ScottSchmidt
Well Known Member
I'm new to the XM weather world using a Garmin 396. I must admit that my first flight with XM weather as it pertains to TFR's was not impressive. Today my wife and I flew up to West Yellowstone for the day to drop off a couple of friends and to fly around Yellowstone and the Island Park area. Checked the faa.gov sight last night and noticed that Dick Cheney is at his Jackson Hole home this week and there was a TFR over the area. Called FSS early this morning and they confirmed the TFR over Jackson Hole and also said that the TFR just north of West Yellowstone was recently lifted. This was a TFR for a fire. When I hopped in the RV this morning and fired up the XM, there was no TFR over Jackson and it still showed the TFR north of West Yellowstone as active.
I understand that we need to always call FSS but I would think that the most important piece of information that the XM folks should think about is TFR's especially presidential TFR's. For $50/month I was pretty let down today by their updates. Of course the in-flight TAF,METAR,NEXRAD,........ is really cool. Just showed the importance of always calling FSS before a flight even though you think you have it covered with your XM system.
You guys seen the same issues or was this an isolated incident?
Also heard something very interesting that happened to a Bonanza pilot who was flying near the Jackson Hole TFR. He was approaching Jackson from the south and was not even close to the TFR and was intercepted by a Blackhawk just as a precautionary measure and was escorted well around the TFR. Now this presidential TFR only included the airspace up to 3000 ft. agl. I was considering popping up to 12,500 on the way home and flying right over Jackson but after I heard that story it made me think differently. It actually made me a little upset that our military is intercepting pilots (and he knew about the TFR and was going to stay southwest of it) well outside of TFR's and escorting them even though they were not even close to piercing the TFR.
It is hard to imagine how much money is spent by tax payers just to have Dick stay at his Jackson Hole home over the holidays. Just think, there is a Blackhawk consuming over 100 gph, 24 hours per day over Jackson as we speak with who knows how many support people on the ground.
Anyway, those are my two TFR experiences today that I thought I would share. Hope you all had a great 4th of July! It was a great flying day here and was happy to have spent it in the air.
![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
You guys seen the same issues or was this an isolated incident?
Also heard something very interesting that happened to a Bonanza pilot who was flying near the Jackson Hole TFR. He was approaching Jackson from the south and was not even close to the TFR and was intercepted by a Blackhawk just as a precautionary measure and was escorted well around the TFR. Now this presidential TFR only included the airspace up to 3000 ft. agl. I was considering popping up to 12,500 on the way home and flying right over Jackson but after I heard that story it made me think differently. It actually made me a little upset that our military is intercepting pilots (and he knew about the TFR and was going to stay southwest of it) well outside of TFR's and escorting them even though they were not even close to piercing the TFR.
Anyway, those are my two TFR experiences today that I thought I would share. Hope you all had a great 4th of July! It was a great flying day here and was happy to have spent it in the air.