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Final Approach
Moved from the other thread to avoid threadjack.
Long story short: I decided no-go. I called ZOB and took myself off the schedule, and drove away. Then I had second thoughts. Why did I do that? True, it would not have been fun. I probably would not have been able to land at LPR. But I had plenty of outs. Both KSKY and KPCW have crosswind runways, and PCW even has a decent restaurant! I had full tanks and it is only an hour flight over there, more likely 45-50 minutes or so with the tailwind. There is no way I would be in the OP's do or die situation. I rationalized that I really didn't want to go through the trouble if I wasn't going to be able to attend the seminar.
I think I was lying to myself though.
I think the real problem is that I'm still a little spooked by the time I waited to go around at 3DA until it was unsafe to do so, and barely missed the trees. Granted, 3DA is a fairly short runway, LPR is nearly a mile. But I've gotten so patient with my landings that I'm no longer 100% confident that I can recognize when one is beyond salvaging.
I think I'm afraid of getting in over my head as Mari says. I'm not really sure what to do about it either. I don't really have a good instructor who is proficient enough in the Cardinal for me to trust him. My CFII has just barely enough Cardinal RG time to meet the OPW, and none of that is recent. There's a good chance that if I got in trouble, he might save my skin but wind up pranging the plane. Not a good risk methinks.
A very timely point for me personally! Today I was faced with a go/no-go decision because of winds, and only winds. Based on every other consideration, it was a go -- the weather was clear and a million, perfect VFR and from the flatness of the few CU, probably fairly smooth above the surface friction zone. I was registered for Operation Raincheck at Cleveland Center and was filed down to KLPR. But the forecast winds (KCLE) were 36015G25KT, the runway is 7/25, and actual wind reports at LPR were pretty consistently 010 to 020 at 15-20 gusting to 25-30. Home at KVLL it was more like 10 gusting to 20, straight across the 9/27 runway on average but varying from 320 to 050. One Bonanza landing at VLL suddenly stalled in from 10 AGL due to wind shear.The real problem is exceeding what you think you can do by getting in over your head. Even professionals do that sometime.
Long story short: I decided no-go. I called ZOB and took myself off the schedule, and drove away. Then I had second thoughts. Why did I do that? True, it would not have been fun. I probably would not have been able to land at LPR. But I had plenty of outs. Both KSKY and KPCW have crosswind runways, and PCW even has a decent restaurant! I had full tanks and it is only an hour flight over there, more likely 45-50 minutes or so with the tailwind. There is no way I would be in the OP's do or die situation. I rationalized that I really didn't want to go through the trouble if I wasn't going to be able to attend the seminar.
I think I was lying to myself though.
I think the real problem is that I'm still a little spooked by the time I waited to go around at 3DA until it was unsafe to do so, and barely missed the trees. Granted, 3DA is a fairly short runway, LPR is nearly a mile. But I've gotten so patient with my landings that I'm no longer 100% confident that I can recognize when one is beyond salvaging.
I think I'm afraid of getting in over my head as Mari says. I'm not really sure what to do about it either. I don't really have a good instructor who is proficient enough in the Cardinal for me to trust him. My CFII has just barely enough Cardinal RG time to meet the OPW, and none of that is recent. There's a good chance that if I got in trouble, he might save my skin but wind up pranging the plane. Not a good risk methinks.