wrote:
: I often file IFR in both central Canada and the northeastern U.S. in my
: Warrior, and on long cross-country flights in both countries, I'll
: often be the only light aircraft talking to ATC in the sector. The
: main exception is when someone's doing practice approaches down below
: me, though once in a while I'll hear a piston twin or another single
: doing what I'm doing. You'll see a lot of IFR piston traffic (mostly
: twins) into places like Toronto/City Centre, though.

Yes, I would believe that in the eastern side of Canada there's more traffic.
I was pretty much keeping to the relatively unpopulated areas during the flight
(Plains of SK, AB and further north by BC). Closest I got was Edmonton Center (40 nm
or so). There was some traffic on ATC, but they almost seemed surprised when I called
them up. Even though I was entering their airspace, they seemed to just figure I was
transitional VFR and weren't even looking for me.

: In the late fall, winter, and early spring, IFR can be tricky because
: of the risk of icing, but the same is true for the northern U.S. You
: were flying across the northern Canada, where a lot of the traffic
: still goes on floats -- as you know, float plane pilots get nosebleeds
: above 1,000 feet AGL, so they can't usually make IFR altitudes and have
: to skim the treetops.

Yeah, I guess that makes sense. For all the same reasons IFR in light GA
planes in the midwest/northeast US is often impassable (icing and embed CB) IFR in
even the populated areas of Canada are often difficult. Sure seemed like scud running
MVFR was the rule of the day when I was up there. As far as your float plane comment,
that's pretty true. Heck, when I filed a flight plan in MVFR going to follow the
road, the *briefer* said, "Oh, you want the route of flight to be follow highway 43 to
Lloydmindster... OK." I can say I got some pretty unusual looks fueling up my Cherokee
in northern BC and in the Yukon. Things like, "Did they put the wings on your plane
on upside down?" One guy told me he'd never *seen* a low-wing!

Different flying world. A lot like Alaska... stepping back in aviation time.

-Cory


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************************************************** ***********************
* Cory Papenfuss *
* Electrical Engineering candidate Ph.D. graduate student *
* Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University *
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