lprellwitz
Pre-takeoff checklist
Morning, all. I'm tired, Grant's asleep, but I had to get this story out. This weekend has been amazing - a short stint in my dream aircraft, and something I (and, from what Grant tells me, Bruce) thought just doesn't happen, happened...
Grant and I are flying back from Traverse City this evening, heading along the lake at about 11 pm, VFR. We'd heard the briefer indicate that there was a convective sigmet and line of activity south of our home airport, tracking west to east, before we left. if we stay by the lakeshore, we should be OK. We're getting fight folllowing, things were going fine until we get to around muskegon, heading south, and then I see it - a first flash of lightning in the distant south. I'm still getting used to the sight picture of weather at a distance, let alone weather at night. sure looked to me like it was closer than they said....
So we're keeping in touch with flight service, they tell us that it's south around Kankakee, moving east, not heading up north. Meanwhile, we've still got a ways to go before we head west, those dang storms still look like they're getting closer, and they're firing up pretty regular now....
After a while, we're at around Michigan City, and the controller gives us the wonderful news: he's seeing an area of moderate to heavy precipitation X miles in front of us, between our 11 o'clock and 2 o'clock position.... don't want to divert south and risk getting too close to those storms (which were rolling along real good, and the coverage area was getting wider), and we did want to get home, so that sends us diverting a bit to the right, farther over the lake than we planned. Joy of joys...... I'm trying to stay cool, but it's my worst scenario: heavy thunderstorms in my vicinity, at night, that I can't see, we're over water, and have no flotation devices....
Looking at the GPS, our home airport is just about due west from our position. Problem is, at or altitude, you'd have to go though both Midway and O'Hare airspace to get there. We ask if there's any way we can get clearance through at least Midway's class C and go direct from where we are, avoid some of the dip to the south that we have to do. The controller said, 'well you'll have to ask midway approach, not sure what I can do, ... wait a minute, let me call approach; standby.."
We're waiting, going farther out into the water, those storms are having a heck of a party to the south, I'm looking for traffic and sweating like a turkey on thanksgiving, then the controller transfers us to another frequency on Chicago approach. We call them up, and the first thing they say to us is:
"Skyhawk 559FA, maintain current squawk, cleared through the Class B airspace to 1c5, advise before changing altitude."
All I can remember about my response is that it was rather enthusiastic, and included some 'Thank you, God!'s after I released the mike; I'm sure the controllers got a kick out of it.
Up until now, the only other time we'd been cleared through Class B in VFR was in Tampa, and we ended up getting rerouted and not needing the clearance. I'm convinved that miracles can happen.....
And BTW, i checked; the curent temperature in He!!, Michigan is well above 32 degrees
Grant and I are flying back from Traverse City this evening, heading along the lake at about 11 pm, VFR. We'd heard the briefer indicate that there was a convective sigmet and line of activity south of our home airport, tracking west to east, before we left. if we stay by the lakeshore, we should be OK. We're getting fight folllowing, things were going fine until we get to around muskegon, heading south, and then I see it - a first flash of lightning in the distant south. I'm still getting used to the sight picture of weather at a distance, let alone weather at night. sure looked to me like it was closer than they said....
So we're keeping in touch with flight service, they tell us that it's south around Kankakee, moving east, not heading up north. Meanwhile, we've still got a ways to go before we head west, those dang storms still look like they're getting closer, and they're firing up pretty regular now....
After a while, we're at around Michigan City, and the controller gives us the wonderful news: he's seeing an area of moderate to heavy precipitation X miles in front of us, between our 11 o'clock and 2 o'clock position.... don't want to divert south and risk getting too close to those storms (which were rolling along real good, and the coverage area was getting wider), and we did want to get home, so that sends us diverting a bit to the right, farther over the lake than we planned. Joy of joys...... I'm trying to stay cool, but it's my worst scenario: heavy thunderstorms in my vicinity, at night, that I can't see, we're over water, and have no flotation devices....
Looking at the GPS, our home airport is just about due west from our position. Problem is, at or altitude, you'd have to go though both Midway and O'Hare airspace to get there. We ask if there's any way we can get clearance through at least Midway's class C and go direct from where we are, avoid some of the dip to the south that we have to do. The controller said, 'well you'll have to ask midway approach, not sure what I can do, ... wait a minute, let me call approach; standby.."
We're waiting, going farther out into the water, those storms are having a heck of a party to the south, I'm looking for traffic and sweating like a turkey on thanksgiving, then the controller transfers us to another frequency on Chicago approach. We call them up, and the first thing they say to us is:
"Skyhawk 559FA, maintain current squawk, cleared through the Class B airspace to 1c5, advise before changing altitude."
All I can remember about my response is that it was rather enthusiastic, and included some 'Thank you, God!'s after I released the mike; I'm sure the controllers got a kick out of it.
Up until now, the only other time we'd been cleared through Class B in VFR was in Tampa, and we ended up getting rerouted and not needing the clearance. I'm convinved that miracles can happen.....
And BTW, i checked; the curent temperature in He!!, Michigan is well above 32 degrees
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