On 26 Dec 2006 11:06:07 -0800, "Robert M. Gary"
wrote:


Doug wrote:
The only situation that is deemed to be even slightly "ok" is to
descend from VMC down through a possible icing layer 1000' thick on
approach where you have weather report and know you can land, where
they are saying "light rime". That might be ok. People do it and get
away with it.

No, if the assigned altitude is still well above the MEA and warmer
air, its fine. Sometimes you have to tell ATC you can't decend to
12,000 but can take 8,000 if the MEA is only 3,000.

My experience with ice is you can't really predict it. If it's below
freezing and you are in a cloud or it's raining or snowing, you will
probably get it. And without a known ice airplane, you will NOT WANT TO
BE THERE!!

Yes, but once you start using your IFR ticket you'll find that you
either spend the winter on the ground or have the occasional ice
encounter. The trick is to keep outs available.

IFR?

As a student (with instructor) we stayed strictly VMC, but still
brought a 150 back looking like a popsicle. Coming in to land it was
warm enough to start melting the ice. The stuff was coming off in
chunks that were flying back and hitting the tail. It sounded like a
trash can falling over.

Michigan and the Great Lakes in general are known for lake effect
storms. They can pop up suddenly and be isolated of cover wide areas.
This was about a week or so before my solo cross country.

As luck would have it, A whole bunch of lake effect snow storms popped
up between Cheboygan and Traverse City on the solo cross country. Even
with a detour to the south I still got bounced around a lot, but that
exposure to ice and lake effect storms really made the cross country
much more relaxed than it would have been otherwise.

That was an interesting cross country. I had to refuel twice.

You need those "outs" even as a VFR pilot. People generally think of
weather changing slowly, but even watching as closely as I do I've
been caught a couple of times. In many areas the weather can go from
great to IMC in a matter of minutes. If you know the conditions you
should have a good idea as to the shortest way out and what
frequencies to use to make sure.




-Robert, CFII
Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com