Would you have cancelled?

[cookmg]

Hello Everybody.

I am flying out of San Diego working on an instrument rating. I was going to go up with an instructor and do some high work and approaches today. We were possibly going to get as high as 7000msl.

Our flight would probably have been from 2030zulu to 2230. We cancelled for weather.

I was hoping some of you might have a moment to review the weather for that time and give some insight into what others look at to help them in their go/no-go decisions.

First off, winds were pretty calm this morning despite an airmet for moderate turbulence below 12000. We've been getting those strong santa ana winds lately.

Second, there was isolated precipitation and isolated thunderstorms in the area. The breifer said that as the day went on things could thicken up or clear up -- could go either way. There were not any convective sigmets for the area.

With bases ranging from 3 - 6 thousands and tops up to 25000, the thought of isolated thunderstorms disturbed me. We have no stormscope.

Would any of you have flown? In the clouds? How about just stay clear of clouds?

Also, no pilot reports of moderate turbulence or thunderstorm activity had been filed. Two local metar stations reported towering cumulus and CB. Several others in the area reported 12000 sct.

Let me know what you all think. Also, if you need more info, let me know. Or, if you're looking at this message around 20:00 zulu perhaps you'd want to check the weather yourself.

I think it will be very interesting to read about how other pilots make these sort of judgment calls.

Thanks.

Mike

 

[Cmdr Taggart]

What was the temp at alt? Was there any icing forcasted?

 

[MYFpilot]

I flew today out of MYF about the same time with no problems. I was bummed I only had one student. It was stacking up a little out east, but it was perfect off the coast. Light turbulence below 2000 AGL was the worst it got. You could have done the OCN-CRQ-MYF loop without barely entering the clouds. Shooting the approach into RNM or SEE might have been a little more interesting but I've given dual in the mighty skyhawk with conditions much much worse. Forecast freezing level was around 9000 so no chance of ice.

How did I know the conditions would be OK for training? Simple, I've been up in similar conditions before. At 140 hrs I probably would have made the same decision as you. There is no hard and fast rule in making a go/no-go decision, it just comes from experience.

Sometimes you need to get up in conditions that are not perfect just to challenge yourself. Good piloting skills come from experience. Today was a great training day VFR or IFR, you should have gone flying. Don't let the weather briefer's scare you, because that's there job. And always remember, you're flying in San Diego!! Don't post any METAR's your likely to make anybody living east of us very angry and jealous.

 

[cookmg]

As MYFPilot said, freezing level was in the neighboorhood of 9000.

Thanks for the encouragment MYFPilot. I think it is wise for a pilot at 150 hours to error on the side of caution. However, I do want to be a pro and so inevitably I want to learn the difference between bad but acceptable and so bad you better not fly. What got me to cancel was the isolated t-storms. Thinking about it more, if we would have avoided the clouds things could have been cool. Our plane was to do the full approach into SEE so that would have been avoided. I did get something out of the day. I had a sim session which actually was fun.

Tomorrow night I'm doing an IFR X-C to SNA. Let's hope for good weather and great flight!

Any other suggestions about how to analyze the threat of isolated t-storms? Any more thoughts about this decision making process?

Thanks.

Mike

 

[toneal]

nice avater myf

 

[bobbysamd]

You are the PIC - the ball is in your court

I had students who would ask me, "Are we going to fly today?" My answer, always, was, "What do you think we should do?" Part of the learning and teaching process is the gradual transfer of responsibility from instructor to student. In other words, at the end of the course the student should be taking the instructor for an airplane ride with the instructor just being a pax.

Lots of things to consider. What was vis (which I realize can be a rhetorical question on the Coast)? Winds aloft? Objectives of the flight? If you were going to do steep turns under the hood and approaches with turb present, and you hadn't done them before in the airplane, your learning experience might have been less than fulfilling. But if you have done them before, it might have been worthwhile to try them.

You could have looked at the radar summary chart to locate cells and their movement. Nowadays, places have radar maps in real time. I agree with MYFpilot's opinion that briefers are out to scare you; their job is to encourage you not to go.

Now, if there are thunderstorms firing all over the place and unsatisfactory PIREPs (Remember that one discussion about the importance and courtesy of helping your fellow pilots by filing PIREPs, even if all is fine?), it might be better to wait another day. Personally, given what I've read, I would have gone up to at least take a look and try to get done what I could get done. You would have been with your instructor. But, that's what I would have done. As I wrote above, you are the PIC. The decision is yours.

Enjoy your X-C to SNA. We used to take our Riddlers there all the time in the soup. It's a totally awesome experience to really see the rabbit and REIL, etc., gradually become visible, as opposed to having the hood pulled off at mins.