ChiefPilot
Well Known Member
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I took this picture last night while parked at the Little Falls, MN airport. What it represents is a weather diversion decision that resulted in an unexpected and fun flying adventure. I had been in Eau Claire, WI during the day for work. The storms which were originally supposed to arrive several hours after my return to South St. Paul, MN showed up early, however, and so I considered my options.
Not wanting to leave The Satellite of Love(tm) out on the ramp in Eau Claire for the storms to ravage sometime in the next hour, and having quickly decided that heading back to South St. Paul through the storms would not be a shining moment in my piloting career, I decided to head north then west around the storms. Seeing the storm from 30 miles away was pretty impressive, while doing 165kts and having several hours of fuel onboard along with nice VMC to the north/south/east was quite comforting.
My plan took me north towards Hayward WI, then west towards St. Cloud MN. Listening to the AWOSes of airports just at the edge of the storm was interesting. At one point, I think it was Cambridge MN that had winds from 150 at 43 gusting to 55 or something like that. Little Falls was well outside the projected track of the storm and was reporting little or no winds, and sure enough, when landing, it was dead calm.
I refueled (at only $4.90/gallon!) and parked the plane, then borrowed the courtesy car for a trip into town for some food. Came back to the terminal building around sunset and thought that these kinds of trips are one of the many reasons I built an RV so snapped the picture. Then I went inside, watched some TV, and took a nap.
When I woke up a couple hours later, the winds at KSGS had died down and the storm was well south and east of the Twin Cities. A super nice flight back with a nearly squeaker landing was the perfect end to a nice little flying adventure.
Keep pounding those rivets (and watching the weather). Totally worth it!
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