Clark1961
Touchdown! Greaser!
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The forecast looked a little better than for Saturday's hop to GNB so I went to DWX yesterday morning. A partner company had tied into our pipeline with equipment with which I was unfamiliar so I wanted to have a look. It was to be a nice Sunday morning flight with the company buying the gas.
The trip outbound was uneventful at 16,500' and found a gaggle of powered parachutes camped at DWX. They were just shutting down from the morning's flying when I got there. All I could tell from the air is that there were a buncha trailers on the ramp. On the ground I realized I had an audience and it kinda made me wish I'd flown a little better pattern instead of the power-off 180 with flaps 40. DWX is normally abandoned so an abbreviated pattern is usually fine.
Checked out the equipment and scratched my head saying my group is going to have to go to school on this one. It's all electronic controls that will be remotely operated. The computer which drives the whole thing is the size of a cigarette pack. Most of the stuff we get is still 80's tech with motherboard sized components. It's nice to see some progress.
Trip back is where it got interesting. Left DWX about noon and winds were same as in the morning - out of the west about 20. Forty miles east the CU was starting to precip in a broken north to south line. I could have gone around to the north but it would have been 20 miles or more and it looked like I could pick my way through.
One particular cell, looked like virga, was directly in my path so I aimed for the south edge flying at about 13,500. The thermals had been fairly benign with 4 to 500 fpm climbs and descents. As I approached the cell, it looked like the precip had reached the ground (no longer virga) but there was a lot more precip near the bottom of the cloud than was reaching the ground. In other words, a lot of the rain was still evaporating as it fell.Got to the edge of the shower and sure-enough, there was the big descent at over 1,000 fpm. Since I was better than five thousand feet above ground and just on the edge the downdraft wasn't a problem.
Made it over to the east side of the front range and there was another band of showers. Fewer gaps here but I still had the out to the north (though it would have been more of a pain now). Similar tactic and result getting through these showers. No big deal since I had plenty of altitude. I wasn't even in the rain long enough to wash the bugs off, gotta work on that.
Anyway, go east around DEN Bravo and down low the winds are out of the east about 15 and variable out of the northeast at ground level. It seemed like two airmasses had conspired to stack the showers along the front range with west winds in the mountains and east winds above the plains.
Sorry I didn't get pictures, guess the weather distracted me a bit. To wrap it up, showers in the mountains & desert can be just a bit different than showers elsewhere. They may have serious downdrafts associated so flying into them can be a really bad idea. The appearance of the rainshaft can give a clue about the likelyhood of a downdraft - if rain is evaporating then the air will be cooling and descending. It'll happily take you right along with it.
The trip outbound was uneventful at 16,500' and found a gaggle of powered parachutes camped at DWX. They were just shutting down from the morning's flying when I got there. All I could tell from the air is that there were a buncha trailers on the ramp. On the ground I realized I had an audience and it kinda made me wish I'd flown a little better pattern instead of the power-off 180 with flaps 40. DWX is normally abandoned so an abbreviated pattern is usually fine.
Checked out the equipment and scratched my head saying my group is going to have to go to school on this one. It's all electronic controls that will be remotely operated. The computer which drives the whole thing is the size of a cigarette pack. Most of the stuff we get is still 80's tech with motherboard sized components. It's nice to see some progress.
Trip back is where it got interesting. Left DWX about noon and winds were same as in the morning - out of the west about 20. Forty miles east the CU was starting to precip in a broken north to south line. I could have gone around to the north but it would have been 20 miles or more and it looked like I could pick my way through.
One particular cell, looked like virga, was directly in my path so I aimed for the south edge flying at about 13,500. The thermals had been fairly benign with 4 to 500 fpm climbs and descents. As I approached the cell, it looked like the precip had reached the ground (no longer virga) but there was a lot more precip near the bottom of the cloud than was reaching the ground. In other words, a lot of the rain was still evaporating as it fell.Got to the edge of the shower and sure-enough, there was the big descent at over 1,000 fpm. Since I was better than five thousand feet above ground and just on the edge the downdraft wasn't a problem.
Made it over to the east side of the front range and there was another band of showers. Fewer gaps here but I still had the out to the north (though it would have been more of a pain now). Similar tactic and result getting through these showers. No big deal since I had plenty of altitude. I wasn't even in the rain long enough to wash the bugs off, gotta work on that.
Anyway, go east around DEN Bravo and down low the winds are out of the east about 15 and variable out of the northeast at ground level. It seemed like two airmasses had conspired to stack the showers along the front range with west winds in the mountains and east winds above the plains.
Sorry I didn't get pictures, guess the weather distracted me a bit. To wrap it up, showers in the mountains & desert can be just a bit different than showers elsewhere. They may have serious downdrafts associated so flying into them can be a really bad idea. The appearance of the rainshaft can give a clue about the likelyhood of a downdraft - if rain is evaporating then the air will be cooling and descending. It'll happily take you right along with it.
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