|
East Tennessee’s best source for regional General Aviation news, trip
reports and resources Newsletters Photo Gallery GuestBook
Calendar Classifieds Flyout Schedule Useful Links Updated
|
|
If ATC Doesn’t
Answer, Call Them Again in 15 Minutes By Don
Miller
Columnist Anna and I had looked
forward to the day we could fly the Cessna to Point Mugu, California and
return ever since we bought N129S in 1999.
Each new adventure along the line brought us closer to a decision.
Finally in July of 2006 we began detailed planning for the trip. Long haul
pilots near and far were asked for advice. Internet trip planning resources
were scanned for tips and guidance plus I have an FBO operator 2nd cousin in Flagstaff. The June annual brought
reassuring news of identical compression readings for the four O-320
cylinders and no structural surprises. I began to look at specific routes and
altitude requirements. In September we began to make necessary reservations
and using AirNav selected airports with any instrument approaches and lower
gas prices. Another important feature of airports chosen was being located
near a moderate cost hotel. That turned out to be more difficult than you
might think. One pilot suggested that we have an emergency kit for possible
off airport landings in the Rocky Mountains where help might be more than a
few hours coming. Ultimately we identified 35 items to include with a total
weight under ten pounds. Everything
from an 8X10 foot tarp to sun block and aviation band handy talkie was
included. Our overall plan was to make a straight line for California with
slight changes to achieve the lowest fuel prices. Our westbound flight included Hohenwald, TN
(0M3), Russellville, AR (RUE), Pryor, OK (H71), Pampa, TX (PPA), Flagstaff,
AZ (FLG), Needles, CA (EED), and Camarillo, CA (CMA). Our takeoff on October
3 was at 7:55 AM. Knoxville was
blanketed in a white cotton-like layer in the valleys but the horizontal
visibility was unlimited! TYS found our IFR flight plan quickly and we were
off for the biggest flying adventure of our lives. With excellent visibility in the region, ATC
was smiling with us as we were handed off from TYS to ATL to Memphis. John A.
Baker field, Hohenwald, was advertised on AirNav as a residential airpark and
fuel at $3.71. After 183nm and almost
exactly two flying hours against a 10kt headwind we landed at a near-deserted
airport and few houses nearby. The FBO had a wonderful self-serve island with
great gas pump, sized for GA. On takeoff we were looking at a longer flight
including three Memphis center frequencies one Little Rock frequency in the
ATC handoffs. As we journeyed west from West Tennessee we
had enjoyed the sights crossing the Mississippi and seeing the rice paddies
of eastern Arkansas. Russellville was a different matter to behold! First the
rwy 25 approach ended with a let down after buildings and trees just off the
runway end. Hoover, the lineman, was on the ramp ready to guide us to a stop
directly in front of the FBO. Within seconds an aging Cadillac was driven to
the planeside, and we noticed on the sign nearby, full service fuel was
$3.42. After lunch in town we were off again to Oklahoma. Pryor, OK was to be
our overnight as I found a new Comfort Inn 200 yards from the FBO and a
restaurant adjacent. We expected no IFR weather or heavy traffic and chose to
request flight following for part of this leg. Our initial altitude was 6500
feet, but it turned out to be bumpy. We quickly changed to 8500 feet that
resulted in a faster ground speed – go figure. H71 is a relatively new
airport built by the city to encourage growth in the adjacent industrial
park. Lots of jets and twins were
parked on the ramp. The FBO staff were typical Midwestern people who aimed to
please. Fuel was $3.40 per gallon full service! The FBO manager offered to
take us to the hotel on his way home. That night we figured we had flown 5.7
hours, used 55 gallons of gas, spent $213 on fuel and averaged close to 100
knots ground speed against the wind! Flying low did make the legs bumpy. We looked forward to day two with anticipation
as we expected to see the plains and mountains we lack in the east. We took
off at 7:38 AM on October 4. This was to be an IFR flight at 6000 feet
initially. Photo opportunities came at us in rapid succession. Tulsa is an
impressive city with several skyscrapers and huge oil storage tanks covering
many acres. This leg was to be a harbinger of future legs with respect to
radio use. Two of our ATC handoffs were so garbled that we said something
like “Rampfi” Center this is N129S
level at 6”. No one seemed to care about the problem. On the Albuquerque center handoff they just
said “call every 50 miles until someone answers”. Pampa, Texas is in the
famous middle of no-where, and had surface winds 25kts gusting to 35!! After
an interesting landing we attempted to taxi to the ramp which seemed to be 5
miles away and moving north! Another
interesting feature of PPA was the pattern altitude of 4244 feet. Service was
excellent after we “tied” the Cessna down with heavy chains. Our vintage
Dodge crew car performed reliably and took us to Cooder’s Dixie Café in town.
A real 1950 western town with great panhandle food. Fuel was $4.20 per
gallon. We took off at 12:35 local time amid the
continuing gusty winds and crystal clear skies. In spite of the previous leg
radio dropouts, we filed IFR again--Amarillo, Albuquerque, and on to
destination. Center reported reception sketchy and requested Ident several
times. We experimented using first the Garmin, then the King receiver, and concluded our best reception
was achieved by using the Garmin with squelch off. Later we were requested to climb for
terrain clearance, finally to 10,000’. Then came this request: Climb to
13,000 or accept new route – TAFOY to V62 to Santa Fe. We chose the new
route. Fuel at Santa Fe was $4.09 per gallon.
Santa Fe airport has the old west look in both setting and buildings. Leaving Santa Fe we had filed IFR with a
dogleg to miss the highest terrain. When we requested clearance we received
the following: direct ZAISE @9000, direct PEDRA @ 10000, direct CABZO at
10000, direct GALLUP at 11000, then down to 9000 direct WINSLOW, then direct
FLG at 9500 feet. We took off at 2:50
PM MDT VFR. We monitored ATC as best we could and later was instructed an
hour or more from Flagstaff “ Squawk 1200 and have a nice flight.” Flagstaff ATIS came alive about 20 miles
out and the tower answered our call about five minutes later. Now we
understood why we had the emergency kit! That leg was spectacular as the
rough and beautiful foothills began to appear in every direction. My 2nd cousin had his “follow me” truck waiting on the
taxiway as he was monitoring the tower. As we rolled to a stop two red
carpets were placed near the doors and he came out with a bottle of
champagne. Just kidding about the champagne! Orville had made reservations at
the best hotel in town for us at his corporate rate and provided a new, clean
van for overnight use. Nice! After showering we went to a home cooked meal at
his house. We had a relaxing evening
visiting with the Orville, his wife and four children. The next morning we were greeted with 35
degree temperatures and we found the Cessna in a heated hanger. Flagstaff airport is at 7011 feet
elevation. The biggest news to me during this trip was the high utility our O-320
Lycoming has. It climbed out competently from airports as high as 8000 feet
with two adults, luggage and full fuel (in October). We had planned to fly
into Lake Havasu City for our refuel before going into Camarillo, but our
host recommended Needles airport. This turned out to be a mixed
blessing. Gas was $3.70 but with tax
it was $5.42. Full service only. Needles is literally in the middle of a
featureless desert on a hillside. The long runway slopes at least 5%. So
regardless of wind I landed up hill and took off down hill. I was motivated to buy a Needles Airport
T-shirt. While crossing the Sierra
Nevada’s, ATC cautioned us to call every so often until they answered. There
were times when we were without contact for 15 minutes or more and flying
over a featureless desert. The last leg into Camarillo is hard to
describe. The LA basin IFR flying is a constant dialog with ATC…when they can
hear you. Traffic reports, requests to
change direction to avoid larger, faster aircraft, requests to change
altitude, and frequency changes are a part of every flight. Although we saw
only a dozen or so other aircraft in the last 50 miles, it seemed several
hundred were operating in the area. As we approached Camarillo, traffic
picked up considerably, CMA being one of the busiest GA airports in the
country--588 aircraft are based on the field; average of 420 operations per
day; the airport is home to 20 aviation related businesses, and 15 non
aviation businesses; it is also home to the largest Commemorative Air Force
Chapter outside of Texas. While
visiting in the area we toured the CAF facilities, including several WWII
aircraft and workshop. Gas prices
ranged from $3.49 full service to $5.32 full service for 100 LL between the
three FBO’s. Our daughter, who we were planning to visit,
had tracked our flights across the country, was at the airport waiting,
camera in hand, to record our arrival and greet us. On our rollout we felt quite a sense of
accomplishment and relief! Our daughter and her family live in base
housing at Point Mugu. During our three and 1/2 days of visit we were able to see a few California sights. The
Ronald Reagan Library is in Simi Valley not too far from Point Mugu. In case
you didn’t know there are 13 presidential libraries. The Reagan library is one of the largest
containing 55 million pages of personal and administrative documents and 1.6
million photographs. Air Force One, a
Boeing 707 is on display in a special pavilion attached to the main library.
The view of Simi Valley and surrounding mountains is amazing! We celebrated
our 49th wedding
anniversary at Iguana’s Mexican Grill in Camarillo. After a nice visit with our daughter and
son-in-law, and playing with our granddaughters, ages 3 & 5, for three
days, we loaded up the Cessna with luggage and filed for Blythe, California.
This leg was to take us further south on the return trip, and we were looking
forward to tail winds to make the return trip a bit shorter. The weather was not ideal, with a low
layer of clouds and rain in the forecast over southern California. We took
off about 7 AM after several unsuccessful attempts to contact SoCal ATC on
the ground. After take-off and a 1000
foot climb, we finally did contact departure control and were cleared to 4000
feet on a heading of 220 degrees. I had filed a circular route at the outer
edge of the LA class B control zone. While climbing I was given a new route:
Vargus, V186, V264, Pomona, Paradise, V388, Palm Springs, V16, Blythe. Try to
copy that in solid IFR while climbing!
Thank goodness for a good co-pilot!
This route was parallel to my original plan but about 5 nm closer to
the mountains. Even so we were
vectored several times to fly parallel with departing jets and twins coming
out of the valley every few minutes. When we broke out near the Arizona state
line we saw what appeared to be 1000 power generating wind mills. We enjoyed
VFR conditions into Blythe. This LA basin departure reminded us of the Tampa
departure which involves being vectored out over the Gulf before turning
north outside class B. Our next
refueling stop was to be Ryan-Tucson airport. Fuel was about $1.00 cheaper
than Tucson Intl. and they have a restaurant on the field! The AirNav note says follow the blue line
to the fuel and restaurant. It worked! It is a huge reliever airport with
three runways and the transient service area is ¾ mile from the runways
between a forest of hangers and tiedowns.
The restaurant was excellent. .
It was on this leg that we flew over the Davis-Monthan AFB airplane
graveyard. What an awesome sight. Flying at 12,000’ we were still not able to
get all the planes in one picture.
The facility is on 2600 acres, with 4200 aircraft in storage. Our next leg took us to Alamogordo, NM and an
overnight stay. We took a taxi to the
Hampton Inn and were pleased to find several restaurants within walking
distance. After a restful night and
good continental breakfast, we called the taxi to return to the airport. There had been torrential rain during the
night, and we found the airport shrouded in fog. The FBO operator had told us that he
arrived at 7 a.m. and, since we wanted to get an early start, we arrived at
7. No one was there. He and his wife arrived about five minutes
later, surprised to find us there. We
had not filled up the evening before because we had arrived as the operator
was closing up. He pulled the fuel
truck around, taking his time because he knew we weren’t going anywhere any
time soon. After cooling our heels in
the lounge for almost an hour, we decided we could take off and get on our
way. While waiting in the FBO we
noticed a sign that cautioned pilots to call 128.1 Holloman AFB departure for
traffic advisories. So, plane loaded
and ready to go, we dialed in 128.1 and called for advisory. We were given an IFR clearance and told to
set course for CORAS intersection (north instead of east as we had planned)
and climb to 13,000’. We weren’t too
happy about this, but we were not given any alternative. After half an hour traveling in the wrong
direction, we were handed off to Albuquerque Center who told us to climb to
14 for terrain. Well, it was time to
make a stand, so we told them that wasn’t possible. They suggested we make a 180 and fly to
BOLES AND PINON VORs then turn east to Zakky intersection. We reversed course and flew about 10
minutes before ATC suggested we might want to turn east and go direct Clovis,
NM (CVN). We had added 40 minutes to
the trip, had seen some spectacular scenery, and taken a few photos on the
way. We made Clovis a quick gas fill
up and were on our way. Our next stop
was Pampa, TX where we knew there would be a car waiting and a good
restaurant for lunch. While traveling
east we realized that we were playing leapfrog with the storms that had
passed us while we slept in Alamogordo.
We flew just above the tops on this leg and were treated to some
beautiful cloud formations in the sun.
Our last overnight stop of the trip was Pryor,
OK again. It was a comfort to know
that the FBO was a friendly helpful guy, and the hotel was within walking
distance of the field if we got there after the FBO was closed. As it turned out, The FBO was closed, but a
call to the hotel resulted in an exciting ride from the airport to the
hotel. One of their staff was leaving
just as we called, and she came and picked us up. We don’t know if she was irritated at
having to take the time to help us out, or if she normally drives with a lead
brick on her foot, but we were both glad that the trip was only 1/2 mile.
The remainder of the trip was uneventful, except for our approach to
DKX. We again played leapfrog with the
storms, but flew above them for most of the trip. As we approached Knoxville, descending in
altitude, we were flying in the clouds for the most part. We did the localizer approach to DKX with
some great help from ATC, breaking out of the clouds at 800’ above the
runway, directly in front of us. It is
great to be back home, where the ATC is friendly and helpful, and can hear
you. ____________________________________________________________ Want to read more from Don Miller?
Check out of his other
columns. Got a comment, question or suggestion for future
article? eMail Don. _________________________________________________________________ Welcome to FatBoyz
Aviation. Updated All content, logos,
pictures and videos are the property of FatBoyz
Aviation. |
