Anyone flying to an airport in the 100% eclipse zone?

[rwellner98]

We ended up at a private strip (Dury) near Carbondale, IL. We were cloud free for totality. Great small group of aviators and friends with a BBQ to keep things going. Good times...

 

[Bill Watson]

I managed to find the one airport with a cloud directly overhead. We all knew it was going to happen... you could see it moving in juuuuuust as totality started. And nothing around for miles. Just overhead (KCSV, CrossfieldTN).

Still... It was pretty cool.

View attachment 55753

That's really tough luck especially since those ragged cumulus were in the process of dissipating due to the loss of heating.

At Triple Tree we had a lot of buildups overhead but they almost all disappeared just in time for totality.


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[Ghery]

3.5 hours on one of the club's C-172s. OLM to just south of Salem, Oregon. Watched the eclipse from 7500 MSL. My wife called it "The flight of a lifetime". I'll finish this with one of the pictures she took during totality. It is pretty good, but it doesn't do justice to what you really see in person.

Oh, and later on our son posted that Google Maps was showing gridlock on I-5 north and south of Salem. Sure was nice to just point the plane north and fly home.

 

[N747JB]

We ended up in Greenwood South Carolina, 5000 foot strip, very nice facility with cheap fuel!! They had about 100-125 airplanes parked on the ramp, taxiway and a large grass field, everyone was friendly and we had a great time! Traffic in bound was a bit heavy with several airports nearby on the same frequency and some pilots taking 15 seconds for a position report and asking ATITPPA!! But, all in all it was a great day, they were limiting IFR clearances into central SC when we were departing Athens, but we went VFR, so it wasn't an issue, even got FF!

 

[Salty]

I got FF but it was useless. I had several planes whizz by me within 1000 feet and didn't get a single alert. They were just too busy.

 

[Croomrider]

Anderson, SC was a good place to be. The airport was expecting 300 aircraft and closed a runway and associated taxiways to create more parking. They only ended up with about 150 planes, but the people were great and the eclipse was amazing!

 

[kyleb]

Anderson, SC was a good place to be. The airport was expecting 300 aircraft and closed a runway and associated taxiways to create more parking. They only ended up with about 150 planes, but the people were great and the eclipse was amazing!

Anderson would have had at least one more plane if the folks at the FBO had bothered to answer the phone or return a voicemail.

 

[Croomrider]

Anderson would have had at least one more plane if the folks at the FBO had bothered to answer the phone or return a voicemail.

Don't know when you called, but they were pretty busy on the day of, and they don't have a lot of people. I called 3 weeks before and the guy was really nice. They weren't making a bunch of money from this either. Five dollars a night parking and one free with gas!

 

[Goofy]

Buddy went to Madras, OR and camped. Bezos shows up first thing in the morning in G650, parks next campers and leaves the apu running. He's such a nice guy....

 

[dell30rb]

I wound up at Triple Tree, flying in about 1 PM and leaving at 5.

Was really cool, perfect weather, glad I made the trip. Will definitely find my way to the next one.

 

[Mike I]

I got quick turns at Medford OR for fuel (Million Air was great), and saw the Eclipse from over Mount Jefferson at 27,000ft. ATC was insanely busy, but we had a pre-coordinated IFR route right on the line of totality so we were in good shape. Perfect weather from up there!

 

[exncsurfer]

I got quick turns at Medford OR for fuel (Million Air was great), and saw the Eclipse from over Mount Jefferson at 27,000ft. ATC was insanely busy, but we had a pre-coordinated IFR route right on the line of totality so we were in good shape. Perfect weather from up there!

How was the view for you? Here is an article about how Alaskan airlines planned and timed their flight to give the passengers the best view. They went way out to sea to get the sun lower. Picture from the article:

 

[Justin M]

At the last minute, an airplane freed up and I took the 172M from MMU (Morristown) to JQF (Concord Regional), where picked up my friend and his son and headed to Orangeburg SC. Alas, with the weather and TFR delays, there was no way were were going to make it to Orangeburg. So ... we looked on the maps, I called the controller and asked if SMS (Sumter SC) had a NOTAM on file. No? May we divert there? Yes! Right Turn!

We landed at 2:30pm and the SMS team marshaled us via moped to parking amidst 10 or 15 other airplanes. As we were shutting down, they announced on unicom "10 minutes to totality." When it occurred, I whooped, it was really cool. The lighting was very weird just before, not the same weird as before a tornado, but a weird light none-the-less. The 360 sunset was a cool effect. I'm really glad I was able to make it.

Not only was the eclipse a great experience, and seeing my friend and his family wonderful; but it was the the longest cross country I've flown (about 570 NM each way, not including the flight from JQF (Concord Regional) to SMS (Sumter) and back) and I learned a ton.

On the way down, I ended up overnighting at GED due to the TFR at my departure airport and met some very nice Mooney owners who had dinner with me at the on-field airport restaurant. Departing in the morning was delayed due to a layer of fog over my planned fuel stops.

Flying the DELMARVA peninsula is tricky with all the flight restriction areas. Dodging the Washington FRZ added at least 90 minutes of flying time to the trips.

I'm really sad that so many VORs are out of service in eastern NC. It makes flying with a GPS almost a requirement.

The JQF controller is a hooooot! I was sad when he wasn't working and wasn't the one to send me back to New Jersey the day after. I'll probably check LiveATC to listen to more of his style.

I think I had tailwinds on the way home. With the tailwinds and that one of my planned fuel stops didn't have fuel and required me to fly to the next option meant I saved a fuel stop on the way home. I'm grateful that the controller said "They do not have fuel there at this time." when I told him of my intentions to descend and land for fuel. Airnav let me down and said there was fuel there, maybe it is a temporary thing. But I slowed down, looked at the map and choose an alternate 20 minutes away stretching my fuel usage (still had 2 hours in the tank once I landed at airport with fuel available).

I used about 8 gallons per tach hour, which will help me plan future flights. I had done my flight plan expecting 10.

Anyway, thanks for reading!

 

[Mike I]

How was the view for you? Here is an article about how Alaskan airlines planned and timed their flight to give the passengers the best view. They went way out to sea to get the sun lower.

The view was awesome! But going out to sea for the lower sun is a great idea. We didn't have the endurance to go far our (Lear25), and wanted some terrain in our photos. I wish I could share them but they're property of the commercial client.

 

[exncsurfer]

The view was awesome! But going out to sea for the lower sun is a great idea. We didn't have the endurance to go far our (Lear25), and wanted some terrain in our photos. I wish I could share them but they're property of the commercial client.

Nice!, did you look at that article, seemed like their plan was a bit over complicated, couldn't they have just flown out along the path(left edge of the 50-70 mile zone), then when it gets dark, turn right, haha. Or start heading back in the path leading the target and just turn left when it gets dark. I think they were just showing off, they didn't want 31deg. sun or 29, they wanted 30.

 

[Mike I]

Nice!, did you look at that article, seemed like their plan was a bit over complicated, couldn't they have just flown out along the path(left edge of the 50-70 mile zone), then when it gets dark, turn right, haha. Or start heading back in the path leading the target and just turn left when it gets dark. I think they were just showing off, they didn't want 31deg. sun or 29, they wanted 30.

It did seem a bit over-complicated, for sure, but good on them for figuring out the eye height in the cabin. Good mental exercise for sure, and less air traffic to contend with way out over the ocean. But yeah, showing off too

 

[JimNtexas]

Three pilots smarter than me reserved all three club airplanes before I thought about it. I made a crazy last minute decision to drive from Austin to the Glendo Wyoming airport (76V) to view the eclipse. What's 1100 miles each way between friends?

Glendo's airport was right on the centerline of the eclipse, and was consistently forecast to be clear, which it was.

One reason I picked Glendo (population 205) was that the town had notamed their airport closed so they could open it to visitors in cars at no cost.

76V is really very large. It has a 4300' grass runway adjacent to a huge mowed field. There were thousands of people there.

About an hour before totality I noticed a tail dragger, a C140 I think, enter a left downwind. 'This is going to be fun' I thought. He turned base and then final. I guess he finally noticed that dozens of people were milling around on the runway and went around.


Two hot air balloons drifted over the field just before totality.

Totality was awesome! There were at least three aircraft that appeared very close to the sun during totality.

I waited almost four hours before I attempted to leave. Google says it takes 2 1/2 hours to get to my motel in Greeley from Glendo. It took six.

 

[Mistake Not...]

Buddy went to Madras, OR and camped. Bezos shows up first thing in the morning in G650, parks next campers and leaves the apu running. He's such a nice guy....

Not sure how it happened, but just before totality, all the bizjets where I was turned everything off, and some turned on nav lights. I don't know if it was pre arranged, or they're just decent people, but the silence was very cool. Seemed appropriate for the event.

 

[StinkBug]

When my buddy called me about going to watch the eclipse a few months ago I honestly didn't expect it to be all that thrilling. Boy was I wrong. There is absolutely nothing a photo or video can do to express the experience fully.

We studied weather forecasts and made multiple contingency plans for different airports. In the end our Plan A could not have been better. Flew into S75, Payette Idaho and camped overnight. A pretty decent grouping of aircraft showed up, but nothing they couldn't handle. Woke up to a perfect clear blue sky.

My friend brought his telescope with a solar filter and we were able to get some really good views and pictures of the eclipse. Most of you have probably seen the picture of the jet passing through the crescent of the eclipse just before totality, well I just happened to be looking through the telescope at that moment and saw it live. It was pretty incredible and I'm glad someone managed to capture the moment.

We had several cameras set up to try and capture everything as well. None of them do it any justice, but watching the video does bring back a bit of the excitement. Anyone who says 99% is close enough, or "boring" clearly has no clue.

 

[StinkBug]

Another friend of mine traveled to see the eclipse as well and captured pretty much all of my feelings on it far better than I could have, since he's a writer and I'm not. There's no aviation involved in his article, but it's a great read.

https://marcusalexanderhart.com/2017/08/22/marcus-figures-out-the-2017-great-american-eclipse/

 

[Flyhound]

As mentioned in an earlier post, we made reservations at a small bed and breakfast in the oregon desert (49OR, Lands Inn) with a dirt/grass runway. 12 aircraft showed up. They have 3 A-Frame cabins for rent, one "double A-Frame and a small apartment in their hangar that is also rented to guests. We had one of the small A-Frame cabins and it was a wonderful gathering. The group was small enough that I got to talk to everyone there, we had a great night at the venue before the eclipse with wonderful food and company and we had clear skies for the flight home. We took pictures of the eclipse, but also enjoyed taking pictures of the traffic on the roads below as we flew home. Here the video of our experience.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

I figured someone would do this eventually... Cool!

https://twitter.com/PostGraphics/status/900850232489062401

Also, I've realized that my eclipse experience was, while awesome, wholly inadequate. I aspire to do this next time: