Wow, Thunder Storms can really be an inconvenience, just an inconvenience though. Just as a bit of background, you really shouldn't fly through them. The text books say things like "Every hazard associated with flying can be found in thunder storms" or some other enchanting statement. Ice, airplane breaking turbulence, hail, gusty winds, wind shear, and lightning of course, but temporary blindness from lighting is pretty minor compared to being demolished by hail, having the airplane break up from turbulence or fall out of the sky from wind shear. For avoidance, weather radar used to cost about as much as my airplane is worth and was a gadget that only the airlines had at their disposal but now you can buy a GPS with weather radar down-linked from satellites for pennies(in airplane money its pennies anyhow). It used to be that you'd ask the controllers and they would help you if they had time, you always wondered how much then knew, how rough the ride would be, and if you really had any chance of living for another day... Well thanks to the new technology you have something more like a conversation with the controllers since you actually have something to add to the exchange. Its an awfully nice change since you really have a lot more on the line than the controller on the ground with the info.
The 4 pictures here show various views of thunderstorms, pretty much in the order I saw them. First is a side view from a good stand off distance, this is a close as you would dare going if you didn't have more info about the storms. This picture is just a baby storm, but it still has all kind of life threatening punch inside. Next is the weather radar picture with my route overlaid.
This isn't really all the info because similar to cars moving through an intersection, the weather is moving at the same time the plane is moving so it is difficult to depict a picture of a flight lasting several hours, weaving around thunderstorms, when the weather is very dynamic as it is when there is thunder out an about. The storms today were moving at around 30 knots which is pretty garden variety. From checking weather data on the ground, I have seen storms that move up to 60 knots! That means you'd have trouble out running them in your car! The third picture shows what it looked like as I was landing near a storm that was running out of gas.
Dark sky, rain but very little turbulence and wind. The last is my little bird sitting on the ramp basking in the storm that allowed us to live another day.
Anyway, today's trip was made possible by XM Satellite weather. I hope they don't go under. You can see from the picture above, I found my way around the ugly stuff with relative ease, I didn't do it all on my own, the controllers helped immensely. I got a much later start today than I wanted but even departing DC around Noon I managed to get half way across the country. Not too shabby. With a little luck I should make it to my new home, San Diego, by dinner time. Game on.
