Icing is a b****

[Dan Thomas]

Freezing rain below the cloud will do it.

 

[Oldmanb777]

I don't care what you are flying, when you encounter ice, your first actions should be to GET OUT OF IT as quickly as you can. Ive had heavy jets in precarious positions with ice as well as light aircraft. Do what you need to do to get out of it.

 

[Dana]

I was on an instrument plan, flying along at 3 or 4,000 feet, about 200 feet below a cloud in the winter. It was overcast, dank day, probably 25F where I was, no precip. I'm fat dumb and happy when the windshield starts frosting up. I turn on the defroster, look at the wing and sure enough, trace to light rime forming up.

Makes sense, that close below the cloud the temp and dewpoint are really close together, and the air cools the last fraction of a degree as it accelerates over the wings and around the windshield.

 

[PaulS]

Makes sense, that close below the cloud the temp and dewpoint are really close together, and the air cools the last fraction of a degree as it accelerates over the wings and around the windshield.

That's what I figured, but it did surprise me, I had thought clear of the clouds, no precip, no ice. Unless sitting on the ramp that is.

 

[Dan Thomas]

That's what I figured, but it did surprise me, I had thought clear of the clouds, no precip, no ice. Unless sitting on the ramp that is.

Used to get ice on the propeller when running up the engine on the ground on days that were just a little misty. It doesn't take much.

It would be interesting to know the amount of pressure drop over the wing or prop blade so we could figure the temperature drop. We do know that the pressure drop is most extreme just aft of the leading edge.

 

[PaulS]

Used to get ice on the propeller when running up the engine on the ground on days that were just a little misty. It doesn't take much.

It would be interesting to know the amount of pressure drop over the wing or prop blade so we could figure the temperature drop. We do know that the pressure drop is most extreme just aft of the leading edge.

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If I recall correctly it was definitely below 32F probably like 25 but I don't remember.

 

[Pinecone]

One thing to think about TKS systems, they have a limited amount of fluid. Most installations around 1.5 hours on high.

So if you fly into icing for 45 minutes, you need to be thinking about whether to continue or turn around.

 

[Dan Thomas]

If I recall correctly it was definitely below 32F probably like 25 but I don't remember.

The lift is due to a pressure differential. We don't want that. We want the local pressure drop on the top of the airfoil, at various span and chord stations. The pressure/temperature drop will also be affected by AoA, wing loading, speed and other factors.

 

[Tobias Göller]

Hi,

I have. It was 2 years ago

Me too, in January 2021. In VFR conditions in (fortunately) light "Rain" (snowy rain & maybe supercooled droplets).

Boy, that was not joyful. Problem with VFR is that you don't have many legal options (like climb through the layer on top). In addition: The terrain was going up to 8000ft - I was at 10k. Not too many options.

Fortunately I didn't pick up too much ice.... but since it was quite cold where I landed (around 0°C) the ice didn't completely melt off (and the ram-rise at 100KTS is not worth mentioning)

Tobias

 

[iamtheari]

I don't care what you are flying, when you encounter ice, your first actions should be to GET OUT OF IT as quickly as you can. Ive had heavy jets in precarious positions with ice as well as light aircraft. Do what you need to do to get out of it.

This is my approach. Every plane can be killed by ice. Every pilot’s strategy should be to get out of the ice in a timely manner. Some planes have some fun options to get out of the ice, like a plane with hot props and boots climbing to non-icing altitudes or a 777 just climbing out of the troposphere before it turns into a cube. But whatever options you have, you should promptly exercise them to stop accumulating ice.

FIKI certification controls what you can plan to do. But just like reserve fuel or filing an alternate, which are preflight planning items, it shouldn’t control what you actually do in the air.

A good example is a Twin Cessna. The “full de-ice” planes have boots on the wings outboard of the engine nacelles, boots on the horizontal stabilizer, hot props, and alcohol sprayers for the windshield. The FIKI planes change to a heated windshield and add boots inboard of the engine nacelles. Are you really going to change how you react to actual icing based on those two small differences in equipment?

 

[Tantalum]

If "air disasters" has taught me anything, it's that ice bridging is a myth when it comes to modern day boots.

that show is a guilty pleasure of mine. Also made me never want to sit on an ATR (even they look better than the DASH planes with the long spindly legs)

 

[Huckster79]

Only had ice once, I’m a vfr pilot and was on the ground. We were going to do a funeral flyover… we had a dozen planes fired up, and a totally unpredicted rain shower of freezing rain began… it was a very small pop up…I had 1/4” on the c150 my son and I were in! I hit the mike n said I was taxiing back I wasn’t going to cause more funerals. It was scary how fast it happened and totally unpredicted and expected. Timing was perfect, 5 mins later some of us would have been rolling down the runway maybe just airborn… don’t like to think of that day much…

 

[jbehler]

Ice scares the crap out of me. I fly a TKS Turbo Cirrus that climbs well so if there is a thin layer with no Airmets or PIreps for icing I'll climb through in the winter. I will not depart if I know that I won't be cruising in VMC and that the ceiling at my destination is either VFR or freezing level is well above MVA. The worst situation to be in is on an approach, in IMC and picking up ice. Even FIKI certified, I would not fly in continued icing conditions in a SEP.