Garmin 396 Weather avoidance..

Bob Gardner wrote:

Saw a revealing presentation at a NATCA controller's conference. They showed
a slide with several large cells being displayed, and indicated the position
of a 172 when the scenario began. The pilot told the controller that if he
could have a certain heading, he would be clear of the cell he saw on his
screen and could proceed to his destination. Unfortunately, by the time he
got to the geographical area which was nice and clear on his cockpit display
at the time he asked for the heading, the cell had moved directly into his
path with predictable results.

Do you have an NTSB report or an approximate date of this accident? As a
pilot of an aircraft equipped with in-cockpit WSI weather, I am interesting
in reading more of the details surround it.


--
Peter

No. The presentation was by the head man at the Air Safety Foundation,
though, and if you go to their web page you may be able to find it...or ask
them.

Bob Gardner

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
Bob Gardner wrote:

Saw a revealing presentation at a NATCA controller's conference. They
showed
a slide with several large cells being displayed, and indicated the
position
of a 172 when the scenario began. The pilot told the controller that if
he
could have a certain heading, he would be clear of the cell he saw on his
screen and could proceed to his destination. Unfortunately, by the time
he
got to the geographical area which was nice and clear on his cockpit
display
at the time he asked for the heading, the cell had moved directly into
his
path with predictable results.

Do you have an NTSB report or an approximate date of this accident? As a
pilot of an aircraft equipped with in-cockpit WSI weather, I am
interesting
in reading more of the details surround it.


--
Peter

This is from WSI's web page. Note the "near real-time" qualifier and
"mosaic."



Bob



"About WSI InFlight
The WSI InFlight system continuously broadcasts near real-time WSI aviation
weather information directly to the cockpit using a geo-synchronous
satellite service. Information includes current observed and forecast
conditions, as well as WSI NOWrad®, a high quality mosaic of the NEXRAD
Doppler radar system. WSI InFlight has complete, uninterrupted continental
United States signal reception at any altitude. The system features a
sophisticated 'high glance' value user interface that is easy to interpret
and thereby increases situational awareness. WSI aviation weather data is
provided on an 'always on' basis for a low cost, flat-fee subscription."

"Peter R." wrote in message
...
Bob Gardner wrote:

Saw a revealing presentation at a NATCA controller's conference. They
showed
a slide with several large cells being displayed, and indicated the
position
of a 172 when the scenario began. The pilot told the controller that if
he
could have a certain heading, he would be clear of the cell he saw on his
screen and could proceed to his destination. Unfortunately, by the time
he
got to the geographical area which was nice and clear on his cockpit
display
at the time he asked for the heading, the cell had moved directly into
his
path with predictable results.

Do you have an NTSB report or an approximate date of this accident? As a
pilot of an aircraft equipped with in-cockpit WSI weather, I am
interesting
in reading more of the details surround it.


--
Peter

Bob Gardner wrote:

This is from WSI's web page. Note the "near real-time" qualifier and
"mosaic."

Thanks, Bob. I am aware of the limitations of this and any downlinked
RADAR mosaic. In addition to Flight Service/Flight Watch, ATC weather
radar (where applicable), and eyeballs, I do use WSI for tactical (big
picture) weather avoidance. It is because of this that I was interested in
reading of the details of this particular accident.

There seem to be some vague details in the explanation of this accident
that I would like to explore. The fact that the accident aircraft was a
C172 (TAS 125 knots) and that it flew into an area of previously
convection-free activity suggests that the downlinked RADAR data were very
stale.

I certainly don't have the experience you have, but I have seen areas go
from no precipitation to level 5 precipitation in about 15-20 minutes. Is
it possible for a strong thunderstorm cell to mature quicker than that?

WSI advertises (at least when I first bought the receiver) that the radar
download would never be more than 4 minutes old. However, add to that the
"pre-processing" that they apply to the data and perhaps the picture is up
to ten minutes old.

With my WSI install, I have experienced numerous downlink outages (which
were attributable to both WSI system outages and installation problems at
my end) and significant delays in the data of up to 25 minutes, so I
learned long ago that this tool could never be used as a replacement to
active, on-board radar for navigating through a convective line.

It is worth mentioning that when the system was working and refreshing once
every four minutes, I did find the precipitation levels seem to match that
through which I was currently flying or that which I could see in the
distance.


--
Peter