What's the worst weather you've been in?

[facthunter]

Where to get it?

 

CASA did a full day seminar at Melbourne Uni., on it.which I attended and it was a full house. I think it is 178 seconds to live. Based on a factual occurrence near Oberon NSW.. I am sure It's still available, though in what form I do not know. Nev.

 

 

[gofastclint]

CASA did a full day seminar at Melbourne Uni., on it.which I attended and it was a full house. I think it is 178 seconds to live. Based on a factual occurrence near Oberon NSW.. I am sure It's still available, though in what form I do not know. Nev.

Amazing figures, I'll stick to 10*C at 0600 with no wind and a perfect blue sky with a top temp of 20*C

 

 

[slartibartfast]

Here's a cautionary tale. Don't go flying in the boundary area of 2 convergent air masses.

 

A couple of weeks ago I was going for a local flight after some work. I knew the sea breeze was coming, but it wasn't there yet. I could see it clearly, and didn't think it would be there for a while. As it happened, it arrived while taxiing. No problem, change runway call and taxi to opposite end.

 

Took off into the sea breeze. Once I got to circuit height, all hell broke loose. The worst turbulence I have experienced since my wave soaring days. Huge holes appeared everywhere. I wasn't sure I was even going to get back to the ground (not flying anyway). Slowed right up and got straight into the circuit and down on the ground OK. There was virtually no turbulence near the ground.

 

I straight away wrote a "note to self - never do that again" and just thought I'd share it in case someone else hadn't thought about it (although I'm pretty sure I'm the only one stupid enough).

 

 

[facthunter]

You are not the only one.

 

The sea breeze coming through has caught me twice with some what dramatic consequences.

 

!t caught me when I was climbing away on take of . Slammed me back onto the runway then almost instantly to a height of about 50' in a vertical bank. This is in a tiger moth.

 

Another time in a C-150, I was returning to the same aerodrome (rutherford, west maitland) and the sea breeze came through. The radio that I was using for shark reports ended up through the rear plexiglas (Even though it was tied down), and the RH ashtray came out of the door. With the nose attitude held pretty constant the airspeed fluctuated from about 50 to 140 knots. The structure made some frightening noises, and I really thought the thing would come apart. On inspection, it was fine. (except for the window). There was no warning on either occasion. Nev..

 

 

[motzartmerv]

wow.. that doesn't sound nice.. Could one of you give us a bit more of an explination as to what occured??..weather wise, what conditions and phenomona lead to this type of turbulance??

 

cheers

 

 

[facthunter]

reason.

 

As slarti said, it is a local convergence zone. A strong sea breeze effect usually maximises around 1400. On these two occasions the prevailing gradient wind was a warm westerly at about 20 knots. The sea breeze in that area is usually a nor easter, and gets up to about 35 knots max. The cooler stronger sea breeze gradually overpowers the prevailing opposite direction wind but the area where these "converge", can have some interesting effects on flying conditions. Nev.

 

 

[gofastclint]

The sea breeze coming through has caught me twice with some what dramatic consequences.!t caught me when I was climbing away on take of . Slammed me back onto the runway then almost instantly to a height of about 50' in a vertical bank. This is in a tiger moth.

Another time in a C-150, I was returning to the same aerodrome (rutherford, west maitland) and the sea breeze came through. The radio that I was using for shark reports ended up through the rear plexiglas (Even though it was tied down), and the RH ashtray came out of the door. With the nose attitude held pretty constant the airspeed fluctuated from about 50 to 140 knots. The structure made some frightening noises, and I really thought the thing would come apart. On inspection, it was fine. (except for the window). There was no warning on either occasion. Nev..

Hey Nev, next time don't fly through a tornado lol. But seriously, lucky you came out alive.

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

Have experienced similar at Elderslie just up the road from Rutherford, decending under canopy and entering the convergence at about 2000 ft wohoo. makes you pay attention during landing.

 

 

[Ultralights]

yesterday was pretty bad, 40deg on the ATIS, so taking the Jabi was out, decided to go and have a look in the tecnam, got just into the training area, and an emergency was declared, and Bankstown would be closing in 15 mins, so in we came, only this time, temp was now 41, and wind was mean crosswind 15 gusting to 25, guess what it was doing as we approached short final, yep, it gusted to at least 25. the tecnam is easy in any crosswind using wing down technique, but it felt like i was at 45 deg bank just to keep it on the centre line...

 

just think, would not have been a problem if runway 18/36 still existed at Bankstown..... not happy mr Macquarie bank!

 

oh, not only that, 41 deg in a low wing tecnam is the most plesent environment to fly in.. which raises the real possibility of suffering the effects of heat stroke in flight... so after today, if temps reach 40deg, we will not be flying in either the Jab or tecnam,

 

 

[motzartmerv]

good idea:thumb_up:

 

 

[djpacro]

Departed Afton, Wyoming USA to the NW for Idaho Falls in a Husky to pick Greg up.

 

 

 

 

 

Clear blue skies as I climbed to 11,000 ft or so to skip over the mountains in the Caribou-Targhee National Forest but I soon found myself in Melbourne-type weather and 500 ft above the ground near Grays Lake. Tower said that weather at the airport was OK but I wasn't going to get there on a direct track. I could see blue skies to the NE so headed off down the canyon and got plenty of height again although the tops of the canyon both sides were in cloud and not enough room to turn around. Plan B was to land straight ahead on the road below. Came out in Swan Valley then an easy flight up to the airport.

 

Returning with Greg in the back the weather had deteriorated by the time we were approaching Swan Valley and we were back down to 500 ft AGL so I decided to turn back. Greg had done this trip many times and advised a later decision point – “if we can get past the dam wall at Palisades we'll be rightâ€. Greg knew all the power lines and towers in the area and most of the power lines were decorated with large coloured balls. Descended to 200 ft AGL and followed the road down into the valley. Approaching the dam wall it looked brighter ahead so climbed a bit higher and soon we were over the frozen lake following the road around the edge.

 

This picture was taken on a much better day over the Snake River Canyon to the NE of Alpine. Cruising at 9,000 ft with a cloud base of about 10,000 although again the canyon walls were in cloud. Plenty of room to turn around here and some options for a forced landing even here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once we got to Alpine the weather improved significantly as Greg had expected however halfway down Star valley it started to snow. Plenty of options now – back to Alpine or land in one of the paddocks in the valley but we stayed VFR all the way back to Afton. This was late spring so little snow on the ground unlike in that other photo. Big tyres on the Husky so a little snow doesn't worry it, in fact we didn't see the tarmac for six months of the year.

 

 

[Gibbo]

Not my worst ever, but the worst I could photograph.

 

Got caught between cooper pedy and the NT border. 35kn headwind, 40mile rain detour and a very sore bum after 4 and 1/2 hours on what should ahve been a 2.9 hour flight.

 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_TnxR4AV0VYc/SHCG83_ZzqI/AAAAAAAAABA/DFa8lOXGUOA/s1600-h/Flying+trip+photos+032.jpg

 

Worst was a '178 seconds' type situation between Cobar and Hillston. Exact same situation as the casa training but kept my brains about myself and stood back and made the correct choices. Hole thru the clouds popped open at just the right moment. One DVD = right information at the right time.

 

I have started to investage the 'possible weather' a little more closely before I go flying.

 

Gibbo

 

 

[Ultralights]

not the best day for a fly.

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest Brett Campany]

Holy crap Ultralights, that's some nasty weather!

 

 

[poteroo]

Ultralights - that is nasty wx indeed. Trust you were using a tele lens? But, at least you can see it.

 

Clear air turbulence is what really frightens me, and in that category, I'm really wary of standing waves and other winds associated with mountains.

 

I remember talking to a very shaken Beech Baron pilot back in the late 60's, who had just arrived in Port Moresby from Lae. In his own words... I had everything to the wall at 10,000 ft and was going down @ 2000 fpm - the Owen Stanleys just rose up in my windscreen. After 2 tries at the Kokoda Gap, I quit and went via the lower east route. The NW Monsoon can really roll over a 13,000 ft range. There was a rumour at the time that an Ansett F27 had a similar experience at 16000, and actually sank well below the LSALT on the Lae - PM route. It was quite likely.

 

I find this turbulent wx the most worrying thing, because the correct responses are not the intuitive ones that you'd expect to apply from your training. You have to be prepared to go 'with' the air movement, and not try to hold an altitude. That's why a 'block' altitude is often sought from ATC to allow for some riding of the air movements.

 

happy days,

 

 

[Guest pelorus32]

As slarti said, it is a local convergence zone. A strong sea breeze effect usually maximises around 1400. On these two occasions the prevailing gradient wind was a warm westerly at about 20 knots. The sea breeze in that area is usually a nor easter, and gets up to about 35 knots max. The cooler stronger sea breeze gradually overpowers the prevailing opposite direction wind but the area where these "converge", can have some interesting effects on flying conditions. Nev.

The other two things that tend to go on here are:

 

1. Wedging: The cool, moist sea breeze drives in under the hot drier air from the westerly creating a wedge. You can see this effect when a cold front comes in and the ARFOR says something like "slopes back by 120nm at FL185". The cold air of the front drives in underneath the warm ambient air which will rise. This causes turbulence and instability;
    
    
   
2. Boundary layer: At the point where the two air masses flow across each other in different directions and with different densities, you get specific turbulence at the boundary. This can range from mild to extreme. If you search this site for "Kelvin Helmholtz Billows" you should find a picture of one kind of cloud formation that you get at the boundary of two layers of air moving in different directions.
    
    
   

 

 

Regards

 

Mike