I’ve almost exhausted visiting almost every possible aerodrome with a paved runway within a 2 hour (round trip) flight from Buttonville. I’m planning on tackling Midland (CYEE) tomorrow.
The weather last weekend was below the renting minima. This weekend looks promising. The TAF for tomorrow isn’t out yet (will be in about 30 minutes) but the weather network shows “partly sunny”.
However, if it’s not the weather, it’s the runway conditions. Here is what the latest NOTAM for CYEE says:
000000 CYEE MIDLAND/HURONIA
CYEE RSC 16/34 50 PERCENT ICE PATCHES 50 PERCENT FROZEN SLUSH 1/4INS
0711281530
I’m not a fan of the 50% ice patches and frozen slush. The temperatures are supposed to remain below freezing all night and tomorrow morning, so I doubt that runway surface condition report will change.
My other option is to head to Kitchener/Waterloo (CYKF). The RSC there is mostly bare and dry (80% or more).
I’ve been actively looking for getting some block time in a 172 or Warrior outside of the school. Mainly for two reasons:
1. It’s impossible to book a plane at TAL unless you do it months in advance. Yes, 30 planes, booked, thats how busy the school is.
2. I’m starting to get frustrated with the rental weather minima. They are there for a reason, and I respect that. They are really close to my personal weather minima, however, how am I supposed to get experience dealing with poorer weather conditions? For example, the forecast visibility for renting an aircraft on a cross country flight needs to be 6 miles or more. I personally wouldn’t fly with less than 7 miles, but I still want to get that experience.
Right now I’m talking to two private owners of aircraft that are parked at Buttonville. One in a hanger (the warrior) and one on the main apron (the 172). We’ll see how it goes.
22 Days until my first flight in the Seminole!
I’m not sure how navcanada missed the major winter storm coming in, but I wouldn’t hold up much hope for flying tomorrow based on what I see now.
As for the minima, that seems really low – is this some sort of recent policy change at the buttonville location? Geez, even as a student I was able to go solo cross country with only 10 miles, and run circuits and such with 5!
Watch the frozen slush – ice patches can be dealt with when given a low crosswind and a long runway to roll out on, but having landed on frozen slush before and speaking from experience, it can scare the living crap out of you if you catch someone elses rut. ;)
By Tomorrow, I actually meant “Saturday” or the same day as the post was made.
Didn’t realize that It was past midnight :)
I ended up going to Kitchener/Waterloo on Saturday. Going to be posting about that later.