Today was my first cross country flight and it definitley made an impression. I had planned a flight between my home airport and a place called Eagle Lake. It's a little airport smack in the middle of nowhere. I wonder if it was made solely as a destination for student pilots making their first cross country trips. My instructor tells me it was base for cropdusters at one time.
The airport is 50 miles or so away due west. I made up a flight plan counting up the mileage to various checkpoints along the away... It had distances to ground cues like road crossings and lakes or rivers in the area. I carefully planned everything taking into account winds that day, and resulting course corrections, resulting ground speeds and fuel burn. I say all this because I've done the whole flight planning exercise 3 times now. For reason or another I've had to cancel it resulting with replan. I can fly that route with my eyes closed now.
I showed up this morning and was called off due to weather. Dark clouds at 1400 feet and darker areas out to the west.
I came back later today (with a whole new set of calculations for the flight plan) and we called the weather briefer. He said there were storms to the south east of Eagle lake but they were moving slowly to the east and that we should be ok. We decided to go knowing that we might have to turn around due to that storm. I felt a little uneasy but I knew we had an out. There were substantial buildups of cumulus clouds out to the north of east and the ceiling was only at 4500 feet. It would be a fateful decision.
I got into the plane for the first time in a little less than a month and it felt good. It fits like a glove and I started it up ran through all the procedures like it was second nature. We got up into the air and I turned and set the course I had planned for. We called to activate our flight plan and started the egg timer. Our little adventure was about to begin.
As we flew along, the view was amazing. The visibility was only 7 miles and there was a haze making the horizon hard to make out so that made the whole thing a little unusual. The cloud buildups seemed to be all around us but they were well out of way. Except of course for the dark clouds out off to our left.
We proceeded to Eagle Lake and the checkpoints came into almost like clockwork according to my calculations... 7 minutes and there are those towers off to the right, 4 minutes and there is the lake off to the right. I was surprised at how well those predictions held out.
As all this happened that dark lines of clouds loomed ever closer. The clouds seemed to be at an altitude lower than ours and it looked VERY dark under them. I drank in the view. It was amazing to be up there around all that weather. Haze, towering clouds, and dark cloud fronts... beautiful but dangerous.
At 15 miles or so to Eagle Lake we decide to turn back. The storm is moving in our direction and although we probably could have made it in, the way back would have hairy. Ok, no big deal, I just initiate a 180 degree turn to the north and transition to the return flight plan. I felt pretty good about turning back. As we looked over our shoulder we could see lightning in the storm and we quickly decided we had made the right decision. As we came back our ground speed zoomed up to 102 knots. It was as if the storm was pushing us away.. I wasn't complaining.
We come back and we zip over my checkpoints like clockwork. I love it! My return plan had taken into acount a tailwind as well and so everything was fine despite the decision to return early. As we travel back to the airport the storms are chasing us. We find that at our home airport the weather advisory is reporting lightning distant in ALL quandrants! We hit a bit of rain and the cloud buildups were huge and EVERYWHERE. I circle into the pattern and set up for landing... and bit nervous about it. It has a good 10 cross wind and 45 degrees and this is the first landing I've done in a while. I turn a little early on final while still a little low but manage to save it by shallowing out my turn and bringing in some power. I land while kicking the rudder in a bit and though it was a little fast and my flare was a little late it worked pretty well.
We taxied quickly back to the hanger to talk about the whole thing.
First of all the storm had changed direction and speed within maybe 45 minutes. Not only that but a whole NEW set of much worse storms had popped up over our home airport. As we debriefed we heard the regular rumble of thunder to the west... the direction we came from. I could have spent the rest of my day at Eagle Lake if we hadn't have turned back. I then drove home in the heaviest storm I've been in down here. There was lighting bolts everywhere and I could barely see the car in front of me! A shiver went down my spine realizing how close we had cut it. With the information we had at take off we were go and IN ROUTE that all changed. In fact when we checked in told them our flight plan was closed due to turning back they said "wheew, thanks for checking back in, we were starting to get worried."
You were worried!!
Well this was all great learning experience and I'm glad I got to do it with an instructor and not just out there by myself. Besides, the view was tremendous. That is why I put myself through all this anway.
Here is a picture of the weather radar when I got home. We left from the area with all the red and were destined for that area with all the yellow. CRAZY.
