Author Archives: tjflyingadventures
State #49 (New Mexico) and Vegas
After spending entirely too much time in China during the past month, I was finally able to squeeze in a good IFR x-country trip. There was a meeting in Vegas that I wanted to attend and conveniently New Mexico was sort of on the way 😉
In the end, I encountered only moderate rain and light chop.
Aside from that brief weather encounter, the rest of the journey till New Mexico was uneventful.
As far as New Mexico, I wanted to land somewhere in the northern part of the state so that it wouldn’t be too far out of the way. So I decided to stop @ Tucumcari, NM. It was a rather spartan airport with quite a bit of construction going on. But it was still a good rest stop and more importantly the official 49th state!
After NM, the final leg to Las Vegas turned out to be the truly memorable part of the trip for a couple of reasons.
Cheers,
== T.J.==
Shaking Off the Rust / Test Flight
Cheers,
== T.J.==
Tough Start To A Very EZ Journey
After fuel and oil, Nathan towed me out of the hanger with me sitting nice and dry in the cockpit! Just when I thought the service couldn’t get any better, Nathan parked my car in the hanger, closed the hanger door and brought me my keys!!!
As I sat in the cockpit getting ready to startup, I was feeling really spoiled.
Then a dose of reality struck…
While trying to start up, I must have used a bit too much primer and flooded the engine. Ugh!!
As I have mentioned before, starting an SR22 is a bit of an art. Even after a 1000 Cirrus hours, I still feel my starts are less than elegant. Usually, it is only tricky with hot starts….But for the first time, I screwed up a perfectly normal, cold start.
After waiting ~ 20 mins, I tried again with much better results. The plane growled and came to life right away!
The takeoff was exactly as advertised on the ATIS, which meant heavy rain, low ceilings and a generally bumpy climb out.
Since I already posted a very similar YouTube video of a rainy takeoff, I didn’t even bother setting up the video equipment this time.
During the climb-out, the weather onscreen looked awful:
But by the time I leveled off @ 17000 FT, I was above all the rain and clouds. The rest of the trip to NC was totally smooth with not a single cloud or bump! In fact, ATC was so quiet, I did a few radio checks just to make sure the radios were working. I could have really used a flight attendant serving drinks and an in flight movie 😉
Washington center laughed at my direct routing and gave me a typical Northeast clearance with 3 victor airways and 6 fixes. Luckily it was close to a direct routing and the weather was so nice, I didn’t notice the time go by.
As I was getting close to Danbury, I got some great views of the Hudson River and even the IBM office in Somers, NY, which you can see below:
Hmmm… Might need to take a creative detour home!
Fuel Planning Over The Gulf
Last weekend was a perfect example of why you must “get good” at flight planning while enroute.
I planned a simple direct flight over the gulf at 16000 FT from Tampa, FL to Galveston, TX.
Conventional wisdom says you do your flight planning on the ground and then simply execute in the cockpit. It sounds simple … But that rarely seems to work for me. There are frequently “surprises” enroute that I never seem to be able to predict in advance.
The flight planning on the ground looked quite promising. The weather was clear and the winds aloft were quite tame along the route (210@10kts) According to my calculations, the flight should have taken 4hours 9 mins. This would allow me to land with comfortably more than 1 hour and 51 minutes of fuel to spare, which is about 30 gallons.
Since the weather and fuel looked good, I began my usual preflight. However, because this was a flight over the Gulf of Mexico, I took a couple of extra precautions. First, I made sure my lifejacket was within easy reach. Second, I made sure my Personal locator beacon (PLB) was in my pocket and ready to go.
Shortly after takeoff, things started to change. Tampa approach was dealing with a lot of traffic in the class B. As a result, my clearance was a bit inconvenient with a heading of 090, followed by several painfully slow heading changes before I was heading westbound. After I leveled off @ 16k FT, I rechecked the fuel projections on R9 and found it predicting 25 gals @ destination.
No problem… (My personal minimum is anything greater than 20) … So far so good …
Then Miami center said the dreaded words “We have an amendment to your routing, advise when ready to copy”.
Uggg… The new routing was direct Seminole (SZW), direct Crestview (CEW) direct destination.
After refreshing the fuel calcs in the R9, it showed 19gals @ destination… This was not good! I have read so many accident/incident reports where pilots “stretched” personal minimums only to realize later that this was part of the accident chain.
I decided if it didn’t improve above 20 by 1 hour from destination, I would divert. But I still had plenty of time. In the meantime, I reduced power to 65% to try to conserve fuel.
After about 20 mins, I found myself in and out of a thin cloud deck and facing increased headwinds (240@33). No immediate danger… But fuel status was now getting worse and the R9 was now predicting 14 gals @ destination.
So I pulled up Foreflight on the iPad and started looking for a place to divert in Louisiana. In addition, I reduced power further to 60% to conserve even more fuel.
I also tried to be clever and “use ATC’s help” to conserve fuel. Every time I got handed off to a new ATC controller, I asked for “a shortcut of 10 to 20 degrees. This worked remarkably well. Before I knew it, the R9 was predicting 21 gals@ destination!
But my optimism was short-lived. The headwinds picked up to 244@42kts.
Now the R9 showed 18 gals @ destination 🙁
That did it, time to divert… Houma,Louisiana looked like a good spot. I told myself 50 miles from Houma would be the decision point to change my IFR flight and start a descent.
Miraculously the winds died down before then and I was able to press on to my destination.
When I landed in Galveston, the R9 reported 20.7 gallons remaining! phew!!
I parked right next to a beautiful Citation CJ2 and a friendly lineman, named Eric, rolled out the red carpet for me!
After a wonderful flight, I am more convinced than ever, that flight planning enroute is an even more important skill than planning on the ground.
Thank goodness that there are cockpit gadgets that let us do that!
Unfortunately, with all the fretting over fuel, I forgot to take pictures!!
(Have to make up for that on my next flight)
Cheers,
== T.J.==
Fuel Planning Over The Gulf
Last weekend was a perfect example of why you must “get good” at flight planning while enroute.
I planned a simple direct flight over the gulf at 16000 FT from Tampa, FL to Galveston, TX.
Conventional wisdom says you do your flight planning on the ground and then simply execute in the cockpit. It sounds simple … But that rarely seems to work for me. There are frequently “surprises” enroute that I never seem to be able to predict in advance.
The flight planning on the ground looked quite promising. The weather was clear and the winds aloft were quite tame along the route (210@10kts) According to my calculations, the flight should have taken 4hours 9 mins. This would allow me to land with comfortably more than 1 hour and 51 minutes of fuel to spare, which is about 30 gallons.
Since the weather and fuel looked good, I began my usual preflight. However, because this was a flight over the Gulf of Mexico, I took a couple of extra precautions. First, I made sure my lifejacket was within easy reach. Second, I made sure my Personal locator beacon (PLB) was in my pocket and ready to go.
Shortly after takeoff, things started to change. Tampa approach was dealing with a lot of traffic in the class B. As a result, my clearance was a bit inconvenient with a heading of 090, followed by several painfully slow heading changes before I was heading westbound. After I leveled off @ 16k FT, I rechecked the fuel projections on R9 and found it predicting 25 gals @ destination.
No problem… (My personal minimum is anything greater than 20) … So far so good …
Then Miami center said the dreaded words “We have an amendment to your routing, advise when ready to copy”.
Uggg… The new routing was direct Seminole (SZW), direct Crestview (CEW) direct destination.
After refreshing the fuel calcs in the R9, it showed 19gals @ destination… This was not good! I have read so many accident/incident reports where pilots “stretched” personal minimums only to realize later that this was part of the accident chain.
I decided if it didn’t improve above 20 by 1 hour from destination, I would divert. But I still had plenty of time. In the meantime, I reduced power to 65% to try to conserve fuel.
After about 20 mins, I found myself in and out of a thin cloud deck and facing increased headwinds (240@33). No immediate danger… But fuel status was now getting worse and the R9 was now predicting 14 gals @ destination.
So I pulled up Foreflight on the iPad and started looking for a place to divert in Louisiana. In addition, I reduced power further to 60% to conserve even more fuel.
I also tried to be clever and “use ATC’s help” to conserve fuel. Every time I got handed off to a new ATC controller, I asked for “a shortcut of 10 to 20 degrees. This worked remarkably well. Before I knew it, the R9 was predicting 21 gals@ destination!
But my optimism was short-lived. The headwinds picked up to 244@42kts.
Now the R9 showed 18 gals @ destination 🙁
That did it, time to divert… Houma,Louisiana looked like a good spot. I told myself 50 miles from Houma would be the decision point to change my IFR flight and start a descent.
Miraculously the winds died down before then and I was able to press on to my destination.
When I landed in Galveston, the R9 reported 20.7 gallons remaining! phew!!
I parked right next to a beautiful Citation CJ2 and a friendly lineman, named Eric, rolled out the red carpet for me!
After a wonderful flight, I am more convinced than ever, that flight planning enroute is an even more important skill than planning on the ground.
Thank goodness that there are cockpit gadgets that let us do that!
Unfortunately, with all the fretting over fuel, I forgot to take pictures!!
(Have to make up for that on my next flight)
Cheers,
== T.J.==
Ribbon Cutting Flight In A Cub
I say “his” because it is one of several planes that he rents regularly and the one that I was most intrigued by. This particular plane was a 1946 Piper Cub (NC98286) with 85HP and the most spartan panel I had ever seen!
When I saw this, I was excited to try a pure “stick and rudder” experience in this vintage airplane. There was no paved runway, no radio, no transponder, no electrical system. We even wore earplugs instead of headsets!As you can see, I sat in the front seat because the pilot in command typically sits in the back in a cub.
As we were cruising along at 60-70 knots @ low altitude, I felt like I was enjoying the raw essence of flight in much the same way barnstormers did decades ago. Then out of the blue, Steve gave me quite a surprise, which you can see in the pic below:
We then did a very smooth, spiraling dive to the left and clipped what looked like a white streamer with the right wing! It was more cool than I could possibly describe in words and something I could never do in a Cirrus!!
After that, we made our way back to Red Stewart airfield for a wild landing . I say wild because with no radio and no ATIS, we did (well… really Steve did) a mid field left downwind entry followed by a very steep forward slip to a nice, smooth landing on the turf. It was wild for me… But Steve later told me that it was a rather typical approach in the cub.
Cheers,
== T.J.==
Migration 9 Trip Summary
I have finally arrived in Colorado Springs and the journey was quite amazing!
It is hard to summarize a 4200 mile trip. (But here goes…)
Some of it what was “as expected ” ; Some of it reinforced how flexible you need to be on a journey like this. Between weather, customs formalities, spotty radar, icing, even the exact route was not as planned. You can see the “planned vs actual” route below:
The next day started mostly as planned Sioux Falls,SD > Bismarck, ND > Glasgow, MT.
As I made my final Preparations to enter Canadian airspace, the Canadian authorities (Canpass) informed me that the Kamloops customs was “Closed for the day” So I had to pick an alternate destination and chose Kelowna, British Columbia.
With a new destination, I entered Canadian airspace for the first time to find more surprises. While crossing the Rockies, Edmonton ATC informed me that radar coverage would be “lost over the
Rockies”, which was not very comforting! They gave me a frequency and told me to “try calling Vancouver” in ~ 30-45 minutes.(I am still trying to sort through the pix to make a Picassa album.)
== T.J.==
The Scenic Route to M9
As some of you know, this week is the 9th annual Cirrus migration, known as M9. While not as big as Osh Kosh or Sun N Fun, it is the biggest Cirrus event of the year. This year, M9 is being held in Colorado Springs. Cirrus pilots from around the country (and even a few from other countries) will be by flying their aircraft into KCOS for the event.
I wanted to make the journey to M9 memorable by taking a scenic route to get there. In addition, this was a great excuse to work on my 50 state quest. You can see my planned route in the video clip below:
It might be a bit ambitious… But this route should include stops in 7 new states and even a FIRST venture into Canadian airspace!
But every experienced pilot I spoke to about it, warned me that a trip like this requires a few things:
1. Detailed planning about routes, alternate routes, procedures, etc
2. A well maintained and prepared aircraft.
3. Flexibility DURING the flight
As a result, I’ve been planning for weeks… Looking at lots of charts… Making sure the plane was in perfect shape in terms of maintenance. Much to the surprise of the line crew in Tampa, I even made sure the TKS de-ice fluid was full while it was 95 degrees on the ramp in Tampa!
I am really trying to follow the advice …. We will see at the end of the week how it goes…
You can follow along in near real time on Flight Aware …. Or just wait till later this week to see my next post…(Hopefully I should be able to get some cool pix along the way.)
Cheers,
== T.J.==
White Plains and NYC Skyline
I spent this week in NY, specifically in White Plains, which is just on the northern edge of the New York Class B airspace frenzy. But more importantly, it is also the home of IBM Flight Operations. The IBM fleet consists of a number of aircraft, including Gulfstream 550s, Falcon 200s and even helicopters. As you can imagine, they have an enormous hanger to house this little fleet.
As you can see above, I was lucky in enough to arrange a tiny corner of the hanger to call home for the week. In the photo below, you can see me with the CEO’s G550 in the background.
Actually, the G550 is such an enormous and impressive plane, that my Cirrus could have fit under the wing.
Even more than the aircraft, the IBM Flight Operations staff are really impressive! They have several dozen staff on the crew and they run a “mini airline” with everything from full maintenance, avionics work, to catering, planning, dispatch etc. The entire crew showed me some incredible hospitality this week, which I truly appreciate!
The night before my trip home, I wanted to do a “fly-by” of the NYC skyline along the Hudson River. I had read about this scenic route in numerous magazines and was eager to experience it firsthand. There is an FAA procedure that has been established for this route that is very simple to follow.