Better Day, Better Flight

When I flew in to Lakeview OR a couple of days ago I was lucky. Rain, snow, low ceiling and reduced visibility all conspired to make my arrival a real cliff hanger. Today was better.

Lakeview to Brandon OR S05 under cold but clear conditions.

Cranking up for the 200nm flight. It's zero degrees C and I'll need 10K feet to clear the mountains between me and the coast.

Nice to be able to see the scenery though. When I flew in vis was only 2 1/2 miles.

I read the briefing in Active Sky this time (I admit, for the first time ever) and things look good for the flight.

This and next two. Scenes along the route. Cold and clear. At ten thousand feet the OAT was -10* C and the cockpit heat was wide open.

Here we are. Not sure if you can see the PAPI lights out there yet.

After my last flight the one was calm and clear, just like the weather. Glad for it too.

The trip continues...

Key West to Cozumel

 This was a really beautiful flight scenery-wise.  Here, we're off from Key West's runway 9 and have turned back over the airport

 Still climbing for FL200 as we go over the cruise ships.

 That's Cuba out the left window.

 Approaching the Mexican mainland.

 The weather turned crappy as you can see out the windscreen and on the radar.

 Another glimpse of the mainland Mexico.

 We're landing on runway 05 at Cozumel so we've flown south and are turning back toward it.

Almost lined up to land now.

Made it--by the Skin of my Teeth

Sometimes things go well. Sometimes things change and you modify your plans. Sometimes you don't modify your plans and things go very wrong. But once in a while, once in a great while you find out that maybe, just maybe you realize you've been living at the foot of the cross. At least on that particular day.

Eureka CA to Lakeview OR KLKV

Early morning at Eureka and we're cranking up. The wx is scattered showers here but the forecast for Lakeview OR is less well. 2500ft ceiling and seven mile visibility calm wind but no rain or snow reported in the area.

So on our way we go. Me, Joyce and two friends. Full load for the 182 (in my opinion) since we need 9K feet to get over the mountains between us and today's target destination.

No problems. Lakeview is reporting 6 mile vis, 2000 ft ceiling and calm wind. Half way and things are...ok.

Seventy five miles out and now I'm shooting these screenies between snow squalls. Lakeview is now four miles and 1500 ft ceiling with wind 10 from 143*.

Would you have turned back or found an alternate this close to your destination? I didn't think so either.

30 miles and Lakeview is reporting snow and 2 1/2 mile vis and 1000 ft ceiling.

And I'm totally not lying or hedging here. This was taken seconds after I popped out under the ceiling. For me, I couldn't ever imagine doing any better.

Before reaching this point I had decided to fly the airplane in, not simply cancel the flight and scratch it off. I felt certain I was going to crash somewhere short of the runway.

Not the best landing perhaps, but any landing you can walk away from...etc.

Sometimes you feel that maybe--today at least--you were living at the foot of the cross.

Across the country part 2

 And now the rest of the flight.  You'll remember we took off from Portland, OR at 9:12am and landed in Wichita at 2:35 local time.  Actually we were in the air  3:23 but flying across time zones like crazy.

 So we took off from Wichita at 3:12pm local time all fuel up.  We climbed back to FL450 and settled in.

 It was dark by the time we reached the lower west coast of Florida.

 Passengers are snoozing and hiding from sight.

 Here we're on final to KEYW's runway 9 and can see a couple of cruise ships docked below.

We landed at 7:35 local time, the flight from Kansas taking 3:23 minutes also.  Parked, it's time to shut her down.