Thunderstorm avoidance

dmccormack said:
NY ATC is da best!B)

Even Manhattan has become -- I dunno -- civil?:dunno:

When I drive in Manhattan I'm still poised to do battle. Then some cabbie waves me ahead....

Now the LIE....:eek:
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I've never gotten a cabbie to wave me ahead. In fact, one keyed my truck last year, while I was in it. Go figure. Of course, I'd just gotten it painted about two weeks prior.

Interesting, back in September after I bought my current truck (Ford Excursion, black with tinted windows) I was driving to go pick up a friend. I was wearing a black shirt with sunglasses, and had my ****ed off going into battle face on. When my friend got in the truck she said "You looked REALLY intimidating and frightening driving up." I laughed... I have a hard time believing I look intimidating or frightening to anybody.
 
gprellwitz said:
No, Chicago PEOPLE are good; it's Chicago Approach that's bad.
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Ugh... Don't get me started. There's a handful of Chicago people, yourselves included, that are good. The rest... :mad:

And the funny thing is that we talk so much crap about Chicago Approach that it seems the Chicago Center guys have a complex about it - I seem to have to reassure them that Chicago *Center* does a GREAT job!

I also got super-duper-excellent service from NY Center last fall when I had an in-flight issue. They were great. Never had the pleasure of talking to NY approach, but I've heard of them letting people into the Bravo, which Chicago can't seem to figure out. (Literally - A CFI of mine tried to go to ORD VFR a few months ago and they didn't even know what to do with him - They kept handing him from Approach to Tower and back, 6 frequencies later he finally had to tell them how to handle a VFR flight... Scary.)
 
tlglenn said:
I began an IPC once on a day where the winds aloft were 34 knots and the surface winds were gusting to 20+ knots. My CFII and I were at the airplane when two guys (including a CFI) wandered over from a nearby flight school wondering who would try to go flying under those conditions. I mentioned that it was an IPC and a day like that would be good practice for me. The other CFI said that you usually don't encounter windy conditions like this in IMC. After they wandered off my CFII, who has plenty of real world experience, had his own comment to add.
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If most of your instrument experience is in the training environment and you avoid windy days for training, chances are you'd conclude that you usually don't encounter windy conditions in IMC. As your savvy CFII must have pointed out this doesn't match the real world IMC experience.
 
A caveat....

It all depends on the pilot. Not every IFR pilot is going to launch when winds are gusting, ceilings are low, ice is in the clouds, turbulence is moderate to severe -- the works, since each pilot (and therefore CFI with each student) should be establishing and constantly evaluating his/her personal minimums.

Not every airplane or every pilot (or combination thereof) is up to flying "the works," and the smart pilot will know when he/she is reach a threshold, and avoid crossing the line until all the ducks are in a row.

Certainly we all need to expand our envelopes, and thus the ever present tension between personal mins and the envelope of latent/inherent ability.
 
Ted, just a short one. You need TWO of these THREE to do good XC work in a piston GA a/c:

(1) Ability to go HIGH e.g, turbochargers, oxygen, or pressure.
(2) Radar
(3) Stormscope

XM is still not a tactical tool. You can do Strategy via second com to 122.0 if you dont' trust XM. HIGH allows you to do the eyeball thing and get the big picture.
 
bbchien said:
Ted, just a short one. You need TWO of these THREE to do good XC work in a piston GA a/c:

(1) Ability to go HIGH e.g, turbochargers, oxygen, or pressure.
(2) Radar
(3) Stormscope

XM is still not a tactical tool. You can do Strategy via second com to 122.0 if you dont' trust XM. HIGH allows you to do the eyeball thing and get the big picture.
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I don't know any GA IFR pilots locally that have Stormscope and Radar. The few Radar-equipped a/c around are corporate birds.

I think "tactical" is whatever happens after launch -- the strategic is the thinking and planning that happens on the ground.

I used XM and StormScope today on a 3 hour XC from Northern NY (PTD) to Pittsburgh (FWQ). XM showed where the cells had been, where they were headed, and at what rate.

StormScope verified the CB, and FSS helped confirm that analysis (it's free and never too busy, though sometimes FW can be out of range).

I was in the clouds or between layers for the first 1.5 hours, then on top at 10,000 the next hour until the IAF, then back into the clouds for the approach.

I made the strategic decisions last night after an Outlook brief. We planned to leave around 1200Z to avoid the convective activity and the local TC that would be along the route of flight by late morning, deal with the low vis and low ceiling on takeoff, and arrive before Scattered CBs appeared in th Pittsburgh area in the afternoon.

Once airborne, the XM + StormScope + FlightWatch provided the information needed to make slight deviations to avoid precip and cells.
 
dmccormack said:
I think "tactical" is whatever happens after launch -- the strategic is the thinking and planning that happens on the ground.
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I think people are defining "tactical" differently. To me, "strategic" is figuring out the general area where storms exist, even after you are airborne. Seems like XM and Stormscope would be good tools for this. "Tactical" is picking your way through the cells which seems like what the OP was trying to do.
Aztec Driver said:
I don't go looking for thunderstorms, and I usually steer well clear of them, but I sometimes clear them by just a few miles, which is what I was trying to do that night.
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In my mind, XM is not accurate enough for that, the only thing that is, really, is onboard radar. Even that can bite you.

My experience has been almost exclusively with onboard radar so I may be biased. I have flown an airplane with uplink weather, similar to XM, maybe twice in my life, and the only airplane I flew with Stormscope also had onboard radar. What I remember about the uplink radar was that it seemed to overstate the severity of the storms, which is better than understating it.
 
Everskyward said:
I think people are defining "tactical" differently. To me, "strategic" is figuring out the general area where storms exist, even after you are airborne. Seems like XM and Stormscope would be good tools for this. "Tactical" is picking your way through the cells which seems like what the OP was trying to do.
In my mind, XM is not accurate enough for that, the only thing that is, really, is onboard radar. Even that can bite you.
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I'd agree that picking your way through a line of Thunderstorms is a bad idea unless you have on board radar.

But after doing the homework, adjusting the takeoff time accordingly, and using a Storm Scope and XM, I've found by giving a wide berth the existing or developing cells I can avoid trouble.
 
2256Q said:
The maneuver is called the '180 degree turn, land soonest, have coffee'. :yes:
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Why do a 180 if the whole thing is lit up? That means the convective is behind you too! So it becomes "land soonest, have coffee (or margarita, if you're packing it in for the day)"
 
gprellwitz said:
Why do a 180 if the whole thing is lit up? That means the convective is behind you too! So it becomes "land soonest, have coffee (or margarita, if you're packing it in for the day)"
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Guess I had assumed the pilot was paying attention to his flying and the activity was in front of him. Only time I ever had it all around me was when I was in the right aircraft, with the right equipment, and had penetrated the cloud mass on purpose.
 
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2256Q said:
Guess I had assumed the pilot was paying attention to his flying and the activity was in front of him. Only time I ever had it all around me was when I was in the right aircraft, with the right equipment, and had penetrated the cloud mass on purpose.
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It's not that difficult for a popup air mass thunderstorm to appear behind you. If you're talking about a frontal storm, then I'd agree.
 
gprellwitz said:
It's not that difficult for a popup air mass thunderstorm to appear behind you. If you're talking about a frontal storm, then I'd agree.
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Talking about my own flying ONLY, I can't say that's ever happened to me. If it pops up behind me, it doesn't matter much since I'm clocking along at 220 kts. or so. Certainly the thing can't catch me. If it's developing immediately in front of me, I'll have plenty of warning and evade. The radar in my plane is very good. The pop-ups build quickly, yes, but not that quickly in my experience. Not trying to say it can't happen. Just that in a whole lot of flying it never has happened to me.
 
I was talking to a 18,000 retired commercial pilot the other day and he said something I'd never heard before about thunderstorms. He mainly flew Aerostar 680's. His rule of thumb was that they could fly through anything east of the Mississippi and nothing west of it. He had story after story of punching through weather. I asked him if he'd heard about Scott Crossfield's accident which seemed to suggest that his thumb might be misaligned. He knew about it and didn't have much good to say about either the pilot or the aircraft he was flying. That's him, not me. They say there's no old bold pilots but I guess there might be a few. This guy built his time over 40 years.
 
Everskyward said:
I think people are defining "tactical" differently. To me, "strategic" is figuring out the general area where storms exist, even after you are airborne. Seems like XM and Stormscope would be good tools for this. "Tactical" is picking your way through the cells which seems like what the OP was trying to do.
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My completely green and uneducated opinion on this...

XM is what you use when you are far away. "In the next 30 minutes, I'm going to be here. How is it looking?"

The sferic tool is used mid-range. "In the next 15 minutes, I'm going to be near there. How does it look in there?"

Onboard radar is used at all ranges, but especially at close-range. "In the next 10 minutes, I'm going to be there. What does the vertical profile of my intended path look like?"

Of course, you can re-assess all of these tools constantly; a 1 minute old NEXRAD update could help you figure out that your radar is lying, or that the sferics can't pick up a blossoming TSRA. The contrary applies as well (as all tools are liars when you bend metal ;) )

A healthy dose of PIREPs, Flight Watch, and ATC reports mix-in to paint a more complete picture.

At the end of it, the pilot is just aggregating various information sources. None of these tools are really tactical -- the only tactical tool you have is your judgment, your de/anti-icing capability, and your ability to climb and retreat. Everything else is strategic; their value is determined by your proximity to the line of weather (the closer you are, the farther XM, onboard radar, or sferics will lead you).

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
I use 'em all. Andrew is pretty close to correct, unless you have a 12" radar antenna. Then it too becomes a close range tool only.

The ultimate close in tool is the Mark 1 eyeball above the embed layer. As in, "oh cr_p!".
 
bbchien said:
I use 'em all. Andrew is pretty close to correct, unless you have a 12" radar antenna. Then it too becomes a close range tool only.

The ultimate close in tool is the Mark 1 eyeball above the embed layer. As in, "oh cr_p!".
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In military terms, Tactics are what is applied to deal with the situation at hand.

Strategy is what you do to make the situation more to your advantage.
 
In military terms, Tactics is for what the Lieutenant is responsible. Strategy is for what the Colonel is responible. When you're out there getting the c_ap beaten out of you, you're an Lt.
 
How about if we take this thread down a notch or two? What are the best ways to identify approaching storms, deal with them, and avoid them if you don't have XM weather or a weather radar? How about some tips for the guy flying around in his rented 172? Where do you get the best weather briefing before you take off? Where can you get reliable information while you are in the air? What do you look for? When do you decide to start looking for an alternate airport to land? I know this is basic stuff, but some of us haven't done the basic stuff for a long time.
 
Maxmosbey said:
How about if we take this thread down a notch or two? What are the best ways to identify approaching storms, deal with them, and avoid them if you don't have XM weather or a weather radar? How about some tips for the guy flying around in his rented 172? Where do you get the best weather briefing before you take off? Where can you get reliable information while you are in the air? What do you look for? When do you decide to start looking for an alternate airport to land? I know this is basic stuff, but some of us haven't done the basic stuff for a long time.
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Whew...

Where to start?!

First, if you're flying less than 2 hours VFR XC, I think a WX brief on the way to the airport, a look at the radar on the FBO computer, and a look at the sky coupled with good out the window lookage will serve the 172 rental pilot well.

If you're flying IMC in areas with possible convective activity -- well, quite frankly, I'd be very wary, and may not launch. Flying into an embedded cell is not my idea of fun.

A lottsa-hour friend of mine said he will not fly IMC in areas with possible embedded cells without XM or other on-board wx data.

I think that makes plenty of sense.
 
dmccormack said:
Whew...

Where to start?!

First, if you're flying less than 2 hours VFR XC, I think a WX brief on the way to the airport, a look at the radar on the FBO computer, and a look at the sky coupled with good out the window lookage will serve the 172 rental pilot well.

If you're flying IMC in areas with possible convective activity -- well, quite frankly, I'd be very wary, and may not launch. Flying into an embedded cell is not my idea of fun.

A lottsa-hour friend of mine said he will not fly IMC in areas with possible embedded cells without XM or other on-board wx data.

I think that makes plenty of sense.
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I realize that this can be a pretty complex issue. I guess I'm wondering how many pilots get caught in a storm, compared to how many simply fly into one? Can you get reliable information, and can you stay away from storms, without a screen in front of you? Or are you at the mercy of fate. Can you see them coming a long way off and have plenty of time to do something, or do they ambush you? While I've been around aviation a long time, I've seldom gotten more than a hundred miles from home. I'm a VFR fair weather pilot, and if it even looks like there is a storm brewing somewhere in the state, I don't go. I do not have a lot of experience dealing with foul weather, so I'm just wondering. I'm thinking about expanding my horizons in my old age, and hoping you have a few tips to help me out.
 
Maxmosbey said:
I realize that this can be a pretty complex issue. I guess I'm wondering how many pilots get caught in a storm, compared to how many simply fly into one? Can you get reliable information, and can you stay away from storms, without a screen in front of you? Or are you at the mercy of fate. Can you see them coming a long way off and have plenty of time to do something, or do they ambush you? While I've been around aviation a long time, I've seldom gotten more than a hundred miles from home. I'm a VFR fair weather pilot, and if it even looks like there is a storm brewing somewhere in the state, I don't go. I do not have a lot of experience dealing with foul weather, so I'm just wondering. I'm thinking about expanding my horizons in my old age, and hoping you have a few tips to help me out.
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No problem, Max!

And I'm sure you'll get plenty of responses.

The XM and other weather devices are most useful when flying IFR, in the soup. You simply cannot see the weather ahead as you should when flying VFR.

The least expensive option is an XM receiver alone, but -- after flying airplanes with XM and a Stormscope, I have to say the combination is probably Minimal equipment for navigating around thunderstorms.
 
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dmccormack said:
No problem, Max!

And I'm sure you'll get plenty of responses.

The XM and other weather devices are most useful when flying IFR, in the soup. You simply cannot see the weather ahead as you should when flying VFR.

The least expensive option is an XM receiver alone, but -- after flying airplanes with XM and a Stormscope, I have to say the combination is probably Minimal equipment for navigating around thunderstorms.
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Probably so. Unfortunately, us rental pilots rarely have the luxury of sferics. AFAIK, there is no portable StormScope or similar.
 
If you have nothing,
(1) Never enter IMC, use eyeball.
(2) Fly in the AM.
(3) Use FSS enroute for current paint. Anything else is old news.
(4) If you are flying a <120 knot a/c, don't even THINK about end running a system. It'll be ahead of you when you arrive. Land, and rebrief.
 
Flying OSH to Altlanta the other day threading through the weather, ATC was calling out cells that coincided with what was showing on the 396. On eproblem, neither coincided with what was outside the window. Leigh was "where are you going? the controller said...and the 396 shows these cells" pointing at the box. I just pointed out the window and said, "Light there for 20 miles, dark there and I'm looking at the wall of a cell, which do you want to believe around a thunderstorm, old information or what's outside the windows?" Tactical weather avoidance decisions should not be made by broadcast radar.
 
Henning said:
Flying OSH to Altlanta the other day threading through the weather, ATC was calling out cells that coincided with what was showing on the 396. On eproblem, neither coincided with what was outside the window. Leigh was "where are you going? the controller said...and the 396 shows these cells" pointing at the box. I just pointed out the window and said, "Light there for 20 miles, dark there and I'm looking at the wall of a cell, which do you want to believe around a thunderstorm, old information or what's outside the windows?" Tactical weather avoidance decisions should not be made by broadcast radar.
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That's pretty much what I was doing yesterday when I flew my mom to Virginia. Worked great. :)
 
Oops, sorry, I was referring to the looking out the window part. I should have snipped better. Eye-dar and storm scope.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
Oops, sorry, I was referring to the looking out the window part. I should have snipped better. Eye-dar and storm scope.
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Looking out the window works when you aren't in the clouds -- or are in and out of the tops or bases.

Stormscope by itself can help you gauge proximity of strikes, but it won't tell you where towering CU are (which can give a very rough ride) or heavy precipitation.

The XM coupled with Stormscope will help fill out the overall picture -- where is the heavy precip? Where are the major cells and in which direction are they moving?

Given the time lag, I give all cells indicated on XM a 50 mile buffer when in the clouds.

When on top, you can usually see the cells and their displacement will be close to what's visible on XM (though absolute location will not, due to lag).
 
Honestly--I've never noticed any significant lag with XM. That said--it's pretty easy to establish by looking out the window if the XM is lagging. If I can see out the window I'll generally get close enough to see it with my eyes. If I can't see out the window--I'd give it some buffer based on the type of storm and the speed that it was moving.

There are other sides to it as well. If there are no airports reasonably close to a line I generally won't fly up to it to see if I can get through--simply because it's too expensive to turn around again. Waiting it out can save a thousand dollars easily in the world of renting.

Couple of weeks ago:
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I've had a number of flights this summer with conditions like this one. A long flight with weather at one end or the other. I knew at some point I had to go through the line or I wouldn't get home. I was totally prepared to land if there was no viable opening, but using NEXRAD I watched the trend in the most likely area to go through for well over an hour before I got there and planned accordingly. Fortunately ATC is always accomodating.

Stormscope, NEXRAD and eyeballs. You can do a lot.

As a question to those that have become amateur meteorologists, is doing all the work with skew-T diagrams and other more advanced tools going to help on longer flights? Can they really tell you something about the chances of getting through a line that you won't get to for 5 hours or so?
 

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With XM/Nexrad, if you can mentally integrate several cycles and see where the storms are going it becomes quite useful. Especially determining where you will be ahead or behind the cells. That said, it's really only a strategic tool - 10+ minute updates are only but so useful for tactical purposes.
 
Lance F said:
As a question to those that have become amateur meteorologists, is doing all the work with skew-T diagrams and other more advanced tools going to help on longer flights? Can they really tell you something about the chances of getting through a line that you won't get to for 5 hours or so?
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I think that background data is helpful in painting an overall mental picture before launch, but once airborne it gets much simpler:

  • Windscreen: How quickly are the CU building?
  • How dark is it inside this cloud?
  • How high is that distant line of clouds
  • Where is the cirrus and altostratus?
  • How close is temp aloft to predicted?
  • How close are winds aloft to predicted (if more southerly or easterly than predicted around here, expect worse weather than forecast)?
  • XM for precip location and trends
  • XM for cell ID and trends
  • XM for satellite vis cloud cover info and trends
  • StormScope for cell/ squall line locations of existing cells
  • StormScope for ID of nascent Cells
  • Flight Watch to help confirm/deny my overall impression of the weather situation and to provide destination wx picture
 
LanceF said:
As a question to those that have become amateur meteorologists, is doing all the work with skew-T diagrams and other more advanced tools going to help on longer flights? Can they really tell you something about the chances of getting through a line that you won't get to for 5 hours or so?
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Nope. There just aren't a lot of days in the midwest when the CAPE is less than 500. The principal value of the RUC cycle 3 hour forecasts is in the winter, when you worry about icing (or summer in the FL's).

Summer times I LOOK at cape, but it mostly confirms what I already knew....
 
You can almost always get through a spring/summer thunderstorm line. My preference if there is a lot of red on the screen is to drop underneath and stay VFR, even if low, so I can see where the light is and where the dark is and where things are moving.
 
Henning said:
You can almost always get through a spring/summer thunderstorm line. My preference if there is a lot of red on the screen is to drop underneath and stay VFR, even if low, so I can see where the light is and where the dark is and where things are moving.
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That can turn into scud-running very quickly, my friend. I've lost a couple of friends to that game. :yes:
 
I enjoy the fly high and get a good visual picture of what's going on. While I certainly don't have a lot of experience, that has worked very well so far. In the visual I can see what I need to to say "Yick, that sucks. I don't want to fly there." It also helps if ATC is getting PIREPs from the commercial traffic. That has helped me, too.

My friends at work with 496s keep on telling me I need to get one so that I can get the XM weather. I'm not convinced I need it, I think I'd rather get myself a hand-held NAV/COM in case of total electrical failure in IMC. At least then I can fly the LOC back into Williamsport. Then again, I also keep out of IMC if thunderstorms are looming and I can't see them.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
My friends at work with 496s keep on telling me I need to get one so that I can get the XM weather. I'm not convinced I need it, I think I'd rather get myself a hand-held NAV/COM in case of total electrical failure in IMC. At least then I can fly the LOC back into Williamsport. Then again, I also keep out of IMC if thunderstorms are looming and I can't see them.
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Have you tried flying a LOC with a Sporty's handheld??

Get the 396/496. If your panel goes TU, you have a backup, XM or not.
 
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