been in a near "catastrophic operational failure," I understand and am most appreciative of all efforts put forth by The Pilot staff. Kudos.

Paul Burnett

Chesapeake