Passenger Pickup - KORD Chicago O'Hare Edition

I'll support the motion - the VFR flight along the lakeshore, with FF, is some neat sight-seeing (if you're a passenger, at least). There's a published chart for that - close eye on the altitude required.
 
EdFred said:
Fly her one more leg commerically to a closer airport. It's January. The weather will be crap.
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I have been lucky flying long distances in the winter, but as you have said, flexibility is required for GA. I think the odds of making your flight without dealing with icing conditions on your 5 hour (non-stop?) flight will require some luck. If not clear, just snow could work VFR. Will the timing between fronts line up with a next day flight from PWK to keep you in the daylight and avoiding IMC icing, or will you need to delay your departure 1 or more days to get back home. Do you feel lucky? While I would want to do this flight, winter conditions are always more troublesome. How are you doing your preheat at PWK? Oh, you are putting it in the hangar overnight(s). This will not be an inexpensive pickup, although I do like adventure.

The reliability of picking her up from a closer airport from a drive, or GA flight, can not be overstated.
 
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MajorTurbulence said:
I have been lucky flying long distances in the winter, but as you have said, flexibility is required for GA. I think the odds of making your flight without dealing with icing conditions on your 5 hour (non-stop?) flight will require some luck. If not clear, just snow could work VFR. Will the timing between fronts line up with a next day flight from PWK to keep you in the daylight and avoiding IMC icing, or will you need to delay your departure 1 or more days to get back home. Do you feel lucky? While I would want to do this flight, winter conditions are always more troublesome. How are you doing your preheat at PWK. Oh, you are putting it in the hangar overnight(s). This will not be an inexpensive pickup, although I do like adventure.

The reliability of picking her up from a closer airport from a drive, or GA flight, can not be overstated.
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Flexibility is key and I wouldn’t do this if I had to be back for something specific within the following week. But you do raise something I hadn’t factored in, and need to: a hangar for the night. Food for thought.
 
I don’t recall a winter ever being this awful for flying. Usually in January, you get the brutal cold under clear skies. It’s been IFR or MVFR and icy all month - maybe one day with sun for a few hours.
 
masloki said:
I don’t recall a winter ever being this awful for flying. Usually in January, you get the brutal cold under clear skies. It’s been IFR or MVFR and icy all month - maybe one day with sun for a few hours.
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We've had much of the same. It got too warm on us and boiled some of the snow into the air, which led to over a straight week of thick fog. Thick enough that I'm keeping my eye on Amtrak tickets because the 21-hour train ride may actually be faster than the airlines if they can't get in. We had a cooler and beautiful (sunny, no wind, not dangerously cold) weekend, but then it warmed up again and turned to crap last night. I continue to watch the weather, airlines, and trains.
 
It’s the worst since I started flying… which hasn’t been that long but long enough!
 
Don't worry, once I get my plane back I'm sure it will be nothing but blue skies. I'm sure of it.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
Don't worry, once I get my plane back I'm sure it will be nothing but blue skies. I'm sure of it.
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I was counting on your bad luck to bring me good weather for this trip. I bet your plane is airworthy by Sunday morning.
 
iamtheari said:
I was counting on your bad luck to bring me good weather for this trip. I bet your plane is airworthy by Sunday morning.
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I truly thought I would get it sometime in January. That is currently in doubt.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
I truly thought I would get it sometime in January. That is currently in doubt.
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We will soon be able to answer whether your luck or mine is worse.
 
masloki said:
I don’t recall a winter ever being this awful for flying. Usually in January, you get the brutal cold under clear skies. It’s been IFR or MVFR and icy all month - maybe one day with sun for a few hours.
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Your getting the normal St. Louis winter weather.
 
One consideration for a flight like this, this time of year: There are many places in the country where I (piston single pilot) can reasonably expect to get a slam-dunk descent or an unrestricted climb to minimize icing concerns. ORD will not be like that; we are an inconvenience to them even on the best of days, and any special requests just makes things more difficult. To some extent, that's true even for the nearby GA airports - unless it's a real emergency, don't count on the kind of flexibility we are all used to in much of the US.

- Martin
 
Martin Pauly said:
One consideration for a flight like this, this time of year: There are many places in the country where I (piston single pilot) can reasonably expect to get a slam-dunk descent or an unrestricted climb to minimize icing concerns. ORD will not be like that; we are an inconvenience to them even on the best of days, and any special requests just makes things more difficult. To some extent, that's true even for the nearby GA airports - unless it's a real emergency, don't count on the kind of flexibility we are all used to in much of the US.

- Martin
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Thanks. That's helpful local information. I definitely don't want to hang out in the ice for the convenience of strangers.
 
Martin Pauly said:
…expect to get a slam-dunk descent or an unrestricted climb to minimize icing concerns. ORD will not be like that;
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Just adding some color - from week days to weekends things improve from impossible to “we’ll see.” I’ve had some success negotiating with enroute controllers (Chicago center/Rockford/south bend etc), or different C90 sectors, well in advance, to phone ahead and see if Chicago approach has some options. Sometimes they can’t put in the effort and some times Chicago approach doesn’t have options, but at least you will get a view into what’s on the table that day. Just another tool in the toolbox when it comes to risk mitigation.
 
If there is any comfort, and there should not be much this far ahead, the progs for the 1/29-30 look pretty good. This will be an anxious 5-7 days of weather watching, versus the relatively sure thing with Amtrak. If you can stand the indecisiveness, then you’re still a go.
 
Having done international transfers at ORD with separate tickets a couple of times in the last year, I’d say she has plenty of time to catch the 6-8pm flight to the city on the east side of our fine state. Then you can pick her up there and avoid Chicago altogether
 
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