1st solo IFR/IMC experience

We needed to get the Arrow to the avionics shop at another airport and
both partners are out of town. Gee, that means I have to fly the plane.
What, you mean skip work to fly, since the avionics shop is open
8-5…and the problem with that is...what? :-) Even better, it was a
Monday. What a way to start the week!

Yesterday's forecast for today was looking decent. Checking weather in
the morning though, it was looking like a 50/50 chance of needing to
file IFR. Hey, I can do that now! So I decided to get an IFR flight
plan on file and use it depending on current conditions when I got to
the airport. When I arrived at my airport, the weather was scattered
at 2200 and overcast at 3400 with visibility of 10 miles. Weather at
the destination was "Better than five thousand and five" according to
the ATIS". Hmmm, looking at the clouds in the general direction of my
destination though, it didn't look nearly as good. I decided to call
the McClellan AWOS. Overcast at 1100…no wonder it looks crappy that
direction. My next call was to the area E folks of the Norcal Tracon to
pickup my clearance.

I experienced a few butterflies as I'm about to depart and look over at
a very empty right seat. No CFII to bail me out. It was a similar
feeling to the first solo when you realize that it's all up to you…but
you also have the confidence of knowing that you can do this, you have
done this, just not with an empty right seat.

After checking in with Norcal, I'm in the clouds. Not solid clouds but
in/out of clouds pretty rapidly. At this point, the "Just fly the
plane" voice kicks in and everything goes well as I level off above the
overcast layer and below a scattered to broken layer. It's *very*
bright outside. Here and there I can see the ground as I cruise along.
I was offered the visual approach to 20 but opted for the ILS 02 with
a circle to land. Mostly, this was because I didn't yet know where the
lower clouds went from overcast to scattered. I also couldn't remember
at that instant exactly what criteria I needed for a visual approach…so,
opted for the ILS.

The approach went well and I flew through one last small cloud as I was
vectored to final. Picked up the airport at about 8 miles out, executed
the circle at minimums, got my first "Zero four tango, take it straight
to the numbers" right after I'd turned base (there was a citation on a
straight in, he opted for a 360 for spacing), and pulled off a pretty
good landing.

Apologies to MarkH. We'd planned to fly yesterday but canceled as the
weather was less than desirable. One of these days Mark, I'll actually
prove to you that our plane really does fly :-)

For any instrument students out there, keep at it. It's a ton of work
(you probably already know that) but when you can get some IMC under
your belt and have a chance to fly when otherwise you couldn't, it is a
really cool experience.

--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-Instrument Airplane
Arrow N2104T

"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the Earth
with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there
you will always long to return"
- Leonardo Da Vinci

(Remove the obvious from address to reply via e-mail)

On Mon, 13 Mar 2006 19:22:36 -0800, Jack Allison wrote:

I was offered the visual approach to 20 but opted for the ILS 02 with
a circle to land. Mostly, this was because I didn't yet know where the
lower clouds went from overcast to scattered. I also couldn't remember
at that instant exactly what criteria I needed for a visual approach¡Kso,
opted for the ILS.

Ain't life grand Jack!

Great post!

Now wait til you hear instead of expect visual, which approach do you
want?? *big smile*.

Allen
(who will be taking tomorrow off to get some air time in. N1943L for those
that want to track me on www.flightaware.com)

On 03/13/06 19:22, Jack Allison wrote:
We needed to get the Arrow to the avionics shop at another airport and
both partners are out of town. Gee, that means I have to fly the plane.
What, you mean skip work to fly, since the avionics shop is open
8-5…and the problem with that is...what? :-) Even better, it was a
Monday. What a way to start the week!

Yea, what a great way to spend a Monday .. or Tuesday, or ... ;-)


Yesterday's forecast for today was looking decent. Checking weather in
the morning though, it was looking like a 50/50 chance of needing to
file IFR. Hey, I can do that now! So I decided to get an IFR flight
plan on file and use it depending on current conditions when I got to
the airport. When I arrived at my airport, the weather was scattered
at 2200 and overcast at 3400 with visibility of 10 miles. Weather at
the destination was "Better than five thousand and five" according to
the ATIS". Hmmm, looking at the clouds in the general direction of my
destination though, it didn't look nearly as good. I decided to call
the McClellan AWOS. Overcast at 1100…no wonder it looks crappy that
direction. My next call was to the area E folks of the Norcal Tracon to
pickup my clearance.

I experienced a few butterflies as I'm about to depart and look over at
a very empty right seat. No CFII to bail me out. It was a similar
feeling to the first solo when you realize that it's all up to you…but
you also have the confidence of knowing that you can do this, you have
done this, just not with an empty right seat.

It was my first solo cross country that really hit me, as it was the
first time I had to work in the ATC system without the ability to be
bailed-out. Plus, I was having intermittent problems with my headset
at that time, making communications much worse ;-(


After checking in with Norcal, I'm in the clouds. Not solid clouds but
in/out of clouds pretty rapidly. At this point, the "Just fly the
plane" voice kicks in and everything goes well as I level off above the
overcast layer and below a scattered to broken layer. It's *very*
bright outside. Here and there I can see the ground as I cruise along.
I was offered the visual approach to 20 but opted for the ILS 02 with
a circle to land. Mostly, this was because I didn't yet know where the
lower clouds went from overcast to scattered. I also couldn't remember
at that instant exactly what criteria I needed for a visual approach…so,
opted for the ILS.

Very cool indeed.


The approach went well and I flew through one last small cloud as I was
vectored to final. Picked up the airport at about 8 miles out, executed
the circle at minimums, got my first "Zero four tango, take it straight
to the numbers" right after I'd turned base (there was a citation on a
straight in, he opted for a 360 for spacing), and pulled off a pretty
good landing.

Apologies to MarkH. We'd planned to fly yesterday but canceled as the
weather was less than desirable. One of these days Mark, I'll actually
prove to you that our plane really does fly :-)

or so you keep saying ... ;-)


For any instrument students out there, keep at it. It's a ton of work
(you probably already know that) but when you can get some IMC under
your belt and have a chance to fly when otherwise you couldn't, it is a
really cool experience.

I'm having a hard time getting through my club's IFR check-out because
I just can't get any time with the CFIIs. My next flight with them is
on the 20th, and still nothing scheduled after that (I think I'll need
3-4 more flights before they'll give me the sign-off).

I expect I won't see any IMC until next season. That's fine though, as
I can get a lot of VMC practice done in the meantime.

Great story, Jack. Congratulations on your big first!

You'll soon discover you'd rather fly IFR. Someone is always looking
out for you, it is simply an easier way to fly. More fun, too. The fact
that VFR people shouldn't be at your altitude is nice, that traffic is
usually called out for you, that you get nice approaches into busy
airports are all positives.

There are some negatives. Sometimes the cleared routing is a lot longer
than VFR, sometimes altitudes aren't as convenient either. I almost
always file IFR, and in VFR conditions find myself saying "Cancel IFR"
about 20% of the time for the reasons cited above.

My first actual IFR (at night, a long time ago) was a nightmare, but it
got more and more easy. You'll feel pretty secure after 10 hours as PIC
in IMC, and after about 50 or 70 actually be confident.

A couple of random thoughts: for a while your own minimums and
requirements for alternate airports should be a lot more conservative
than the regs require. When in doubt, stay on the ground or do a 180.
Flying in the northeast about 10% or my planned flights (usually
business which equals additional pressure) were cancelled because of
icing, thunderstorms, no solid gold alternate -- this in a Mooney 201
with 60 odd gallons of fuel aboard -- that's a lot of range.

FWIW, I liked to file for as high an altititude that winds aloft would
allow, it made flights from the Chicago area to New England nonstop
with lots of reserves.

Everyone has their own fuel management ideas. Mine is really simple.
I'd start up on whatever tank I was not going to take off on, taxi out
on the takeoff tank (now there's some evidence both tanks are sweet),
and fly away half that tank. Switch over, that would be maybe 90
minutes into the flight. It's worth noting that if the second tank had
gone sour there should have been enough fuel aboard to get back to the
departure airport. I'd fly most of the second tank away. No matter
where I was in the flight, even if my destination was only 45 minutes
ahead, I would land at the next available airport and refuel. I never
wanted to fly with less than 25% of the fuel still on board.

One other minor thing. Especially on homebound flights, if there wasn't
a reason to do otherwise, I always set the ADF to WBZ in Boston. The
ADF needle in effect became a second DG, and it always pointed toward
home. It makes things easier if the vacuum pump and therefore my DG
fails (that happened twice in my airplane!).

Welcome to the IFR club!