Bravo Zulu Aviation

This past Friday I had planned to use my shiny new complex endorsement to fly with my wife up to Maine in our club Arrow. My early preflight planning showed the ugly weather that had passed through upstate New York earlier in the day had not made as much progress east as I hoped it would. The TAF at PWM (Portland Jetport) showed a stubborn overcast layer at around 3-400 feet. I looked at some other airports nearby and realized that my sister-in-law was driving near an airport near Boston that was showing a little better weather. So I picked my wife up in Syracuse and hit the sky with the goal of Minuteman Airfield (6B6) where her sister was waiting to drive us the rest of the way.

The first part of the flight was beautiful. Smooth air awaited us up high (9500′) and a tailwind boosted our groundspeed to 165-178KTS…great! This lasted for the first 100 miles of the flight.  Just as we entered eastern Mass however, a low overcast layer crept underneath us. I did some math for fuel planning purposes and concluded that we had plenty of fuel to fight the tailwind back if were not able to find a hole through the clouds at our destination.  30NM from 6B6 I stepped it down to around 5000′ to try to pick my way down.  Unfortunately the overcast was solid. I monitered the AWOS/ASOS at all of the nearby airports and discovered that BED was calling only a low broken layer. I arranged a clearance into the Boston Class B to have a look. A couple of pilots on the frequency in bigger faster airplanes piped up with their advice that there was no hole over Bedford.

Some pilots choose to never put themselves in the situation of having to make difficult decisions. I feel that you should be able to make the smart decision in any situation. This is possible if you identify what external pressures might push you towards an unsafe decision.  I had people waiting, a passenger who was more than happy to get on the ground, and the personal desire to get there. All of these can be hazardous if you allow them to sway your decision.  The weather at Minuteman was above the minimums for the NDB/GPS-A approach. I had the current approach plates, an IFR capable airplane, and have done 18 approaches in the last six months. So when Boston approach asked my intentions and if I was IFR capable…what was my answer?

Negative.

I still do not have an instrument rating. I had a number of great, safe options to descend through the overcast layer between our beautiful blue sky above and the runway below, but no legal way to do it. So I did what I was able to do as a VFR only private pilot: Turned west, thanked Boston approach for their help and went on my merry way.

I took this opportunity to check out an airport near my little sister’s home in Troy, NY. I managed to stick a great landing where the numbers once were on this run-down strip in Rensselaer. 5B7 is a cute little airport set in the hills near the NY/VT border. Make sure your first landing here is during the day! Trees on both ends and a runway that could use some love kept me on my toes. The Arrow proved to be a great short field performer as well as a traveling airplane.  We had just enough time to give my sister a hug before we headed back to Syracuse for the evening.

I hope to have my instrument ticket by the end of this month and I look forward to a little bit more flexibility for family trips. We may have missed a great reunion in Maine this weekend, but we’ll make the next one…

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