Weekend Edition

By Peter Conant - I read somewhere that when you are flying an airplane, most surprises are generally not good surprises.

Things happen in a predictable, routine way on an IFR flight and any deviation or distraction from that routine immediately sets up a situation where our normal, calm, cool-hand Luke self-image is going to be tested. Maybe the surprise is a door popping open along with a chart being sucked out into the slipstream. Maybe it's finding rougher weather than was forecast. Or it could be a simple failure of a navigation device or a communications radio.

I've experienced all these and more in my thirty-plus years of boring holes in the clouds.

During my twin engine training on a night flight back from Block Island to Boston, my evil instructor failed an engine. Now we are in the dark, over the water, flying a one-engine Piper Seneca. My actions were instinctive: Tank selectors to on, boost pumps on, mixtures rich, check the magnetos, strong foot-strong engine, raise the dead: identify, verify, secure. The devious little imp had shut off the fuel feed from the right tank so with both selectors moved to on, the engine came back to life with scarcely a burp. Training and more training in specific events will save the day every time.

Last month at our Norwood IMC Club meeting we had a presentation from Pilot Workshops about picking up a load of ice in the clouds where none had been forecast. The scenario gave six possible choices including pressing on, turning around, spiraling down into an unidentified airport which suddenly appeared through a break in the clouds, heading to a tower-controlled field with an ILS and landing downwind, circling to land, or holding. The discussion and comments from experienced instructors was, I thought, invaluable. And the surprise of picking up ice on your wings is never a good surprise. There is no way to prepare for this, only to make rational choices when it occurs. Would I have been able to list and consider all my possible options at the time? I rather doubt it.

I've had five unexpected encounters with ice and the solution in all cases was to descend to warmer temperatures which I knew were below me. The worst was departing Iceland in a Cherokee Six, eastbound over the Faroe and Shetland Islands to Norway. We were loaded slightly over gross with our ferry tank, and the VHF antenna wires from wingtip to tail were the perfect small anomalies in the airflow to snag the ice soon after departure. Full power with no climb performance, back pressure only leading to loss of airspeed and a pronounced shudder as we approach the stall. Fortunately I was with a Norwegian Air Force pilot who methodically went through our options. We knew we would have to descend and fortunately were not yet over the mountains. With warm air flowing over our wings and ice melting off, life was good again.

My loss of an alternator and all radio communications in clouds over the Rockies was more disturbing and exposed a flaw in my situational awareness. I completely forget that the Bonanza I was flying with my family was equipped with a standby generator. Which would have helped enormously with the gear indicator lights, radios and VOR receivers. How could I have not remembered? What was I thinking? The answer is probably the effect of stress combined with fixating on a small part of the problem. I was surprised and didn't keep thinking. In future I resolved to touch all the instruments before takeoff as a reminder of what is available.

But perhaps my most recent surprise was in flying a Redbird simulator. Proceeding through the clouds to Worcester, MA the simulator suddenly would not respond to elevator or elevator trim imputs. We still had the navigation and engine instrument but needed to climb to an initial approach altitude of 3,000 since Worcester (ORH) is 1,000 feet above sea level. This was a system failure and not something planned. My experienced instructor, Radek Wyrzykowski, did some trouble shooting and discovered that with full power and full up trim, we could eek out a climb of perhaps 100 feet per minute. We kept at it and barely cleared the ridge while maintaining control. The simulator indicated that we "landed" without crashing, although not precisely on the runway.

I was amazed to re-experience the wisdom of some simple ideas. First, fly the airplane. Second, navigate as best you can. Third, call the tower and have the fire equipment standing by. And overall, examine your options and your available (though limited) resources. Thanks, Radek, for your example of professionalism.

Training for the unexpected can be easily accomplished in a simulator with an experienced instructor. But even the simulator can surprise you. What's important is to never assume you are out of options when things go kerflooey. You might just be stressed out. "Fast eyes, slow hands" is a good rule to live by when things deteriorate. Remember, there is no situation in aviation that you as a pilot cannot make even worse by grabbing the wrong knob or shutting down a perfectly good engine. If we were all as cool and nonchalant as we would like our passengers to believe, most surprises would not surprise us.

By Peter Conant - If you were to wander out on the west ramp of this Massachusetts airport, past the visiting Piaggio Avantis and Pilatus PC-12's, walking past the tie-downs of more modest airplanes, you would soon find yourself at the door to Hangar 10, a modest office building attached to a hangar which features Cessna Citations, Beechcraft King Airs and other "heavy iron". Poking your head inside and wending your way up the stairs to the second floor, you would see a Redbird full-motion simulator operated by Wild Blue, which shares office space with the president of IMC Clubs International, Master CFII Radek Wyrzykowski (which I pronounce vish a KOW-ski).

Around the corner is a small kitchenette. There is a door at the far end, usually closed, with no signage nor any indication of its use. I always assumed it was a large storage closet. Imagine my surprise when last week Radek introduced me to what lies behind it.

To find a fully outfitted radio station occupying a corner of the IMC Club headquarters was something of a shock: a room full of microphones, mixers and monitors (love that alliteration). On every Wednesday from 6 PM to 7 PM, Radek and his colleague Jon Roberts (known to us locally as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court) occupy their microphones for Plane Talk, discussing anything and everything to do with General Aviation, a term that in my view needs expansion and clarification for most non-pilots. Some define GA for what it's not: it's not the military, it's not the airlines, it's ...well, it's everything else!

Radek and Jon present a loose format designed to engage listeners and stimulate discussion through emails and live calls to the station, WIMC-DB (Digital Broadcast).  Their phone number is 855-647-2123 and their email is accessed through the "Questions? Click here to chat with us!" button on the website. Current issues relating to aviation are always presented including recognition on December 6th of the upcoming 70th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack (somehow "anniversary" doesn't seem like the right word...any suggestions?) and the resignation of FAA Administrator Randy Babbitt. Last week Radek's special guest was Chris, a new hire at Mike Goulian's airshow company here in Massachusetts. Radek's question: why do you like to fly upside down so much?

The show is easy to access. Not being a computer geek myself, I frankly had some trepidation about getting the direct radio broadcast over the internet. The reality was simplicity itself: just go to the IMC Clubs website, click on the IMC Radio button, and you are there! I'm reminded of Mark Twain's phrase, "I've had a lot of troubles in my life, but most of them never happened."

The show has over three thousand listeners from eight countries, including China, Egypt, Poland, the Philippines, Germany, England and Ireland. Radek describes the broadcast as "an open mike for the GA community". If you want to call in as free advertising to briefly describe your company, go for it. If you have a flight school anywhere in the country (or in the world, for that matter), you owe it to yourself to call in as part of their broadcast and brag about yourself. You'll be heard all over the world, with the United States and Canada being your primary listeners. It would be a good idea to contact Radek (radio@imcclubs.org)and let him know before Wednesday that you will be calling so that he and Jon can schedule you. Also, podcasts are produced within one minute after the show ends. You can download the podcast player and embed it in your own website for free. I mean, what's not to like?

Here's how Radek describes the operation: "Plane Talk is the only talk show in the world exclusively dedicated to the General Aviation community of pilots. During the program we present the hosts' opinions and commentary about current aviation issues and news events with a dose of humor. We have guests from different fields of aviation including expert flight instructors. You can email us or call us live with any aviation related question, suggestion, problem or opinion. This is a call-in show but watch out: you can call us but we can and will also call you!"

Our Transmitter to the World: Plane Talk on IMC Radio. Access is simplicity itself. Believe me, if I can do it, anyone can. Radek, Jon and I hope you can use the show to your advantage. If you're a pilot, a non-pilot (that pretty much covers all the bases), aviation enthusiast or someone just interested in learning something new, please contact us. After all, this weekly show is all about you!

By Peter Conant - Steve Cunningham is a pleasantly low-key flight instructor, retired but showing no signs of slowing down. His offices at Nashua Airport contain two simulators that he tends with a practiced hand. Steve is guiding me patiently into my first encounter with a Garmin 530 while I'm also getting the feel of the equipment. Looking through the windshield, I can see the runway environment in a 135 degree wrap-around view projection. And as I turn the plane to straighten out, the runway slews around to faithfully mimic my ground track. This is very cool.

The round "steam gauge" dials that I'm comfortable with are re-created here in an electronic display, sort of a glass cockpit but with old-style equipment. Which is fine with me. The HSI is a welcome addition to the DG and with the 530 off to my right, I immediately feel I'm flying something familiar. Gear, flaps, fuel gauges: it's all very convincing. I'm setting up for a localizer approach into Suffolk, Virginia. Practice approaches at any airport in the United States are available. Ceiling for this approach is set at 300 feet and visibility at a mile and a half.

After takeoff I discover that I'm tracking fairly well but over-controlling in pitch, with unintended excursions above and below my intended altitude. I ease the throttle back and the engine noise appropriately decreases. "It happens to everyone their first time" Steve explains, and then goes on to tell me that commercial pilots who fly every day can sit in this cockpit and track a localizer in a crosswind with turbulence and never have the needle vary more than one dot. And sure enough, when he adds in wind and turbulence  my localizer needle shows a full scale deflection. "In cases like this, I'd say a go-around is called for" he says tactfully. I try again and this time reach minimums in the general vicinity of the airport. But it's when I look up to find the runway that the simulator becomes the real thing.

I've been in the soup for about eight minutes but now the green of the earth rises up out of the fog. I can just make out the runway end identifier lights and the threshold while the runway itself is still shrouded in mist. The realism of the projection is so strong that I'm experiencing the same sensations as when I made my first actual approach to minimums. Transitioning to visual flight, I fly down the runway at 200 feet AGL and as the departure end appears I power up and raise the gear to initiate the missed. With engine noise increasing, I climb back into the klag.

Now I see what Steve means when he says he's seen pilots really sweat while flying the simulator, and he hasn't even added in the audio portion with Boston Approach in the background, vectoring and handling other traffic. The experience has been so realistic that I find myself with the same heightened awareness, concentration on my instrument scan while tuning out all other distractions as when I fly in actual conditions. This is so much more challenging than wearing a hood.

For pilots like me who are used to conventional cockpit instrumentation and dials, this is a great way to get acquainted with GPS technology in a familiar environment. The Nashua Simulator can be configured for singles or twins: what a great way to practice losing an engine in a Baron in low IMC! The approach can be frozen, the airplane can be re-positioned and the weather conditions set to any ceiling, visibility, wind direction and speed, and turbulence. This is an effective way for an instrument-rated pilot to maintain currency and proficiency, and it's cheaper than flying the actual airplane. The cost is $65 per hour for the simulator and $57 per hour for the instructor. IMC Club members receive a ten percent discount, so for around $110 per hour you can sharpen your edge with an instructor at your side and practice things you may never get to experience otherwise.

By Peter Conant -  Last week some colleagues asked if I could fly them from Norwood, Massachusetts up to Machias, Maine on the Atlantic coast for an early morning meeting. The airport at Machias is unattended and has only an NDB approach with a GPS overlay. Minimum ceiling required for the approach is 840 feet MSL. The airplane I would be flying did not have an approach-certified GPS. Low clouds and fog were forecast for our arrival which would be at 7 AM. Departing Boston at 5 AM would have meant wheels up before sunrise.

As it turned out, these colleagues decided to drive the nine hours to Machias since the airport lacked any means of local ground transportation to their final destination, and also since a diversion at Machias, which could have been well below minimums, would have put us into either Bangor or Bar Harbor. A wise move on their part. I did make sure however, before learning of the cancellation, to get my three takeoffs and landings to a full stop completed after dark so I would be night current. I hadn't done much night flying in a while, and the experience was instructive.

Night flying can be a beautiful thing, as it was on the Saturday evening when I flew after dark. An enormous orange harvest moon was just rising over the ocean, the lights of Boston were like scattered jewels on a velvet background, and the traffic coming north from Providence was jammed up at the Route 128 interchange with a string of taillights like Christmas decorations come early.

Three trips around the pattern are all that was required, but it pointed up how rusty I was. The first circuit required a lot of attention, since an airplane flown after dark can quickly turn into a very unfamiliar environment . Following standard instrument departure procedures when taking off with no visible horizon is a great comfort. By the third trip around, I was feeling like an old pro, even though I forgot a few things on the pre-landing checklist, like delaying flap deployment. Just reading a checklist in the dark is a challenge!

One of the many reasons I trained for and received an instrument rating many years ago was my inability to locate airports after dark using just my eyes and a map. This was in the days before GPS, and often I would ask for an instrument approach if one was available. I remember a time flying from South Dakota with my family to College Park, Maryland which does not have a published approach. The lights of Washington, DC and the beltway were hampering my ability to find the flashing green and white beacon. After circling fruitlessly (with my oldest daughter saying "Dad, ...DAD" and being shushed by my wife with "not now Becca... Dad is trying to find the airport) I finally I headed out toward the Baltimore VOR, which I had used in my many trips down from Boston: 234 degree radial, 16.5 NM To CGS. After landing, I asked my daughter what she wanted to say. "I was trying to tell you that we were right over the airport!" she piped up.

Flying however to a completely unfamiliar airport after dark requires real concentration. I remember flying with my wife to Kalamazoo, Michigan in a Piper Seneca after a long flight at night through snow showers over Lake Erie. I don't think I would have made that trip in a single. I could see the airport environment but somehow couldn't focus on the runway orientations. So I asked for the ILS, which was absolutely the right thing for me, being fatigued and weary. We all know the pilot check acronym "I'M SAFE" for Illness, Medications, Stress, Alcohol, Fatigue, and Eating. At the end of a long flight, finding my way into a strange field is not one of my strengths. Doubtless my readers will scoff at this. The one time I did impress my significant other was my first night landing at St. Augustine, Florida. The main runway is parallel to the coast and I realized I was perfectly set up on a right downwind, all without any help from grownups. Turning base produced some anxiety and then suddenly I was on a beautiful turn to final with the lead-in lights winking at me.  Afterwards my wife asked me how I did that since she had never even seen the airport. I replied that it helps to have a coastal destination with the runway orientation neatly aligned with our downwind course.

Now that I'm more comfortable flying after the sun goes down, I think I will do more instrument practice maneuvers after dark. The chatter on the approach and tower frequencies is reduced, the air is calm, and the visibility is amazing. I remember once coming back to Norwood after an AngelFlight to Newcastle, Pennsylvania. It was a clear, moonless night and I was flying an A36 Bonanza. I saw a light ahead of me, not moving, and asked Center if there was a plane coming toward me. The controller replied, "there's a single-engine Cessna about fifty-five miles ahead of you, same direction". Which I never would have picked up in daylight, that's for sure.

Now that it's getting dark pretty early, night flying is a great way to maintain instrument proficiency after work (with a safety pilot aboard, of course) while enjoying the remarkable vista that is afforded to all of us who are fortunate enough to be pilots.

By Peter Conant -  DG failure in IMC

Last week I received an email from an IMC Club member who related an incident during an AngelFlight where he had picked up his passenger in Tampa and launched into the clouds, only to discover after entering IMC that his directional gyro had failed. He presented a Pilot Workshop type analysis with his decision tree of options and factors such as weather between Tampa and Charlotte, fuel on board, and whether he wanted to shoot an ILS without a DG. His decision was to proceed without a DG to his destination, explaining to his passenger what was happening. As it turned out, Charlotte was closed due to weather when he arrived so he diverted to Columbia (I'm not sure if this was in North or South Carolina) and shot an ILS successfully with the help of the approach control facility. Strong winds on final made it difficult to hold on to the localizer without a DG.

Strangely enough, the exact same thing happened to me a few years ago on an AngelFlight from Norwood MA to Montgomery Country Airpark in Maryland. I was flying an older Cherokee Six with original instrumentation. My decisions were less rigorously examined since I was flying the return leg solo in VMC at the time and only needed to let down through a cloud deck into Norwood. Nevertheless, my experience and his experience got me to thinking. Both of us had a GPS unit on board. Mine was an older Northstar M3 which is approach certified but does not have a moving map. I am so used to monitoring the ground track readout and matching it up to the bearing to station readout that whenever I fly behind a Garmin 430 or 530, I'm more interested in monitoring the numerical information than using the visual course line, although the course line is great for giving a rough indication of where I am and what's happening.

In truth, partial panel exercises such as this should be practiced on a regular basis (as we all know, right?). I remember in training having my instructor cover the attitude indicator and timed turns were needed at one-half standard rate with the DG and turn coordinator. It wasn't a big problem, but I was under the hood and less stressed than if I'd been boring holes in the clouds. Losing the DG in real life was not all that stressful, but again I was in VMC at the time. I carry 3 x 5 cards in my shirt pocket which are useful in covering over the instrument dials, because with the DG spinning enthusiastically at perhaps 500 RPM it's difficult to just ignore it. So, covered over, the loss of this instrument is not a real problem unless you are trying to hold a heading with just the compass. The GPS "direct-to" function was my primary navigation instrument, and I still had the AI and turn coordinator. All in all it was pretty routine except when I had to descend through the clouds. If I had lost both the DG and AI... now, that would have been a bit more interesting. We all know the turn coordinator can bounce around a lot in even the slightest turbulence and is only a crude backup when the gyro instruments are lost.

Descending with the AI and GPS reference information was not a problem, but then again I was not shooting an ILS, since Norwood was good VFR below the cloud deck. The question that arises in this condition is which backup instrument would you like to have: a DG or an AI? The answer is pretty obvious, and indeed all the glass cockpit units always have three primary backups, either electric or vacuum: airspeed indicator, altimeter, and an AI. Without an AI, things can become very dicey. With one, especially with the addition of GPS nav information, the choices become much simpler.

I'm not certified to fly glass cockpits yet, but when I am I think the crosscheck with the backup instruments will be the first of my preflight duties. Because you never know. One of our IMC Cllub members in Massachusetts relates a complete electrical failure of his Aspen unit: no readouts, not a thing. When your backup instruments become your primary flight instruments, it is a good idea to have a GPS unit on board for additional safety if you are anywhere near the IMC portion of your flight. Even a VFR unit can give you reference and heading information which might just save the day. As an essential backup instrument, let me strongly recommend that we all fly IFR with a portable GPS.

By Peter Conant -  The directions I copied down from the friendly Air Canada pilots were to depart Iqualiut and head northeast until picking up the NDB at Pangnirtung on the north coast of Cumberland Sound. The southeast portion of Baffin Island is a three-toed claw, with Frobisher Bay and Cumberland Sound forming the three peninsulas which lead down to the Labrador Sea. This land is true wilderness. Only the eerie geometries of pingoes, those frozen uplifts of pressure ridges in the permafrost looking like tiny fields cordoned off by earthen berms, outcrops of rock and icy fissures passed beneath my wings. It was late afternoon.

One pilot told me to keep an eye out for an island near the south coast of Cumberland that "looks like a dinosaur" as a way of confirming my position. Well, there were a lot of islands. In fact, Canada is the county which has the greatest number of islands in the world. I'm here to tell you that ALL of them look like dinosaurs.

With good VFR I saw the gravel runway at Pang from twenty miles out. I flew to the NDB and into the inlet whose waterway would lead me to the gates of Ayuittuq National Park tomorrow morning. I was on the right downwind for the airport. Glancing to my right, I saw that the strip was pretty much in the center of town, with pedestrians walking across it. Lots of pedestrians. I had been told to fly a long downwind into the valley and turn base beyond the cliff face which hugged the far side of the runway.

Except all I saw ahead of me up in the valley were more mountains, much higher than the cliff face. There is something about flying into a totally new environment where one has a great respect for the terrain, namely mountains, and is reluctant to leave the security of an airport and a settlement to wander alone into a canyon in the hope that there will be a better place to turn around. So I turned right base.

I kept telling myself, "There's nothing difficult here- you're on a standard right base to final. Just don't overshoot the turn to final or you will find yourself uncomfortably close to that cliff face looming above which is coming at you pretty quickly. In fact, if you don't turn final RIGHT NOW you may find yourself in a situation that could ruin your whole day!" I understood why the Air Canada passengers who fly here in a Twin Otter always said they thought the wing tips would scrape the nearby cliff.

The landing was uneventful and gravel provides good natural braking. After parking off to one side, I wandered into the flight shack and was told "We don't get many single engine planes in here. Are you going to Greenland?" No I said, this was far enough north for me. I found a camping spot beyond the airport along the gravel beach with two other parties of hikers and prepared to settle in for the night. Except there was no night. The sun merely hugged the horizon in its westward travel. Wandering down to the shore, I found a few Arctic Char held on gill chains in the shallows. Enormous, beautiful fish.

Next morning our guide, a native Inuit with the odd name of Palimony, put us in his dory for the twenty five mile boat ride up to the National Park. We arranged a pickup time for a few days later, disembarked and started up a faint path toward the Penny Ice Cap, a remnant of the glacial ice which eighteen thousand years ago covered all of Canada and a large part of the United States. The valley I was hiking was a glacial excavation with huge amounts of gravel and sand.

Now, I know this is supposed to be an article to do with instrument flying, and I will get to that in a moment. The silence of the valley was absolute. Great blocks of ice were lying in shallow pools formed from their meltwater, brooding shapes of the most delicate blue. The strata of each year's snowpack was clearly visible with each layer a slightly darker hue than the one above. In the silence the melting drops of water were whispering a soft murmur as they fell into the pool and I was sure that a crowd of people was nearby, speaking very very softly. Of course there was no one. The silence, the whispering echoes reflected from the water and the ice, were like a greeting to this most wild and untended land.

Crossing the cold rushing streams of meltwater coming off the mountains into the inlet was a greater challenge than I had expected. There are stories of hikers falling in the icy torrent and being swept away with their heavy backpacks preventing them from regaining their footing. Two things I realized. First, doing this as a solo hike was pretty dumb. Second, I will always carry some sort of walking stick. Balancing in the stream in my tennis shoes (the recommended footwear to keep your hiking boots dry) was not the most calming experience of the trip. A third point of support would have made all the difference.

I camped out for two nights after having gotten beyond the cairn of rocks anchoring a rough sign: Arctic Circle, 66 degrees 30 minutes north latitude. Nearby was an emergency shelter with a radio to signal for help if necessary. There was a couple occupying the shelter with no emergency that I could see. What a bunch of softies.

The mountains of the icecap had been scoured and gouged by the enormous weight and burden of the glacier. A view of the remaining ice was like seeing your fate waiting for you just up the road. Who knows when the ice might again decide to resume its inexorable journey south, obliterating all before it? The landscape of the far north is a humbling reminder of our own rather brief time on this earth.

Flying back to Iqaluit, I had to air-file because the clear skies turned into layers of icy stratus. I climbed above them to eleven thousand, only to find that the ice I had picked up was now binding the ruddervators of the V-tail Bonanza. Right at the end of each stationary fin the control surfaces wrap over to complete the rounded tip. Very pretty to look at on the ground. But since ice forms on the projections and discontinuities, I was stuck now without rudder or elevator control. I stomped on the rudders and pushed the yoke as hard as I could. After a few tries, there was a satisfying lurch and the controls came alive.

It is astonishing to me that real untrammeled wilderness, the last unsettled region on earth, is accessible by air just a few hours north of New England. I will definitely make this trip again. But this time it will be in a twin-engine, high wing design and I will be in the company of fellow hikers. And I'll have my hiking stick with me.

By Peter Conant - Canada's Baffin Island is about as remote a destination as one can imagine. In summer, the Land of the Midnight Sun is never dark and the local Eskimos, or Inuit, shake their heads and smile at visitors who bring flashlights and compasses to this landscape. In the far north, the Magnetic Pole is so nearby that a map of the magnetic variation in the region looks very much like a nighttime photo of fireworks emanating from a central explosion. Except there is no nighttime this far north: more than two thirds of Baffin lies above the Arctic Circle, sixty six degrees thirty minutes from the equator.

My trip from Boston to Baffin in 1988 brought me initially to Sept Isles on the St. Lawrence River. I had tried flying north from there to Kuujjuaq (formerly Fort Chimo) in the late afternoon, somewhat tired, but after twenty minutes of flying in and out of cloud and looking down at the uninterrupted wilderness of northern Quebec I felt a bit unnerved. Nowhere to land safely in that terrain. Deciding a good night's sleep would better serve my purposes, I discovered that everyone in Quebec spoke only French. Fortunately for me, the words for taxi, restaurant (or "salle a manger"), and hotel are universal.

The next day brought me to Kuujjuaq, complete with an NDB approach in low cloud but with great visibility underneath. Parenthetical comment: In this month's Flying Magazine, Dave Hirshman and Tom Horne debate the merits of doing away with NDBs, non-directional beacons. Hirshman thinks that, except for flying in the remote and uninhabited regions of the globe, NDBs are a thing of the past and positively archaic. But the NDBs in northern Canada have a range of several hundred miles. These are not your local marker beacons but full-throated radio stations. I was glad to have the Kuujjuaq beacon faithfully send its Morse Code signal of dots and dashes during my outbound leg, procedure turn, inbound course interception and subsequent let down to minimums.

After refueling and exploring the nearby coastline, my next stop was Iqualiuit, formerly Frobisher Bay. As I passed over a powerful NDB, the Qaqtaq Beacon located on the northern coast of Quebec, I saw a gravel landing strip, probably there for servicing the beacon, since there was no settlement anywhere nearby. Except that the "gravel" consisted of stones no smaller than eight inches across. Definitely a place for tundra tires. Crossing Hudson Strait in August, with icebergs dotting the dark blue water, I had a spectacular view of Akpatok Island with its vertical walls and snowcapped plateau. My first view of Baffin showed long ropy sinews of rock, the creases filled with ice. Defnitely not a good place to have to land.  The sight was one of what the world must have looked like when it first began to cool. The peninsula of south Baffin still bears the name "Meta Incognita" from the days of the early explorers searching in vain for the fabled Northwest Passage.

Iqualuit tower had me fly a wide pattern and directed me to parking beside a group of Canadian military transports. The Air Canada pilots I spoke with were eager to give me their opinions of flying a single-engine low wing Bonanza into Pangnirtung, a gravel strip at the gates of Auittuaq National Park. "You'll get some nicks in the prop: make a soft field takeoff to get the prop above that gravel as soon as you can. And fly a long downwind leg, since there is a three thousand foot high rockface alongside the strip which will be staring at you if you turn base too soon."  Auittuaq means "the land that never melts" and although the flight there would last only an hour, I felt I'd covered enough territory for one day.

Next week: Pangirtung and a Walk through Time

I always like hearing from my growing reader base, now up to five. Contact me with comments, thoughts, criticisms, off-color jokes or what have you, at Peter@IMCClubs.org

By Peter Conant - To continue with my story of our trip twenty five years ago from Mitchell, South Dakota to Kalispell, Montana I first want to correct my recounting of the sequence of events which led us into the mix-master (this is to partially exonerate myself from having performed such a bonehead maneuver). Last week I was informed by my significant other that in fact I did not enter the clouds after hearing the Sigmet for thunderstorms, hail and tornadoes.  I was already well into the clouds and getting concerned about the growing turbulence, darkness, and rain when we heard the broadcast from Minneapolis Center. It was when I called to request a higher altitude (since we were already heading up like an express elevator) that I was told we would be through it in about fifteen miles. Not that this matters to anyone else but me, but I don't want to appear to be too much of an airhead.

After leaving Mitchell we continued on to Rapid City, where it was good VFR. Center informed me that I was perfectly lined up for nearby Ellsworth Air Force base and that Rapid City was a few degrees to my left. Humbling, that. Continuing on to Billings, Montana we got a good briefing for our first ever trip across the Rockies. Some clouds, light winds, good VFR below the bases. Remember, this was in the days before GPS with only VORs to track. After lunch, we again pointed the Banana west and climbed to ten thousand feet. All smooth and clear, with occasional wisps of cloud depositing the slightest bit of rime ice on our wings.

And then the alternator went out. I was having trouble hearing Center, picking up a bit more ice, and checking the VFR Sectional against the Jeppesen Enroute chart. I realized that with the slightest deviation from the CDI I would be straying close to the edges of the pass we were traversing. I hung on that Course Deviation Indicator like a tiger hunting a gazelle.

Letting down into Kalispell with good VFR conditions, I extended the landing gear and waited for the three green lights. Except that I didn't have any lights. The alternator and possibly the battery had given up. No problem: I had lots of experience extending the gear manually with the crank behind the seats. Except I'd never done it with the floor covered with dolls, toys, and water bottles. After a quick cleanup, the fifty turns brought me some assurance that the wheels were down and locked. I asked Kalispell tower to let me do a fly-by and have them check. Except I couldn't hear more than broken static.

Long story short, the gear was down and the landing was one of my best, trying to hold it off long enough to avoid the screeching of abraded metal. That's an exercise I would teach to any pilot of a high performance airplane, trying to land as though the landing gear was still retracted. And of course, through all this I had completely forgotten that the Bonanza was equipped with a standby generator. It's one thing to read about staying calm in an emergency. It's another to actually examine your options when you're in and out of clouds, over the mountains NORDO, and focusing on course guidance to the exclusion of everything else. Believe me, a real emergency will test your powers of coolness and logic like nothing else.

By Peter Conant - My family has fond memories of Mitchell, South Dakota. Known as the home of the Corn Palace, it's also the airport where we finally got spit out of the clouds after a wild ride across the Midwest. I write this in the hope that other pilots of small planes winging their way across the Great Plains for the first time can learn from the experience of more seasoned pilots who show great respect for gathering storm clouds across our nation's midsection.

More than twenty-five years ago I was flying my 1974 V-tail Bonanza with my family to Kalispell, Montana for what eventually became a spectacular vacation at Glacier National Park. I had left the family in Kalamazoo, Michigan where my wife and daughters were visiting family and friends while I returned to Boston for a project presentation. Flying back to Michigan the following morning (this is the important part) I passed between two thunderstorms just west of Detroit. Approach Control and EFAS both confirmed that the storms were strengthening but were still fifteen miles apart. I flew in visual conditions between them, watching the lightning and building squall lines but never felt more than light chop. This was the setup for a more interesting encounter that afternoon.

The plan was to meet up with the family at South Haven, Michigan and proceed on to Mason City, Iowa. The last leg for the day would be Mason City to Rapid City, South Dakota. A lot of territory was being covered westbound, with the knowledge that most weather systems are heading in the other direction.

After loading all the gear: dolls, coloring books, stuffed animals and new toys that had mysteriously appeared in Michigan, we departed for Iowa, skirting the south shore of Lake Michigan. Everyone ooohed and aaahed at their first crossing of the Mississippi as seen from the air. Mason City airport was in a classic middle-of-the-cornfield location. It looked like a great trip was shaping up.

After lunch we all traipsed into the Flight Service Station. I'd planned the hops to all end at an FSS to look at real-time radar and get the scoop from weather people who knew the area. We were getting a standard briefing from a woman about building thunderstorms over Wyoming moving toward Rapid City and were trying to figure what a good alternate would be. As she was proceeding through her spiel, her supervisor suddenly appeared, took great interest in her briefing, and then decided to take over. I was a bit surprised at the change of command, and suspected that it had to do with her supervisor wanting to play the Dutch Uncle to the young girls and their parents. Now I think there was something racial about it: the supervisor being a well-fed older white guy and the briefer being black. He poo-poohed the thunderstorms and assured us that we would have smooth skies all the way to Rapid City for our arrival.

Are you getting the picture here? An experienced pilot flying his first long cross-country, having encountered nearby thunderstorms earlier that morning with no ill effects, and attempting to digest the local information from supposedly informed sources. Now that I'm older and more blunt, I realize that this "social interaction" at Flight Service should have set off my warning horns, since it was clear this bozo was not giving us many details or specifics. "Trust no one" is not a bad lesson to learn as a pilot, provided you are still around after the experience to reflect on it. When you get conflicting information, who you gonna trust? Trust no one.

Armed with what was assumed to be local knowledge, I pointed us west after departure. The August afternoon had turned hot and humid. After about an hour we saw gathering clouds on the horizon and I was in the process of calling the Enroute Flight Advisory Services when a Sigmet was broadcast on center frequency: there is a line of thunderstorms stretching from Colorado to Wisconsin, tops to 50,000 feet, moving east at twenty knots, lightning in cloud, cloud to ground, wind gusts to sixty knots with possible tornadoes. Why I didn't turn back at that point will always be a mystery to me. I suppose it had to do with the fact that I'd just flown through a line of thunderstorms that morning! Hey, what could go wrong?

Plenty. Before the advent of XM Weather displays on our GPS screens, we only had the vaguest idea of where the systems were located and how intense they were. When we got into the front a lot of things happened very fast. First, the darkness. I read somewhere that in thunderstorm conditions you need to tighten your seat belt, turn up all the cockpit lights to guard against temporary blindness from the lightning, and don't try to hold altitude. Uh huh. That's the equivalent of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Next, the updrafts. We all know theoretically that the approach of a cold front produces rising air which lifts the warm ambient air to its dew point. Well, we were being lifted at a rate of 1,500 feet per minute. I requested a higher altitude since we had already left six thousand and were proceeding up to eight. When we got to ten thousand, I knew we had not made the right decision.

Then the turbulence. Unbelievable. We never saw any lightning, fortunately, but the turn coordinator was useless, the compass swinging wildly, and the Attitude Indicator was showing bank excursions of forty-five degrees or more. The family was pretty unhappy, with more than one lunch reappearing. This was truly one example of how it's so much better to be on the ground while wishing you were up in the air than the reverse. Altitude excursions of 2,000 feet per minute were not unusual. Center said we should be out of it in fifteen miles. At that point, I did not want to even consider turning around. I would classify the turbulence as Severe with occasional Extreme. On we went.

And the final touch, after we had flown through the worst of it and were beginning to see blue sky ahead, was the downdraft. I have never experienced anything like it since. We were flying along, relatively stable, and with no warning the Bonanza just dropped. Charts, water bottles, glasses, dolls and coloring books all flew up to the headliner as we felt the plane fall out from under us.  It only lasted a few seconds before we flew out of it, but my wife and older daughter turned pale and later were determined to have gone into shock

We spent the next day in Mitchell letting everyone recuperate. There was an indoor pool at our motel which served as a consolation and provided more fun than I had subjected us to.  Note to self: when flying with the family or anyone you care about, DO NOT attempt to penetrate weather where you don't know the local conditions and don't have a clear picture, from either radar or satellite, of the movement or strength of the system. In fact, since you presumably care about yourself, don't EVER do this. And it's not as though I hadn't heard the Sigmet. Better a day spent on the ground enjoying the sights than recovering from an ill-fated excursion into the unknown. I'm fortunate that everyone in my family still flies with me, after such a foolish choice on my part.

By Peter Conant - I am always amazed at the willingness of the Logan Airport tower to allow sightseeing flights over downtown Boston and even over the airport itself. While there are some risks in flying at twelve hundred feet down the Charles River and over the inner harbor, there is always a body of water close by where you could ditch if necessary.

For the last few years I have volunteered my time for a charity event I support, which raffles off two flights in a Cessna RG from Norwood for the winner. Young kids just love the idea of flying over their house and then seeing the sights- Fenway Park, Boston Common, Beacon Hill, the Old North Church- from the air, sometimes even piloting the plane themselves. This is such a rewarding experience for me that I recommend it to all pilots who want to show their non-pilot friends what the fun is all about.

The last flight I made was with a dad and his son, Charlie. Charlie was eight years old and had never been in any kind of plane before, and told me he was a little nervous as we were taxiing out. I told him there were no points being given for acting like a hero so we would just take off, circle the field and land, and see how he felt about the whole thing. I then casually mentioned that if he liked it, he would get a chance to take the controls. Immediately all Charlie's thoughts of nervousness were left behind. I had two seat cushions duct-taped together to make sure he could see over the glareshield. Takeoff on runway 35, turn crosswind, climb to pattern altitude, power back on the downwind: I ask Charlie how he liked it. The answer, of course, was "Wow!"

I had called Boston Tower an hour beforehand and was told to contact Skyways on a discrete frequency before entering Class Bravo airspace. As we left the traffic pattern and proceeded toward Boston University I received a squawk code and altitude restriction. It's good to call ahead: wind direction and landing runways may prevent Logan from accepting additional traffic. But this was a calm morning, which I always find the best time to fly, and the visibility was about 90 miles. Perfect.

Logan was landing runway 4, and over downtown we were asked to maintain visual separation from a United Airlines 757 on a five mile final. The idea of our flying above the jet, which was all of three quarters of a mile away on its slow descent over South Boston, was just amazing for Charlie. About that time I told him to take the controls if he wanted.
Charlie's dad, in the back seat, said "easy does it, Charlie." And Charlie was suddenly all business, concentrating on holding the wings level over the Public Garden. When I suggested he make a shallow turn to the left as we proceeded toward Fenway, he slowly and carefully banked the Cessna without my having to correct for the "overbanking tendency."  I showed him how to make a steep turn to the right as we circled the ball field, where a groundskeeper was mowing in left field. He made the turn while I held a little back pressure to maintain altitude. The tour was working out just as I had hoped.

After looking at Symphony Hall, MIT, Beacon Hill and the North End it was on to find Charlie's house in Braintree. After leaving the Class Bravo ("thank you for all your help this morning, Boston Tower"), we maintained the squawk for flight following with Boston Departure. I pulled out the Google aerial I had printed up the night before. When we found the house, I circled while Charlie and his dad looked and took pictures. There is something about looking at one particular house in midst of all the other suburban houses that seems, well... anticlimactic. It's hard to make out your own dwelling when there are so many others and since the view is literally a new perspective it is difficult to focus on just the one. People living in the country can get a much more vivid sense from the air of how their home, there by itself in the unspoiled terrain, relates to the landscape.

Charlie seemed a bit worn out after the intensity of piloting for the first time, so I headed for Norwood, checked the ATIS, got clearance from the tower, and made a decent landing. You've heard the old adage: A good landing is one you can walk away from. A GREAT landing is one where you get to reuse the airplane.

So what does this have to do with IFR flight? Only this: the procedures of tower control, radar following, holding altitude with different power settings, maintaining a continual "what-if" mentality for the inevitable engine cough or instrument failure, radio communication and navigation by positional awareness are all critical skills that can be utilized on any flight. GPS is a great positional aid and has probably saved many VFR pilots over the Midwest, where every corn field and section line looks pretty much the same. But basic skills always need exercise. A well-conducted flight in conditions where you have to get it all right, over a city with a major airport hard by, is incredibly satisfying and a good refresher for what we all do when flying in the clouds. The added bonus of giving a small boy a chance to see the world from a different point of view is just icing on the cake.

The City Tour: see if you can find one near your home 'drome to fly with companions. It will make your day.