Things we don't teach you when you're getting your Private Pilots License

Most flight instructors teach stick and rudder skills for the Private and Instrument ratings. In those courses we also provide some dual cross country training for our customers. However there are some common sense things that get overlooked in rating training and I became aware of them while talking to a new pilot the other day. 

This gentleman had asked me about flying to Florida in the spring for the Sun and Fun in his airplane. I told him that I had made that trip about eight times  and provided him with some advice about flying a long cross country in a light airplane. I then realized that this information is generally not taught and only acquired through the school of hard knocks.

When to Travel

Travel during the week-Monday through Thursday is best. If you’re looking for a long weekend leave Thursday and come back Monday if possible. There are a few reasons for doing this but the primary one is that should anything on the airplane break, parts via overnight delivery is generally only available until Friday and generally unavailable during the weekend.  If you fly an older aircraft it may take a bit of time to locate parts (read days) and the more time they have before the weekend the better off you’ll be.  Additionally mechanics like their weekends off too, and getting one to agree to come in to fix your bird after five pm on Friday through Monday at eight am might be difficult and most surely will be more expensive than during normal business hours.

Plan your route and fuel stops to places where there are rental cars, hotels and things to do, if the weather or the airplane isn’t cooperating with your plan.  Cleveland's Burke Lakefront is a much better place to get stranded than say Toledo or Akron. Chicago Midway beats Gary Indiana or Rockford Il.

Prior to fuel prices skyrocketing over the last  few years I would normally suggest using major airports where a commercial flight home could be possible if hard return dates had to be observed.  

These days I say plan to a location that is within driving distance to one of those airports in case you need to buy an airline ticket home. (e.g. Hampton Roads Virginia (KPVG) vs. Norfolk (KORF) Charleston Executive (KJZI) vs.  Charleston International (KCHS))

Additionally the smaller airport will likely have the services to match your equipment.  Even though there may be lots of piston airplanes on their ramps most major airports don’t have mechanics with a lot of recent experience with piston singles or twins.

I had a bad spark plug on the ramp at Greater Buffalo Niagara International two summers ago The mechanic at Prior Aviation wasn’t knowledgeable about servicing the iridium plugs in my airplane yet kept servicing the same one over and over again. It would run fine on the ramp but out at the run up pad it was fouled with a dead short. The mechanic insisted that it was our magneto that had gone bad not the plug.

I made a call to our mechanic in Danbury who emphatically told me not to let him touch the magneto. Fortunately for us we had four spare plugs in the back of the plane from when we swapped them out with iridium replacements.

After the third go around I asked him to replace the plug with the best one from my collection of spares. The problem was solved.  Speaking with him for the two hours we were together he admitted that he was the on call night mechanic who  hadn’t worked on a piston airplane in years.

Naturally I'm not saying don't fly on weekends, rather if you are on a trip of some length (covering a few area forecast regions) you're in much better shape from an options standpoint if you travel during the week.  

The Battle of Dunkirk - Or why I finally finished my instrument rating

After receiving my private pilot's license in September of 1986. I immediately started training for my instrument rating. In retrospect, as a new pilot I was fearful of flying alone and by continuing with another rating provided a convenient excuse to fly with an instructor.

Working out a barter deal with a flight school over in Waterbury Oxford (OXC) I agreed to write them a point of sale system and install it on a new multi station computer network I configured, in exchange for receiving instrument rating training.

At the time I was a naïve 26 years old, dealing with a wily old retired airline Captain, notorious for getting the better of people in business situations related to aviation.

Needless to say I received a good portion of my training but when push came to shove, and it was time to actually get the rating the good Captain invalidated our deal.

I bought an airplane after that and continued training with a CFII buddy of mine. I sold the airplane a few years later still not having received my certificate.

Life got in the way and I stopped flying aside from biennial flight reviews from 1993 until 2000. At first it was difficult to stop flying, but ultimately it became easy to stay away from the airport as I started making different excuses not to go.

Renting an airplane after you've owned one is difficult so after a while I decided to do something else with my spare money.

Turning 40 I found myself working away from home for extended periods of time mostly based in Quincy Massachusetts.  Judy started to complain about me being gone all the time so I pitched her again to let me buy another airplane and this time she relented.   We bought the Mooney and started flying it crossing a lot of real estate- always VFR.

If the weather was bad or the flight service briefer stated VFR was not recommended we just didn't go.

The speed of the Mooney had us taking longer trips. Some of those crossed weather boundaries and ultimately we started getting stuck in places.  During my first trip to Airventure Oshkosh in 2001 the mixture cable on the airplane let loose after we shut the airplane down at Fond Du Lac so I flew home commercially on a round trip ticket from Milwaukee to LaGuardia. 

I cajoled Judy into letting me buy her a one way ticket from LGA to MKE and we flew out to retrieve our airplane.

We rented a car at MKE and drove the two hours to central Wisconsin. After paying the mechanic at FDL we headed out to fly VFR around the Chicago Bravo airspace. There was a broken layer at 3800 so we stayed below 3000 and cruised VFR around  Chicago across South Bend, Toledo, and Cleveland, finally calling it a day in Erie PA as it got dark.

We stayed at the airport hotel and walked to the chain restaurant where everyone had lots of flair and suspenders on.

We awoke to good weather in Erie and our plan was to head northeastward towards Buffalo where Judy's family lived.  The weather in Erie was good VFR but there was low ceilings and fog along the eastern shore of Lake Erie that the flight service briefer had warned us about.   He suggested that with the weather being clear both in Erie and Buffalo perhaps we could get up on top for that area in between.

I took the advice that I liked and consulted Judy. My conversation was "Lets head up to Buffalo, its only 92 miles,  it's clear here and there,  all we have to do is climb above the clouds and when we get to Buffalo we'll make a normal descent and land. Judy was reluctant but ultimately said "you're the pilot if you think it will be ok let's go".

We departed Erie in the clear and climbed to our planned cruising altitude of 5500. Our route had us flying Victor 14 to Dunkirk VOR (DKK) then to Buffalo (BUF). At five thousand five hundred we looked down and saw the low clouds and ground fog the briefer had told us about.  Crossing over Dunkirk we noticed the clouds were getting higher so we climbed first to seven thousand five hundred then nine thousand  five hundred  yet we couldn't get on top of the clouds.

Fifteen miles northeast of DKK almost halfway to Buffalo we were at eleven five and surrounded by towering canyons of cumulus. I looked over at Judy and instead of seeing her smiling and offering encouragement; she was looking straight down staring at her feet.

The airplane was really struggling to climb so thirteen five wasn't an option even with the RAM air door pulled open.  I knew I was in trouble and realized it was time to confess.  I called up Buffalo approach and told them of my predicament. The controller came back with an incredulous ' let me get this straight you're a non-instrument rated pilot flying at eleven thousand five hundred- currently in the clear bur surrounded by clouds'. I sheepishly agreed with his grim assessment.

The controller handled a few more airplanes and after what seemed an eternity finally quipped   "Mooney 58 Victor did it ever cross your mind to do a 180?"  In all of my recently adrenaline soaked moments I had not even consider that.  I agreed that turning around was the best idea and negotiated the course reversal while managing to stay out of the clouds. When I asked him for vectors to the closest VFR airport he gave me a course to fly leading to Dunkirk. At that time Judy spotted a hole in the clouds that led to the surface so we chopped the power and started our descent down and landed safely at DKK.  

We landed at Dunkirk and it was clear to everyone on the ramp and in the FBO that we were spooked. They gave us the keys to their crew car and told us of a place where we could get some lunch.

We ate and headed back waiting on the ramp for the weather to clear. Finally an instrument instructor who was taking a client on a session said he would radio back the current conditions for the 32 miles between DKK and BUF. We received the radio call, headed out and picked our way into BUF arriving in time for another hotel , dinner and rental car. Launching the next day we made it to Utica before banging into the back side of the system that had caused us the grief a day earlier. We waited on the ground in Utica until the ASOS from Albany said they were VFR and we picked our way down there. Landing in Albany I shut down got gas and checked the weather. It was a continuous improvement but when it was time to start the airplane to depart vapor lock kept the engine from starting. We engaged a mechanic who also was unable to start the airplane. At that point frustration set in and we rented a car at Million Air and drove the balance of the trip back to Danbury. On Wednesday of that week I took the Amtrak to Albany, grabbed a cab to the airport and flew the airplane back to DXR.

Judy met me at the tie down as I taxied into Business Aircraft Center just as the sun was going down. As I got out of the airplane I vowed to have the rating by the time I flew to Oshkosh in 2002.

I earned my Instrument rating after finishing up with Paul Whittaker then took my practical ride with Ray Nobel early in 2002. While we still cancel trips for weather and somtimes get stuck at distant airports, having the rating allows us to get additional utility out of the airplane. 

Redbird Skyport, Bar VK Ranch, US Aviation- General Aviation is Alive and Well in Texas

We rode the airlines from Newark to San Antonio to attend the grand opening ceremony for the Redbird Skyport a revolutionary new flight training center in San Marcos Texas this past week. Continental had a $266 round trip ticket for that pairing and we really couldn’t afford to be out of the office more than three days.

Believe me we tried to justify the math as our most recent airline trips have been as pleasurable as sitting through root canal therapy. I figured the $600 we spent on tickets would have got us to San Marcos and it would likely be another $600 to get home -just in fuel.

We left EWR on Monday and arrived at 11AM CST. With nothing to do until 6pm Tuesday evening, we headed to Denton to visit our Texas Friends from Oshkosh. Jim recently had sold his hangar at Denton Airport (DTO) and purchased an airpark home in Sanger with the money.  Airpark living has been a retirement fantasy for Judy and I for several years so we really wanted to see what it was like.

Driving on I35 north for three and a half hours we arrived at Jim’s where they graciously planned a party for the Yankees.  We toured Jim’s five bedroom  Man Cave (his wife will not spend the night there yet- “too primitive”) riding around on a golf cart to see the runway, fishing pond, pistol range and some really over the top homes sitting alongside a three thousand foot turf runway.  The entire Denton contingent we met at Oshkosh eleven years ago was in attendance. Jim Bill Larry and Howard usually camp in Vintage but we met them the one year they camped in the north 40- and this was the first time we met their wives.

We caught up over a dinner of BBQ brisket, pinto beans, potato salad and copious quantities of red wine. All through the party whenever you would walk through the house you could see Jim’s pristine 1963 V35 Bonanza under the lights in the adjoining hangar. I wondered whether he intentionally left the hangar lights on for that view and then thought - I would.

We spent the night at Jim's and arranged with Howard for a tour of the US Aviation Flight School in Denton where he is the Chief Pilot and Designated Pilot Examiner. US Aviation has sixty some odd airplanes and an elaborate simulator lab, proving to me that everything really is bigger in Texas.  Primarily training foreign students from all over the world, they run an ab initio program for numerous airlines, taking applicants through their Private, Instrument, Commercial, multi engine ratings finishing them up with King Air 90 simulator and flight time in one of the four King Air 90’s in their fleet.   

It was a real refreshing experience to see a well-funded flight school in a clean modern facility with well-kept aircraft and literally a hundred pilot/applicants going through their program. You would never think that there has been a downturn in aviation by visiting their facility.

We drove to San Marcos, checked in at the Embassy Suites, and headed downstairs for the shuttle to take us over to the airport.

The Redbird folks have created this FBO/Flight Training Center/Flight Experience Center and training laboratory out of nothing in less than a year. The facility is first class and includes a simulator lab with several of their FMX , a MX2 “hummingbird”,  numerous  TD and TD2 table top units as well as the first MCX a dual control FMX type motion simulator.

The MCX simulator elicited the same “we’ve got to get one” response out of me that the original had when we saw it in the NAFI Learn to Fly Discovery Center in Aeroshell Square at Oshkosh in 2009.

Dual controls solves a few of the challenges with instructing in the FMX primarily for Pitch Hitter

training, CFI applicants and for primary training where the need to explain, demonstrate and correct are concerned.Judy made sure that we steered clear of the sales staff that I’m sure were itching for someone to write a check for one.

We had a wonderful dinner buffet  with a  endless supply of beer and wine and listened to a list of distinguished speakers laud the Redbird team for bringing their idea to fruition. I will be keeping a close eye on the progress the Skyport people will undoubtedly be making. I had a few long conversations with many people at the AOPA Summit about the need for the FAA to revise the private pilot practical test standards to allow more than the current 2.5 hours of sim time that can be counted towards that rating. Everyone agreed and on Friday I saw a press release stating that the Skyport people have received a waiver allowing them to do just that.  

That’s a beautiful thing and will undoubtedly spur more student starts and finishes as the mechanics of stick and rudder skills will be learned and perfected in the simulator then brushed up in the airplane. It’s an exciting time and of course everything is bigger in Texas.

Just go buy a plane already

Bonus depreciation ends on 12/31/2011.  I glommed the following from an Aviation Tax Consultants Web site.

“New aircraft purchases and new equipment purchases for used aircraft can now be expensed in the year of purchase through December 31, 2011.  For 2012, 100% bonus depreciation returns to 50% bonus until it expires on January 1, 2013.  In addition, new aircraft purchases (but not new equipment on used aircraft) will receive a one year extension on the placed in service requirement under certain circumstances.  The additional first year depreciation deduction is allowable both for regular income tax purposes and alternative minimum tax purposes.  Qualifying property must be new, used primarily for business purposes, and meet other tests necessary to qualify for modified accelerated cost recovery system depreciation (MACRS).  The new bonus depreciation excludes property acquired under written binding contract in effect prior to January 1, 2008”.
Airplanes are the cheapest I’ve ever seen since I started flying and the interest rates are also at historic lows. Our airplane is possibly my most prized possession. An hour or two in the Mooney is the best therapy I can think of for diminishing the stresses of the day to day. So what are you waiting for?   If you think you won’t use your own aircraft enough to make it worthwhile let me suggest this.  Its 7:30 on Sunday morning, the sky is clear with high cirrus and light winds and the forecast is it will stay that way. I’m going to take Judy over to Westhampton Beach (KFOK) for breakfast at the Diner in the terminal and we’ll be back to watch the Buffalo Bills and Dallas Cowboys game at 1pm. That plan wasn’t even a thought until I sat down with my tea and laptop this morning and looked at the sun streaming through the kitchen window.
If you’re renting airplanes from a school or club, chances are the airplanes are already booked today. Owning your own means your airplane is waiting for you when you’re ready.   

Strange Weather

Like many of you I got up last Saturday morning really interested in seeing whether the forecast for the area was correct. The local weather man had said a winter storm warning was in effect for 3 to 6 inches of wet snow with as much as 6 to 12 inches in the higher terrain. We live at 950 MSL which can only be considered high if everything else around you is at sea level.

When it started snowing in earnest we decided to close shop and head home.  I had worked late the night before and we had a wedding and go to that night so when I got to the house I decided I’d take a nap for an hour then shower and dress for the wedding.

When I woke up the snow was really coming down. We already had about five inches on the ground and it was falling furiously. I hopped in the shower and suited up for the wedding. We got in the truck and started backing down the driveway. When it came time to turn around, the truck was still moving in the same direction and no amount of control input was changing that. I brought it to a stop and tried reversing course. We just sat there and spun the tires. Four wheel drive wasn’t much help and I quickly came to the conclusion that we would need to plow the driveway prior to leaving for the wedding. Unfortunately the plow wasn’t already on the truck so we bailed on the festivities resigning ourselves to the fact that we weren’t going anywhere.

Well it continued until midnight and when it was finally done we were left with 19” of heavy wet snow, on October 30^th. We lost power around 7PM and now a full seven days later the power still hasn’t been restored. Turns out this was one of the worst storms in many years and the worst October storm in my memory.

The leaves hadn’t yet fallen from the trees and the rapid snowfall accumulated on them causing branches to snap off and take down  transmission lines.

So we’ve had two one week long power outages in as many months, the first from Hurricane Irene and our unexpected snowstorm. It seems odd that this should be happening but only if we view these storms as isolated events. 2011 has seen its share of bizarre weather.

Weather Underground meteorology director Jeff Masters, who wasn't involved in the study, said in the United States from June to August this year, blistering heat set 2,703 daily high temperature records, compared with only 300 cold records during that period, making it the hottest summer in the U.S. since the Dust Bowl of 1936.

Anyway the weather will be what the weather will be, and I believe that these wide swings and storms define what the new normal is. As pilots we’ll have to learn to adapt to it.

Retrofitting older aircraft

I’ve been instructing in a 1965 Mooney C model for the past few weeks. The owner of the aircraft just received his Private Pilot’s license last August in a Cessna 172 and wanted to get checked out in the airplane and then continue training towards an instrument rating. His C model is an interesting airplane with a manual “Johnson bar” gear and hydraulic flaps along with a carbureted 180 horsepower Lycoming engine.  The airplane is a bit shorter than our 1975 F model but makes up for it with speed and fuel efficiency.

Anyway the drawback of this particular airplane for instrument training is that typical to a mid 60’s airplane, the panel arrangement is not in the “basic T” or “six pack configuration”.  The aircraft is largely restored though with a quality recent paint job, an Airtex interior with new carpets and headliner, and new Plexiglas.  However the avionics are vintage Narco. Equipped with two MK12D’s, two OBS indicators- one with glideslope, an AT50 transponder and the push button audio panel typical to that equipment.  Sandwiched between the audio panel and number one navcom  is a Garmin 150 xl VFR only monochromatic liquid crystal GPS. Simply put the avionics date the airplane.

The AT50 transponder is intermittent and while this isn’t much of an issue for VFR flying it needs to be repaired or replaced prior to any serious IFR training in the Northeast. Narco went out of business earlier this year so the drawback with continuing using their products is the lack of parts or technical support. Now this really isn’t that much of a liability considering many companies like Wentworth  or Bennett avionics still have countless yellow tagged Narco radios in stock (at very affordable prices). Additionally you could say the same drawback exists for Mooney airplanes themselves, with Mooney having ceased normal business operations a few years back.

My client expressed a desire to put a WAAS GPS (wither a GNS430W or a GTN650) in his panel along with replace the existing AT50 with a Garmin GXT330 Mode S transponder to get TIS traffic on the panel.  We flew the plane over to VIP Avionics in Hartford Brainard this past Monday where we had made an appointment with Rob Lenart to see what the options were for an avionics update.

Rob as is his custom went out to the airplane with his digital camera and took numerous photos of the panel and then went to work.  One of the things I had asked was how difficult would it be to rearrange instruments in the panel as to closely replicate a six pack. My concern about the haphazard placement is its impact on pilots who train with a non-standard configuration and then fly other airplanes

He was having difficulty figuring out how to put this together when we spied the Aspen Evolution demo unit in Rob’s office. Turns out the depth of rear end of the Aspen unit is greater at the top where the attitude indicator is located and shallower where the HSI. This actually would work well in the Mooney where the panel is slanted, deep at the top and shallow where the control yoke comes through. Well an hour later Rob had prepared  a mock up drawing of how the panel would look when finished and provided a quote for the cost of the equipment and labor.

Investing significant money into a forty six year old airplane takes a unique mindset. The avionics upgrade proposed for this airplane would complete a restoration process started a few years back. Adding considerable dollars in modern day avionics to the airplane will not increase the resale value of the airplane by a proportional amount. Rather it will make it a useable “going places” vehicle again.

Could my client go out and purchase an equivalent airplane equipped in the same manner for the total amount he has/will have invested into it?  Absolutely not, but by adding these devices to his existing airplane he will have a safe and reliable craft with all of the capability of a machine forty years newer.  The avionics upgrade brings back the utility it had when it first left Kerrville Texas in 1965.  

AOPA Summit 2011

I haven’t posted anything since September.  Excuses aside, I’ve been real busy first with working the AOPA Summit in Hartford, and then catching up with being out of the office for a week.    In case you didn’t know, Judy and I donated our simulator to the AOPA Learning Center for the show and in return became supporting sponsors of the convention.  

The Redbird folks arrived at our building at 7am on the Monday the 19^th, prior to the show.   Josh and Chris disassembled the FMX and loaded it into a truck that Chris had driven from Austin Texas.  I showed up at the convention site on Wednesday afternoon with our signage and promotional literature.

Working the AOPA show was an exciting experience. We flew our Simulator roughly 25 hours (Hobbs time) over the three day event. To maximize the throughput we only let people fly the box for six minutes which equated to 80 flights a day or 240 people that we exposed to Aviation, Simulation and the Redbird FMX.

Ben helped me with the workload on Thursday and I traded off the flight instruction part with my Redbird associate an hour on and an hour off on both Friday and Saturday. Judy was kind enough to take a vacation day from her day gig Friday and worked the booth on Saturday as well.

We left the convention center at 6pm on Saturday and had dinner at the restaurant at the Marriott, went to bed to wake at six and drive to Danbury heading to the office. The Redbird team arrived at 10am and worked until well past nine PM putting our machine back together.

I was whipped for the next few days after that finally getting my first day off on the Sunday after the show- 28 days straight without time off. Whew

My 9/13/2011 email to friends following the World Trade Center Bombing on 9/11

This is an email that I sent out to friends after the tragedy on 9/11/2001. I'm reposting it here for the upcoming 10th anniversary. I'll be in the city on 9/11/2011 for the tenth time joining my friends and former associates Wilson, Pete, Kevin, Tony and Slava  same as we have for the past 9 years. The former Global Information Delivery Department of the now defunct Industrial Bank of Japan.

Hello All;

Where to begin? Numerous friends and associates have called and sent me emails this week inquiring how I was doing in the aftermath of the bombing of the World Trade Center. I started to write a response back and while writing, actually started to feel better as I got my thoughts out. I have been quite confused as to why this tragedy occurred and what I’ll need to do to come to terms with how I feel having witnessed it.

First off, I'm OK, no injuries aside from very sore feet from wearing dress loafers for what turned out to be around a 10-mile walk.

I’ve been working for the past few months at an investment bank downtown. My office/cube is on the 10th floor of 1 State Street Plaza on the corner of State and Whitehall. I got a call @ 9:00am from my wife Judy telling me that the Trade Center was on fire. I looked out the window and sure enough it was ‘smoking up good’. A few moments later she called back and said she saw on the TV in her cafeteria that an airplane crashing into the building caused the fire.

She said they reported it was a small plane. I tried to rally a few of my associates to come outside to check it out. Most were reluctant but I convinced the other consultant Kevin by saying 'hey this is history.... we have to check it out'

Kevin and I walked over to Battery Park (It's behind our building) to get a closer look. He was a bit slow moving trying to recollect how many of his friends and former associates were working in the Trade Center and whether they’d be in this morning.

We walked over and closer, looking up at the opening in the building. From our vantage point (we were 5 blocks south) it didn't look that bad. In retrospect what we were looking at was the exit hole from the 1st plane.

We had no way of knowing it was an airliner that had crashed into the building.

After walking northwest bound for about 5 minutes we heard the other plane which was in full cruise @ about 400 500 feet off the surface. We heard the plane well before we saw it. It was the sound you’d hear at an air show.

We looked up as the noise intensified and saw the second Jet as it flew directly over our heads. The bottom was gray and in the very few second seconds between seeing the plane and the impact my thoughts went from thinking it was a military jet either patrolling after the catastrophe , or a firefighting plane that was going to help put out the fire. The plane was maneuvering. As it passed over I saw the top was blue making me realize that it was a commercial airliner either US Airways or United who have that type of paintjobs on their planes.

Only seconds elapsed between seeing the plane and the impact and I thought that some navigation aid was misconfigured but dismissed this immediately as the day was clear and the visibility was unrestricted. There was just no way I could bring myself to think that the pilot’s intentions were nefarious

The plane rolled right, then to the left as it hit the building in a nose low attitude. It was incredible. I have never seen anything like this in my life. It appeared that it hit with its wing as the fireball and debris appeared to continue through both walls of the building. There was no way I was believing that someone had intentionally just flew what appeared to be a 737 through the World Trade Center

The noise and fireball I can't describe. The sound of the engines at full cruise and accelerating, the impact and resulting explosion, all incredibly loud yet seemingly delayed by what I think was the distance between where I stood and the tragedy.

Turning and looking for Kevin I said something like ‘Holy Shit did you see that?’ Kevin was already gone. The impact from the plane was subsiding and a huge plume of black brown and gray smoke was emanating from the side of the tower. People were crying, screaming and running everywhere. I stood there in disbelief transfixed by the spectacle unfolding around me.

I saw hundreds of people running away most of them heading towards me in the park. At that point I remember wondering ‘why are these people running’ and then ‘hey you should be running too’ so I turned and ran southeastward through the park and out to State Street. I used my cell phone to call my wife and was alternately talking to her and the people around me, people of all walks of life talking in disbelief about what they had just seen.

Walking back to my building I was thinking ‘just go in, get your stuff and split’, while alternately wondering ‘how am I going to get out of here’. All of the people working in the plaza had been evacuated to the sidewalk on the east side (front) of the building. I saw some coworkers and immediately went up to them, wanting to tell them of the horror I just had witnessed. Everyone was facing north, looking up at the towers smoking, standing there in disbelief. They wouldn’t let anyone upstairs so I hung on the sidewalk having to squat down as I was getting dizzy and short of breath.

It was pandemonium on the streets. The corner of State and Whitehall is across from the Staten Island Ferry and the South Ferry subway stations along with a downtown exit from the FDR drive. Traffic was in gridlock on those streets with emergency vehicles driving on the sidewalks on State Street. It was then when I became cognizant of the noise of horns blaring and emergency vehicle sirens. The trade center was emitting strips of what appeared to be aluminum shavings, which I assumed were part of the aircraft. It was similar to the tickertape you’d see during the Yankee’s parades in the Canyon of Hero’s (Lower Broadway) over the past few years.

At this point the towers were just burning and there was a breeze blowing the smoke to the south, but it was way above our heads. At times the smoke obscured the sun making it appear that it was dark out similarly to the way entering fog while diving will make it dark. The air quality was still good aside from the smokers indulging themselves a cigarette.

We were told we would be safer inside and we went back to our desks. We talked
about what had happened. People were of all different moods. Everyone was trying to call their loved ones and get messages out that they were OK.

Watching out the north wall of our floor (all glass) everyone was discussing what we thought was going to happen. It was then the 1st tower collapsed. It was horrific; no special effects in the movies could ever duplicate that sight and sound. I cannot describe the despair I felt at that moment, as it is still incomprehensible to me. I’m not aware whether it was the fear of debris shattering the windows or people not wanting to witness this spectacle anymore as people pulled down the window shades were on that wall.

We were told to go downstairs and instructed to stay in the building lobby as the street outside appeared as if a smoky blizzard was raging.

A short time later another loud noise was followed with more smoke, dust and debris as the second tower collapsed and it became like night outside. We couldn’t see the second tower collapse as the windows of the building lobby face eastward. This kept me from believing that it actually collapsed. Whitehall Street became engulfed in a tidal wave of particulate matter rolling southward towards the harbor.

After several minutes passed the sky lightened a bit and I went outside (all the smokers were out there still) and looked towards the towers where there was nothing but a huge plume of dust rising several stories. I couldn’t see the towers and went inside.

The air quality within the lobby was getting intolerable between the smoke and exhalation of the occupants of a 30-story office building all milling about in the lobby. The Bank security people determined that we would be better off in the Sub-Cellar Data Center two stories underground. Everyone was so frightened as we didn't know if more planes were going come along at any time and fly into ours or the surrounding buildings. We had no link to the outside world and were unaware of any of the other bombing attacks. Once downstairs I hooked up my laptop and sent out an email to my wife letting her know I was alive and to call the rest of my family and let them know that.

After about an hour Kevin and I decided that we'd walk up the east side of Manhattan with several other people to get out of downtown, which we did. I now understand how people in other parts of the world and at other times felt/feel when terror strikes occur during the normal course of their day.

Donning painter’s masks we ventured outside. State/Water Street was completely void of traffic save for the constant movement by rescue and police vehicles. As I recollect I’m amazed at what it must have taken to clear the streets of all traffic. The streets had an apocalyptic appearance covered by a few inches of dust, with blowing smoke paper and debris everywhere. The only sounds were that of emergency vehicles.

Thousands of people were filing away towards any route off Manhattan. It was very orderly as people were in shock. The crush of the crowd reminded me of the organized chaos usually experienced when leaving a football game except with a much grimmer undertone.

As we walked east out of the financial district, relief workers were offering people paper masks as every passing vehicle would kick up clouds of dust or have it trailing off the horizontal surfaces similarly to snow drifting off your car when you don’t brush before driving away. I put my sunglasses on as this material was the consistency of ash/fine sand and was stinging my eyes as the wind blew it as we walked.

Taking up an easterly heading down Water Street and while passing South Street Seaport (where I had eaten lunch the afternoon before), my thoughts turned towards the tourists that typically would be visiting the shops and restaurants there any late summer afternoon at lunchtime. How must they feel, vacationing and sightseeing in downtown New York? I then thought about the tourists that would have been killed visiting the trade towers, the early birds (like my wife), who wouldn’t want the long lines later in the day.

Police officers from organizations I never knew existed made everyone stay on the sidewalks to keep the roads clear. Everyone followed directions and cooperated fully with the authorities. Relief workers were in the streets every few blocks offering rest rooms, water, phones and just someone to talk to if needed.

We walked through Chinatown, into the East Village and then up 1st Avenue. When 1st became too crowded we simply walked to 2nd and then ultimately 3rd where we stopped for a drink at a bar that Kevin was familiar with. I looked at my watch and was amazed that it was close to 3:00pm. We had been walking since 11:30. The owner was seating people and told us they weren’t serving outside, as none of their employees were able to come in. We went into the Bar and tried to order a drink. I was talking with an older guy at the bar who told me to be patient with the bartenders as none of the people who were working there were employee’s, but the barfly’s that drink there every day.

Getting thirsty hot and impatient, we left there and went to the pub across the street. TV’s were on and the place was filled with people staring at NY1, CNN, CNBC, and FOX News drinking. I bought Kevin a Heineken and had a club soda. I went downstairs to piss, spotted a phone and called Judy. When I went upstairs I realized I couldn’t just hang in the bar all afternoon, I was determined to get off Manhattan..

My original plan was to walk to Grand Central to see if the trains were running. If not my next step was to walk to my apartment on E82nd change into sneakers and workout garb and walk until I was in a place that Judy could come and pick me up.

I walked with Kevin until 38th street. He went home and I went on to Grand Central. All the trains were local every stop so I got on the 1st one figuring that once I was clear of the island Judy could pick me up anywhere as she had a car.

The train was packed but I got a seat. I have to confess that I looked down or away when I saw someone coming down the aisle more deserving of my seat (old ladies and the like), but I had just walked about 10 miles in dress shoes and was pretty needy myself.

I finally got my cell phone to work, and was touched by the scores of people who had left me voice mails, just saying that they were thinking of me and please call as soon as you can. Anyway I can only say that I am very grateful and appreciative of how precious my life is and what a wonderful privilege it is to be as blessed as we are, living and working in a free world.

We’ve probably seen the end of our liberties as we have grown to know them. I’ve included some pictures of the skyline we took before this tragedy so you can remember. I don’t think the government will ever let us fly this close to New York again and I’ve heard that Washington National airport may never reopen. My hope is that this terrible act does not change the way we live too appreciably.



Stay well and out of harms way

Your Friend
Sean

WFC 1&2 Judy took this picture on 9/24/1988 from the right seat of N8229F while flying @ 500’ MSL which is the floor of the New York Class Bravo Airspace. This is about the height the planes were flying at when they struck the tower Financial District &Battery Park Taken by Judy on 9.24/88 moments earlier than the trade center shot I was standing on the north edge of the park when the 2nd plane hit the tower. My building at the time was the square black one next to the shiny one in the lower right corner

Final approach into Washington National Airport 2/19/2001. You'll never get this shot from a GA Airplane again

Oshkosh 2011- Recapping the Ride Out

This year we departed for Oshkosh on Wednesday July 20^th.. We give ourselves a window of four days to travel and hope to arrive by Saturday at the latest. That said, we plan our departure for the best weather day starting the Wednesday prior to the show. This year that day was Wednesday and our only concern was the heat wave that had been gripping the middle of the country and forecasted to move east.

We woke up Wednesday morning and the weather was pristine for a good portion of both of the routes we typically take. I decided on taking the southerly route around the bottom of the lakes as there was a disturbance across the northerly route which was bringing thunderstorms and rain to the Rochester, Buffalo, London, and Saginaw areas.

I prefer not crossing the Great Lakes for all of the normal reasons, single engine, cold water, no ditching experience, poor swimmer.   We planned on a 7 am departure and filed for that. Somehow that got delayed to a more reasonable hour.

 In reviewing Judy’s impeccable flight logs for the first leg, we started the engine at 10:13 AM, ATIS Bravo was current departure runway 26 and the pressure was 29.93. Liftoff was at 10:25 am and our climb was staggered from three to six, seven and finally eight thousand feet approaching Sparta (SAX) VOR. Nine different controllers handled the flight which finished with the localizer 25 approach into Akron Fulton Airport in Akron Ohio. Landing was at 1:23 and shutdown at 1:26 where the outside air temperature was 35 degrees Celsius versus 32 degrees at altitude. Tach time in was 1946.2 which totaled a 3.3 hour leg. We took on fuel at Summit Air where the manager was working the line.   He provided fantastic service and charged $5.57 a gallon for avgas on their Oshkosh special. The special was kind of deceptive though, as they advertised $4.94 a gallon conveniently leaving the three different state and local taxes off the airnav.com website.

We started at AKR at 2:35 and lifted off at 2:47 filed for Rockford Illinois.   Chicago approach controllers are as brusque as their New York associates and they let the smaller city guys deliver their bad news for them. We filed a simple Slant Golf flight plan via READS MFD JOT. I lifted this flight plan from fltplan.com as the last ATC clearance for a piston airplane between these two locations.   But like New York the Chicago controllers won’t allow piston single IFR aircraft inside their Bravo airspace unless they’re specifically filed to a location within that airspace.   As we were filed to Rockford they directed us “around the Horn” (their term).   We were advised of a change to our clearance by Fort Wayne then South Bend approach. There was a 20 knot on the nose headwind and it was hotter than hell in the airplane.   We opened the roof vents which blew 90 degree air on our heads and necks but because it was moving we left it open.

 Approaching Rockford, the temperature increased another degree.   The oil temperature was elevated and the prospect of a hot start on Rockford’s one hundred degree ramp was not too appealing.  Likely we would have to spend more than an hour there.   I checked the XM winds and noticed that when we turned north east we would be the beneficiary of a tailwind for the first time on the trip.  Checking with the FS450 fuel flow computer showed we had 2:30 of fuel left.   I was running rich to keep the oil temperature below 230 (red line is 245) so when we were clear “of the horn” I asked Chicago if it would be too much of a hardship to change our destination to Oshkosh. We received vectors until we were fifteen miles northeast of Rockford and were cleared direct to Oshkosh. As we turned north and east the groundspeed jumped to 175 so I pulled the power back to 55% and opened the cowl flaps as the airspeed decreased. We were blessed with 168 knot ground speed and oil temperatures back at 210. The FS450 showed we would land with 1.5 hours of fuel remaining as we entered the left base for runway 27 and landed.

EAA wasn’t fully staffed when we arrived so we exited the runway to the left into the grass.   A minute or so went by when a lineman arrived on a scooter and led us into the north 40.   He asked me where we wanted to go and I requested row 505 runway side.   He marshaled us up and we counted ourselves as the 6^th plane to tie down in the north 40.   Three days later the entire section would be filled with aircraft tied up tail to tail.   Judy had the tent set up before I got the airplane tied down and squared away.   The heat was oppressive in the mid 90’s and we were blessed that the wind was blowing steady at 17 with gusts to 29.

Dinner the first night was at the Hilton Garden Inn and I begged Judy for a reprieve from camping while the hotel was still $99 a night.   Reprieve denied, we ate at the bar and started walking back to our tent around 10pm CDT.   It was still over 80 with the sun down but the breeze was our saving grace. Sleeping with the tent door wide open was remarkably bug free.

Oshkosh and our History, The what when and why

For the past eleven years Judy and I have made AirVenture Oshkosh our big vacation destination during the year. Actually when I say eleven I really mean this past year was my eleventh trip out and back to the show.  Judy wasn’t with me on my first trip out so this was her 10.5^th trip. In 2001 I flew to Oshkosh with Drew and Ann. Drew was my flight instructor at the time and I’ve known Ann for a real long time. Judy and I had reacquainted ourselves with Sun and Fun in April that year after a ten year absence so I began talking to people about making the pilgrimage to Oshkosh whenever I’d find someone who would listen.

We flew out there and because we stopped at Chicago’s Meig’s Field (logbook entry stop) we were late arriving to Oshkosh and had to divert to Fond du Lac.  Upon arrival at KFDL the mixture cable on the Mooney broke stranding us there on the field.   Fond du Lac is an overflow for Oshkosh so we camped there for the show and took the shuttles in. I spent my three days at the show looking for a new cable which ultimately I found but it wouldn’t arrive until the Wednesday after the show ended.

At the time I was working in lower Manhattan for an investment bank who frowned on my aviation hobby, and they were none too pleased about me taking the trip to start with. I couldn’t wait with the airplane unless I wanted to be unemployed so I purchased a round trip plane ticket from Minneapolis to New York. Once home I pitched Judy to take the ride out with me to retrieve the airplane. That Friday we departed New York’s LaGuardia Airport on a US Air flight and arrived in Minneapolis to rent a car and drive it to KFDL. Returning the rental car we paid our tab and departed VFR flying at 2000 below the clouds.   That flight back became the reason I got my instrument rating and is worthy of its own post.

Judy has always liked long cross country trips and we’ve made it part of our lives ever since.

We leave early because we like to pick our camping spot and arriving five days ahead of time usually allows you to choose where you want to camp. My motto is to arrive and leave early. Once the second weekend starts drawing nearer the lines start to form and it’s time to go.

We have stayed till the end of the show once or twice and dislike the way it transforms once the crowd shows up.  Early in the week the attendees are mostly aviators and the conversations usually revolve around “nice airplane”, “where’d you fly in from?”, “Wow, you built that?” or my favorite “How’d you fit all that gear in a Mooney?”  To me the “Air show” is watching the GA arrivals. We usually sit for several hours each day and watch the arrivals and the departures of air show luminaries and their photo chase planes. 

My favorite day is the Sunday before the show starts. It’s the first day you are required to wear a wristband to walk the show grounds, the exhibits are largely complete and you can take a close look at the planes and products without a throng of people getting in your way and in your pictures.

The groceries and camp supplies are procured off airport at the Pick and save supermarket and the local Target.   Judy and I walk to the market twice a day usually carrying around eighty pounds of lightweight materials each trip.  Unlike Connecticut “package goods” liquor, beer and wine are available at the supermarket which adds considerably to the load.  Early on in the week people with vehicles feel sorry for that crazy couple carrying all the ice and supplies and sometimes give you a lift to your campsite or at least the row you’re camped in.

It’s a relaxing week with friends although I must say the weather in east central Wisconsin can be quite variable. Many years we’ve experienced sweltering heat followed by massive thunderstorms leading into bone chilling cold, all occurring within a twelve hour period.

We have friends that we meet on the airport every year. These people have become like our extended family. During the year we exchange emails and keep up with their lives. The ones who live close by we have either visited or they have visited us. Around April the emails start arriving more frequently developing into a frenzy of calls and test messages once the second week of July rolls around.

If you haven’t had the opportunity to attend I would say start planning for next year now. If you have any questions feel free to reach out to me as I obviously don’t mind talking about it.

Your Flight Instructor as an additional insured on your aircraft insurance policy.

I  received a call from a customer who wants me to fly with him in his airplane this coming weekend. Typically I like to take Sundays off but knowing this person, I understand his business interests keep him busy 6 days a week as well, and the only time he has to fly is on Sundays. He needs to get a few approaches in and do some crosswind landings. When we spoke I requested that he call his insurance company and have my name added as an additional insured on his aircraft policy. A few hours later I received an inquiry form, from his insurance broker, requesting all of the information they typically collect.

As I was filling out the form I came on the fields looking for the date of my last Biennial Flight Review and instrument Proficiency Check. I’m a dick about details so I pulled out my logbook to look it up. I was confused about both because I thought my session at the FlightSafety this past April would have counted as my IPC and getting my ATP back in November 2010 would have sufficed for my Flight Review obligations.

On further review I checked the yellow card from FlightSafety and noticed the absence of the checkmark on the line that said FAR 61.57(d). Now I know that the Sim we used in Wichita has the same limitations as our FMX in Danbury with regards to conducting an IPC. The FAA doesn’t let allow either of us to count landings from a circling or straight in approach. FlightSafety’ s work around is the same as ours, we do 90% of the things we need to do to satisfy the IPC in the simulator, then we must go out in the airplane and do some landings from approaches.

During the week I spent in Wichita, I did twelve hours of Simulator time as pilot flying, twelve hours as pilot not flying, and two hours in the airplane with three approaches and nine landings. That satisfies the letter of the law for an IPC and I was wondering why Tim (My instructor at FSI) hadn’t checked the box next to it. On reviewing the card I did notice that Tim had checked the box next to Biennial flight review so I put that date into the form for the insurance.

Looking back through my logbook to determine the last time I did a formal IPC it dawned on me. My ATP practical test this past November was done completely under the hood. I called a few folks asking them if I was off base assuming that I could and should use that date as my last IPC. We all agreed that it did, so I put in that date and submitted the information.

In the past I’ve had instructors ask me to put them on our Mooney’s policy when they had flown with me and always viewed it as a nuisance.  Now that I instruct in Other Peoples Aircraft regularly, I understand the wisdom of putting this in place.

In my experience I have found that insurance companies will do their level best to minimize their exposure to your claims.  It’s the part of their business they dislike the most, the paying claims part. Having fallen victim to this with innumerable different insurance products and policies, spanning my entire adult life, I know that not having this all lined up at the moment when the inevitable unforeseen circumstance occurs can have a detrimental impact on your claim.

If you own an airplane and fly with independent flight instructors putting the instructor on the policy as an additional insured protects you as the owner from having the insurance company deny payment. Most people assume that the instructor is covered by the “Open Pilot Warrantee” and need not be added to the policy. This is a poor assumption as most owners’ policies prohibit any commercial use of the airplane. Paying your instructor to fly in your airplane makes your lesson a commercial endeavor and invalidates warrantee, hence the instructor is then not covered by the policy.  If the instructor is an additional insured, the insurance company is unlikely to subrogate to someone who they actually cover on the policy.  A waiver of subrogation keeps the insurance company from attempting to collect damages from your flight instructor should he/she be present in the airplane when God forbid you should have an accident.

This is a better option for both the instructor and you, than just having the instructor carry their own policy. I’ve posted some information on our website that I received from the EAA about all of this http://www.fullmotionflight.com/TrainingPrograms/AircraftTraining.aspx . At the end of the day just to be safe, and name your instructor as an additional insured on your policy.

Utilizing the Automation - The Airplane

Mooney 58V as a TAA or Technically Advanced Aircraft

Our Oshkosh trip was the first real IFR cross country since we updated the panel and cockpit navigation gear this past May. I’ve taken a few moments to highlight our experiences with the upgrades in case any of you reading this has a similar desire to lighten your bank balance.

We recently installed a Garmin GTN 650 navigator and an S-TEC GPSS module in our Mooney. The GTN or Garmin Touch Navigator is the successor to their venerable GNS series of Navigators.  WAAS was the primary reason for the upgrade. Additionally the KLN89B we installed in the airplane back in 2004 was getting increasingly difficult to remember how to use.  Considering the airplane was going to be down for two weeks to install the new GPS unit I thought it would be an ideal time to install GPSS.

The GPSS module is an upgrade the STEC-20 autopilot we installed back in 2007. The System 20 is a turn coordinator based device that will track GPS VOR LOC but has no vertical component. It’s a simple unit and is considered an entry level autopilot. I’ve never been too happy with its ability to track on approaches preferring to hand fly them. Enroute I typically have had to use the heading bug to get it close to or adjust the course if it wanders a dot or so off.

Adding the GPSS steering module changed all of that. Combined with a WAAS enabled GPS navigator it enables the autopilot to take command input directly from the GPS unit. Regardless whether it’s departure procedures, flight plans, approaches with procedure turns or course reversal holds the little GPSS box reads the waypoint information digitally and then commands the autopilot to manipulate the appropriate servo’s flying them exactly, right out to the missed approach. There is no wandering with the autopilot anymore as it is not slaved to the CDI needle. Subsequently the CDI needle stays where it should be, centered all of the time.

The GTN650 has a big touch screen display and uses much of the programming logic that the larger G500/600 G1000 navigators use. The first and in my mind best improvement over the GNS series is the ability to flight plan by Victor Airway. I’ve been doing this in G1000 equipped airplanes and it is a real time saver. Our initial route segment on our Oshkosh trip was from KDXR to KAKR. The routing we filed was DXR CMK V39 SAX V188 LVZ V106  SEG PSB. As we were sitting on the run-up pad off runway 26 Judy started entering the waypoints using this new feature.  One simply enters the waypoint and when it’s an element of the flight plan pressing the menu key will present the load airway button.  Selecting this and the navigator will then present all of the victor airways that are off of the fix. Selecting the applicable airway and you’ll be asked for the exit point where you can do it again.  This greatly simplifies data entry eliminating chances to slip an invalid/misspelled waypoint into the unit. The aforementioned flight plan was entered using six fixes and that a real time saver as V188 and V106 have multiple fixes and bends in the airway.

The touch screen feature is better suited to the GTN 750 and it is my belief that the 650 was not designed to be a primary radio rather the bottom of the stack radio in a 750/650 combo. When I mentioned this to Steve from Garmin at Oshkosh he got a little offended and gave Judy and I a quick tutorial of how to make use the radio.  Guess what Steve was doing that we weren’t? Steve was using the knobs and buttons instead of the touchscreen. If you use it like a 430 it’s very cool.

Utilizing the Automation - Electronic Flight Bag

Foreflight, Bad Elf and iPad

Judy bought me an iPad for my 50^th birthday last September and I immediately put Foreflight on it based on the advice of several customers who had raved about it. The Foreflight/iPad combination has been a winner for me with flight instruction both in the Redbird as well as in customer airplanes. I’ve gotten quite adept at using it and have taken it on trips in and around the local area as well as a couple thousand mile plus GA airplane journeys. For the past eleven months whether I show up in the office or at the airplane all I need to bring is the iPad and a pair of headsets and I’m ready to go from a chart and weather perspective. I’ve been so pleased with the service I actually cancelled my paper Jeppesen subscription in October of last year after only a month on the iPad.

If I had a complaint about this gear it was the onboard GPS would lose position occasionally which would wipe out the geo-location features of the software.  I mentioned this to a pilot I fly with occasionally in the Sim as well as in his Cessna Skylane. He had bought a few external GPS modules for his iPad and offered to lend me one for the trip. I had heard good things about the Bad Elf GPS so I asked if I could try that one. The Bad Elf appealed to be because it makes a hard wire connection into the iPad. One of my long standing concerns with using generic non-aviation specific consumer electronics in the airplane is battery life. If the battery goes shingot you’re flying without charts.  The iPad with Foreflight running and 3G data enabled really drinks up the battery power. I can usually get about six hours out of it before I have to put it on the charger. Turning Bluetooth on would likely drain more from the tablet. The Bad Elf comes with USB cable allowing you to charge both the GPS and the iPad from a cigarette lighter outlet. Well “charge” is a bad word. It allows you to utilize the iPad and Bad Elf and not drain the battery. I flew for seven hours with the unit on and plugged into the lighter and when I shut down in Oshkosh the battery was charged to the level it had been prior to using it. Disconnecting the elf and using the cigarette lighter charger actually charges the battery.

Anyway I was nervous about making such a drastic change vis-à-vis going paperless so I called Sporty’s and ordered approach planes enroute charts and facility directories for the trip for $80.  The morning of our departure I sat at the kitchen table and marked up my charts/plates with post it flags. Once we were in the plane it was a different story, I looked at the first enroute chart and put it behind my seat for takeoff.  Once we were in the climb and talking to departure I picked up the iPad and put it on my lap. The Bad Elf had captured and displayed our position on the chart. Now don’t get me wrong. I’ve used this gear for a while but I’ve always been sitting right seat instructing or monitoring the pilot flying. This was the first trip where it was all me relying on the technology.

It worked flawlessly, and if you don’t have one go buy one. If you do any sort of flying aside from saving you a ton of money on charts, the weather functions will eliminate the need to talk to flight service unless you really like speaking with them.  Going forward I will print the approach plates (from fltplan.com) for my destination and alternate and just use the iPad and Foreflight for my charts. I could rave about the weather products as well but I’ll likely need something to write about next month.

Airventure 2011- Recapping the trip home.

Our departure from Oshkosh was originally slated for Thursday. We had family coming on Saturday that we absolutely positively needed to be home for. We also desired a full day to unpack, rewind and pick up our house prior to their arrival, meaning ideally we would need to be home on Thursday. After looking at the weather on Tuesday morning, the charts prognosticated that by leaving Thursday, we would encounter significant areas of convection across most of the conventional routes home.  This made it seem unlikely that we would arrive home in a single day, unless we wanted to venture into areas where thunderstorms and heavy rain were likely to be prolific.

Tim and Craig saw the same information and decided that they best get out of Oshkosh before the airshow to avoid all the potential bad weather. Judy and I arrived back at camp for lunch to find that they and Pete’s 172 had already departed

I waited until the 2pm forecasts were out before making our decision, and on seeing those decided that the below the lakes routing would likely be the best considering the placement of the fronts and forecasted precipitation.

We told the remaining crew of our plan to depart on Wednesday. Pete after losing half of his posse as well as his airplane already,  decided that loading up the camping gear with four people helping was a better prospect than having to do it with two. He suggested that we downsize the kitchen and I agreed, so during the airshow, we cajoled security into letting us pull the BMW out to our row and we loaded it up and headed out to our storage container.

Once we were back on the show grounds with no cooking equipment or food everyone took the shuttle and walked to a Pizza restaurant. During dinner, a check of the 8PM forecasts showed - if they held,  a mid-morning departure would be in the cards. We got back to camp about 10pm said our good nights and went to sleep. I brought my iPad into the tent so I could plan the flight when I woke up in the morning and with a belly full of Pizza fell asleep quickly.  I woke up at 5am to the sound of people talking and moving around outside the tent.

I grabbed the iPad and flipped it to foreflight. I keep mine in landscape mode, and as such,  can see your list of ‘favorite’ airport’s current conditions from the Foreflight opening screen. I usually set my Favorites to the cities that span the trip I’m on. This gives me an executive dashboard of the conditions across my route.

Looking at that I could see the hourly METARS were all green or VFR. Drilling into some of the locations I checked the TAFS and saw that the 2AM forecasts closely mirrored their predecessors from 8PM the evening before. Judy stirred and mumbled something similar to what’s it look like and I told her it was fine and go back to sleep. I fell asleep as well and woke at 5:45 to the sound of not so distant thunder. Picking up the iPad I saw that Madison and Janesville Wisconsin had change from green to blue and drilling into the NEXRAD screen witnessed a Connecticut sized blob of purple, red and yellow returns encroaching on Oshkosh from the west. We jumped out of our sleeping bags and pulled the plug on the air mattress standing on it to expedite its deflation.

We struck the balance of our camp in near record time pulling the final zipper on the tent as it was thrown into the back of the Mooney. Precisely when the baggage door was locked the rain started in earnest. We huddled under the still standing Easy Up as the deluge commenced.  I tried accessing E-STMP from my iPad to see if I could get an IFR departure slot to depart Wittman Regional but the web site does not support Safari. I pulled my Windows 7 laptop from my flight bag and tried again to get a slot but there were only two available the first in 10 minutes or one after the airshow. In the meantime people were departing into the storm, mostly VFR. The airport was open and pilots were firing up their airplanes and trying to get out before the worst of it hit.

EAA didn’t have any flag people on the turf taxiways and we watched as a conga line of airplanes started taxiing up the north 40 looking for a hole in the fencing to taxi out to the runways through.  Two of them passed us in row 505 with the first turning right down row 501 away from the runway. Judy ran out and opened up a hole in the fence for them to exit the north 40 while Pete and Pat approached the planes and told them to turn around. We contemplated going but when we witnessed the lightning in the near west decided against it. Plus we had to pay for our fuel and say our good byes to friends inside the show.

Putting on Wednesday’s wristbands we went into the convention riding trams to stay out of the rain. We got soaked walking in the grass and once in the show went to the FAA pavilion to get a weather briefing from the Lockheed Martin FSS people. From my observations there were two waves of precipitation in the storm. The first we were experiencing now and it looked like this would last some time. There was another wave that was 150 miles northwest of Oshkosh and moving southeasterly. Between the two was an area of lighter green to no returns. Getting a briefing was dicey. We couldn’t go IFR without a departure slot those were known to be filled and VFR was not recommended due to the rain, low ceilings, and visibility. Posing a hypothetical scenario to our briefer I presented my observations and asked for his opinion. He hypothetically agreed with my assessment adding the time to depart was between 1130 and 130pm.

Judy and I walked back to the North 40 stopping in the War Bird Café for a horrible breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast and brown water they claimed was coffee. We didn’t want to eat but the rain was coming down in sheets so we viewed our breakfasts as tickets to use their tent and tables to get out of the rain. We sat there for about two hours having a lively conversation with a pair of brothers who brought their Yaks to fly in the big military airshow and tribute to naval aviation that was to occur that afternoon.  One of the brothers fed my worry about the trip by saying that the grass taxiways were already under water. We had witnessed this in 2010 when the entire field was flooded. Then the grass taxiways along runway 9/27, specifically the easterly one, had enough running water in it that the ducks from Lake Winnebago were landing there splashing and quacking.

When the rain let up we walked back to our camp enlisted the aid of a neighbor to push our plane out of the ruts it had sunk into. We surveyed the taxiways and similarly to last year the exit taxiway had a few inches of water in it. The one closer to the runway was dry having a greater slope so our plan was to taxi across the outbound and taxi to the runway on the inbound route. There were numerous water filled ruts and skid marks from planes with higher prop clearances than ours powering out and sliding around.

 We started up and headed out behind a Cessna 210 that’s belly and tail section was dripping mud. Crossing over to the inbound side the Cessna pilot saw us from his periphery and decided that ours was an appropriate plan so he changed sides ahead of us, legitimizing our ignoring of the sanctioned procedure. We annoyed a few CAP linemen who were trying to marshal us through the mud eventually shutting down traffic that was inbound to the North 40.  Judy and I were holding tight and full aft on the elevator and once reaching the hard surface we conducted our run up while rolling out to the departure runway   

The weather was 700 few 1300 broken 2300 broken and 3000 overcast with visibility 4 miles in light rain and mist. The dew point and the temperature were nearly the same and the air was definitely saturated.     We were cleared to line up and wait on the left side of runway 27 while the 210 and a Commanche 400 were cleared to depart the left and right sides respectively.  The traffic holding on the right side was a v35 Bonanza and was followed by a 172. This relieved me somewhat as I didn’t have to worry about the airplanes departing prior to me as they were all as fast, or faster, than the Mooney. Behind us was an airplane we were clearly faster than so they wouldn’t run into us from behind. Departing Oshkosh VFR is always scary even when the visibility is unrestricted but leaving when the weather is marginal, without the security blanket of an IFR clearance had me on edge.

I climbed per the procedure to 1200 and when the Garmin 396 showed we were 5 miles from the field turned toward Madison with the hopes of landing there, picking up an IFR clearance and departing south/south west until clear of the Chicago Bravo then head east. Enroute to Madison the XM display showed the airport being engulfed in the next round of heavy precipitation with the METAR icon changing from marginal VFR to Low IFR. Looking towards Janesville we watched them change from VFR to IFR so when we saw a decent sized hole in the broken layer climbed to a VFR on top cruising altitude of 4500 feet.

Between layers Judy panned out the XM to see the weather in Rockford IL. RFD was overcast at 8000 with light winds and visibilities greater than five miles. Twenty miles out we called their approach control with the ATIS and were told to expect the Visual to Runway 7 left base entry.

We arrived at RFD at 2PM where clean and dry clothes were unpacked and changed into. The tanks were topped and an IFR plan filed for Akron Fulton Airport for some more of their $4.88 100 Low Lead. With an uneventful departure and a tailwind behind us the leg lasted about 2:45 with us arriving at 6:45 EDT. Tired and wrung out a rental car was procured and the kind folks at Summit Air made hotel reservations in the nearby Quality Inn. Dinner at Applebee’s and a few well-earned adult beverages followed and we started feeling somewhat human again. A quick check of the TAFS for the balance of the ride predicted benign weather from Akron through Danbury if we left before noon Thursday morning.

Waking at 6AM we found that the forecast again was off. Similarly the forecast still predicted good weather but a look at the NEXRAD showed all manner of precipitation across three quarters of the available routes home. Querying the LMFSS briefer on the phone she was skeptical of what she called my “hi-resolution radar product” stating that it was likely showing precip that wasn’t reaching the ground.

A northeasterly departure was filed towards Youngstown OH, Franklin, Lake Henry then Wilkes Barre PA into Danbury.   Akron Fulton is uncontrolled so we picked up our clearance on the ground from their RCO and once released we were cleared as filed at 5000 runway heading assigned. We took off on Runway 25 which is real interesting as it slopes significantly downhill in the middle and turns up at the ends.

 Calling Akron once airborne we were cleared direct to Youngstown (YNG). Turning left to the northeast the XM display highlighting our route showed purple and red returns with tops to fifty thousand emblazoned with lightning bolts on the magenta (active) route segment. I queried the controller who nonchalantly informed reported the center weather advisory and convective SIGMET for the entire two thirds of our route ending with a nonplussed “say intentions”

I replied that we didn’t want to go anywhere near that and while waiting for his reply Judy was already panning around the screen for the easiest way through the mess without having to backtrack. That effort paid off and we saw that Beaver Falls PA was IFR but the radar in their area was relatively clear of primary color returns. The controllers supervisor came on and told us to descend 4000 and started vectoring away from the heaviest precip. When she asked what routing we wanted I told her we wanted to head towards Beaver Falls later deciding that we should land there and formulate a plan.    They vectored us for the Localizer Runway 10 approach and we broke out while on a three mile final.

Beavers Falls is a sleepy little controlled field north of Pittsburg PA. Availing ourselves of their WIFI we pulled all of our planning gear out. Looking at all of the available information the routing direct Tyrone (TYR) then Milton (MIP) then Wilkes Barre would put us in an area of substantial rain but keep the majority of the thunderstorm cells north and west of our course. Departing off KBVI we flew through about 125 miles of light to moderate rain with an area or two where it was heavy.

North East of MIP and half way to Wilkes Barre we cleared the weather and being fat on fuel we changed our destination to Danbury when we called Wilkes Approach. Boston Center dicked around with our arrival clearing us direct RAGER v58 IGN v157 HAARP direct. Judy wanted to cancel the IFR and go direct but the we were making good time, the air was smooth and after all the crappy weather we had flown the past two days I didn’t want our AirVenture to end so quickly. We landed long on runway 8 and turned left off at the end and entered Reliant. Colin was moving aircraft around the ramp with the Lectro Cart and when we shut down he came over to greet us while pushing the Mooney into her spot with the tug.

We were gone a week and a day departing the twentieth and arriving home on the twenty-eighth. The total trip was 1723 nautical miles and 13 hours of flying. We consumed 156 gallons of AvGas which at $6.00 per gallon comes to $936 definitely more pricy than in years past. The camping and show admission was $458 for the two of us of which $110 was refunded for us leaving the show early so the EAA portion was $348. We spent on average $100 per day on food and drink for an additional $800.

So all told the trip cost us roughly $2100 for ease of math. Naturally this does not include the cost of the plane, insurance and maintenance. However when you consider an eight day and seven night vacation for two adults in Aviation’s garden spot, surrounded by 541,000 likeminded individuals, of which ten thousand brought their airplanes with them,  we considered it money well spent. And now a week after I’m already planning next year’s trip and looking forward to the last full week of July.