The mission? Deliver Louise?s RV-6 from Houston to Virginia on a given weekend in January. The flight would be VFR, as I haven?t accumulated enough time with the new instrument panel to feel safe under IFR conditions ( and besides, IFR in the clouds in the winter frequently means ice?.and I just won?t go there!). The trick? Finding the right hole in the constant flow of winter storms sliding across the country this time of year!
I began looking at the weather about five days in advance. I had a reservation on Southwest for a return flight on the Monday MLK holiday, so that fixed my return, and the nominal plan was to fly up on Saturday, with Sunday as a contingency day. Friday was also a possibility as I was working shifts on Mission Control that days before that, and that ended Thursday at midnight. The weather pattern had the jet stream dipping well south, and the net effect was that moisture was getting picked up down in the western gulf, developing into rain over south Texas, then being flung to the northeast to interact with cold air dropping down out of the north. The result was several fast-moving storms along the route, with a separation of about a day and a half.
The direct route takes me north of Birmingham (AL, then over Chattanooga, Roanoke, and into the D.C. area. This takes me over the hills and mountains of the east, which is fine in the summer, but in the winter, those hills tend to be the boundary of ice and snow. So my strategy was going to be to stay a little more southerly, avoiding both the higher terrain and the colder precipitation. Of course, since I was planning on gong VFR, I wasn?t going to be getting into any areas of significant weather anyway, and certainly I didn?t want to get stuck in the hills with low ceilings. This was somewhat problematic as the showers tended to linger over the southeast after crossing eastern spine. So deviating north would put me in the air behind the frontal systems, deviating south potentially put me into IFR conditions (or low altitude scud running), and going right up the spine invited encounters with freezing precipitation (due to forced higher altitudes). This is where the timing became critical.
What I needed was a ?weather Window? to ?surf? one of the breaks between the storms, since they were only about 24 hours long, and I didn?t want to get caught at night since the recent history showed fog formation in Virginia after sunset. As I watched the weather on Wednesday and Thursday, it looked like there was going to be a break starting late Friday, with the weather at the destination end acceptable on Saturday, but the departure weather being a problem that morning. I went to bed Thursday night thinking that Saturday would be the best option, but decided to get up early on Friday to have a peak.
Sure enough, I got up at sunrise on Friday and saw wet ground and an overcast. Figuring that the predicted lowered ceilings and rain had gotten to Houston earlier than expected, I decided it was going to be Sunday (predicted clear), and to catch another hour of sleep. When I got up at 0800 and checked the weather, I was surprised to see that while there were a few showers around Houston and to the southwest (much of it virga), the ceilings were up around 7,000 and the visibilities were 10+. Better than that, the weather from Central Louisiana on east was clear , with great visibility, and winds aloft directly on my tail! The only hitch was the weather moving in from the southwest.
I grabbed my flying gear and a spare set of clothes and headed for the airport. When I got there, I saw a few low wisps of clouds beginning to blow into the area, so I loaded quickly, started up and headed east. Sure enough, the weather to the west was looking pretty dark, but I had a good shot over to the east. The XM confirmed that I was indeed heading to clearing weather. I made a quick turn stop for fuel at Winnie, just before Beaumont, and then took off again below the thin layer of clouds that had formed up at 1500?. Being very familiar with the area, it didn?t bother me to scud run (the visibility was a good 50 miles) for a little ways, as I knew that by the time I got to Lake Charles, the reports were for the overcast to be up at 10,000?. If I?d wanted to go IFR, the whole departure would have been a non-event, as the weather in the clouds was fine. The problem with the lower altitude was headwinds ? about 25-30 knots of headwinds! Fortunately, the low stuff ended just as predicted, and the headwinds changed to tailwinds as I climbed though 4,000?.
The standard plan when I fly the Val on this route is a single stop at Jasper, AL, but with the -6?s slightly smaller tanks, Louise and I like to plan for a three-hop, with two equally spaced stops. Planning accordingly, and climbing up to 9,500?, I was headed for some little town about a third of the way, but as the tailwind picked up and the groundspeed increased, it was obvious that I could change to my RV-8 plan and get in to KJFX with almost two hours fuel. I changed flight plans accordingly, and checked the winds up ahead again ? right on the tail, and just as Weathermeister had promised ? increasing to 60+ knots as I got into Virginia! I used the time enroute to play with the new Dynon units we had installed in the panel, and to get a better feel for their capability. I muse admit that I missed some of the useful integrated Nav features of my GRT, but coupled to the 396 which acted as my moving map and planning aid, the essentials were there ? especially fuel state, including fuel remaining at the next waypoint (which was also my destination).
The fuel stop at Jasper was quick, and since I didn?t have oxygen aboard, I climbed to 11,500 and ?settled? for tailwinds of 50 to 60 knots. I could have gotten more at altitude, but didn?t want to deal with the hassles of carrying my portable O2 system back on the airlines. Even at 11,500, I was seeing ground speeds in the high 220?s almost all the way, which seemed sufficient, promising a total flight time of right at 6 hours. Not bad for Houston to the Nation?s Capitol in a single engine plane. By contrast, my return flight on Southwest, with a 1+20 layover in Chicago took six and a half hours block to block ? and the door to door time on the 737 was almost two hours longer than flying it myself. Once again, the XM weather proved invaluable, as I could see that I had no problems ahead, the rain to the southeast was moving to the south, and my departure from Houston was stress-free because I could see that the weather just got better the farther east I went.
Another safe trip, mission accomplished due in large part to the speed and range of the RV and the information available with GPS, glass panels, and satellite downlinks. Information is, as always, power ? it takes away the fear of what might be ahead, and gives you the confidence you need to proceed. As I slid down the imaginary glide slope displayed as a descent to Shannon airport, I was clocking in 250+ knots groundspeed and as I slowed to enter downwind, the 396 switched to night mode as it computed that the sun had set. ?Mikey? was back at home with Louise, and it becomes her turn to learn the intricacies of a more complex and capable airplane.
I began looking at the weather about five days in advance. I had a reservation on Southwest for a return flight on the Monday MLK holiday, so that fixed my return, and the nominal plan was to fly up on Saturday, with Sunday as a contingency day. Friday was also a possibility as I was working shifts on Mission Control that days before that, and that ended Thursday at midnight. The weather pattern had the jet stream dipping well south, and the net effect was that moisture was getting picked up down in the western gulf, developing into rain over south Texas, then being flung to the northeast to interact with cold air dropping down out of the north. The result was several fast-moving storms along the route, with a separation of about a day and a half.
The direct route takes me north of Birmingham (AL, then over Chattanooga, Roanoke, and into the D.C. area. This takes me over the hills and mountains of the east, which is fine in the summer, but in the winter, those hills tend to be the boundary of ice and snow. So my strategy was going to be to stay a little more southerly, avoiding both the higher terrain and the colder precipitation. Of course, since I was planning on gong VFR, I wasn?t going to be getting into any areas of significant weather anyway, and certainly I didn?t want to get stuck in the hills with low ceilings. This was somewhat problematic as the showers tended to linger over the southeast after crossing eastern spine. So deviating north would put me in the air behind the frontal systems, deviating south potentially put me into IFR conditions (or low altitude scud running), and going right up the spine invited encounters with freezing precipitation (due to forced higher altitudes). This is where the timing became critical.
What I needed was a ?weather Window? to ?surf? one of the breaks between the storms, since they were only about 24 hours long, and I didn?t want to get caught at night since the recent history showed fog formation in Virginia after sunset. As I watched the weather on Wednesday and Thursday, it looked like there was going to be a break starting late Friday, with the weather at the destination end acceptable on Saturday, but the departure weather being a problem that morning. I went to bed Thursday night thinking that Saturday would be the best option, but decided to get up early on Friday to have a peak.
Sure enough, I got up at sunrise on Friday and saw wet ground and an overcast. Figuring that the predicted lowered ceilings and rain had gotten to Houston earlier than expected, I decided it was going to be Sunday (predicted clear), and to catch another hour of sleep. When I got up at 0800 and checked the weather, I was surprised to see that while there were a few showers around Houston and to the southwest (much of it virga), the ceilings were up around 7,000 and the visibilities were 10+. Better than that, the weather from Central Louisiana on east was clear , with great visibility, and winds aloft directly on my tail! The only hitch was the weather moving in from the southwest.
I grabbed my flying gear and a spare set of clothes and headed for the airport. When I got there, I saw a few low wisps of clouds beginning to blow into the area, so I loaded quickly, started up and headed east. Sure enough, the weather to the west was looking pretty dark, but I had a good shot over to the east. The XM confirmed that I was indeed heading to clearing weather. I made a quick turn stop for fuel at Winnie, just before Beaumont, and then took off again below the thin layer of clouds that had formed up at 1500?. Being very familiar with the area, it didn?t bother me to scud run (the visibility was a good 50 miles) for a little ways, as I knew that by the time I got to Lake Charles, the reports were for the overcast to be up at 10,000?. If I?d wanted to go IFR, the whole departure would have been a non-event, as the weather in the clouds was fine. The problem with the lower altitude was headwinds ? about 25-30 knots of headwinds! Fortunately, the low stuff ended just as predicted, and the headwinds changed to tailwinds as I climbed though 4,000?.
The standard plan when I fly the Val on this route is a single stop at Jasper, AL, but with the -6?s slightly smaller tanks, Louise and I like to plan for a three-hop, with two equally spaced stops. Planning accordingly, and climbing up to 9,500?, I was headed for some little town about a third of the way, but as the tailwind picked up and the groundspeed increased, it was obvious that I could change to my RV-8 plan and get in to KJFX with almost two hours fuel. I changed flight plans accordingly, and checked the winds up ahead again ? right on the tail, and just as Weathermeister had promised ? increasing to 60+ knots as I got into Virginia! I used the time enroute to play with the new Dynon units we had installed in the panel, and to get a better feel for their capability. I muse admit that I missed some of the useful integrated Nav features of my GRT, but coupled to the 396 which acted as my moving map and planning aid, the essentials were there ? especially fuel state, including fuel remaining at the next waypoint (which was also my destination).
The fuel stop at Jasper was quick, and since I didn?t have oxygen aboard, I climbed to 11,500 and ?settled? for tailwinds of 50 to 60 knots. I could have gotten more at altitude, but didn?t want to deal with the hassles of carrying my portable O2 system back on the airlines. Even at 11,500, I was seeing ground speeds in the high 220?s almost all the way, which seemed sufficient, promising a total flight time of right at 6 hours. Not bad for Houston to the Nation?s Capitol in a single engine plane. By contrast, my return flight on Southwest, with a 1+20 layover in Chicago took six and a half hours block to block ? and the door to door time on the 737 was almost two hours longer than flying it myself. Once again, the XM weather proved invaluable, as I could see that I had no problems ahead, the rain to the southeast was moving to the south, and my departure from Houston was stress-free because I could see that the weather just got better the farther east I went.
Another safe trip, mission accomplished due in large part to the speed and range of the RV and the information available with GPS, glass panels, and satellite downlinks. Information is, as always, power ? it takes away the fear of what might be ahead, and gives you the confidence you need to proceed. As I slid down the imaginary glide slope displayed as a descent to Shannon airport, I was clocking in 250+ knots groundspeed and as I slowed to enter downwind, the 396 switched to night mode as it computed that the sun had set. ?Mikey? was back at home with Louise, and it becomes her turn to learn the intricacies of a more complex and capable airplane.
