Leveraging the (meteorological) Cesspool that is the Central Valley

So I "had" to get to Redding, CA from home base in San Diego on Monday December 29. The winds aloft forecast depending on the source and altitude varied from 30 to 60 knots nearly straight on the nose. Turning what would normally be a 3:15 flight into something close to 5 hrs... at 5 hrs I might as well get a car right? Below are the winds at 6000, even down low at 6000 there are areas enroute with 25-30 knots winds:

All was not lost, after some informed decisions with altitudes we made the trip in 3:36 despite the headwinds. Why? Because the Central Valley of California is a meteorological cesspool. I make no commentary on the CV otherwise but with towering mountains in nearly every direction air tends to get trapped and there isn't much wind, usually. This was the case on Monday afternoon and I was able to take advantage of the stagnant low level air in the CV to get to my destination faster.

My usual wisdom for the RV-8 is that higher is better, even if that means dealing with a strong headwind. The air is thinner and for the same fuel burn the plane will go faster. This flight was an exception.

The first part of the flight I had to get over the LA airspace and that forces you to either follow preplanned routes through their airspace or go over at 10,000 feet or higher. I opted to go higher which gave me a headwind of around 30 knots. After I crossed the Tehachapi Mountains I was able to descent into the CV where the headwind turned into a tailwind at times.

The amazing thing is that there was a Cessna 210 that flying the same direction as me. The normally aspirated C-210 has about the same cruise speed as my RV-8 but this driver decided not to descend into the CV and I left him in the dust. Below is an annotated plan and profile view of the flight:

Also noteworthy in the first part of this flight I traversed an area with mountain wave. There are plenty of other places that cover what wave is but for this conversation I'll just say that downwind of a mountain, mountain range or ridge, above the level of the ridge, sometimes you find areas of air that are rising(lift) and falling(sink). These areas are situated in bands perpendicular to the wind direction(parallel to the producing ridge). Think of the air "bouncing" as is goes down wind. So in this case I encountered mountain wave created by the Tehachapi Mountains. The autopilot(or manual pilot) response to this is usually to hold altitude. Holding altitude in this situation results in speeding up in lift and slowing down in sink. If you are trying to go from point A to B through a wave area this might be the worst possible strategy. You go slow in the falling air spending the most time trying to out climb the sink and then you dive quickly through the rising are. In this case I was seeing variations of 60 knots true airspeed. Another approach to get your power plane through a wave area faster is to intelligently allow altitude to vary rather than trying to maintain altitude. The glider pilots might call this "porpoising", flying the "McCready Speed" or maintaining the Speed to fly. Generally, the idea for a glider is to spend more time in rising air and as little as possible in stagnant or falling air. For a given set of conditions there is an ideal speed to fly a glider, generally fast in sink and slow in lift but you can get very technical and figure out exactly what the optimal speed is. You don't need to take it to that extreme but if you allow the plane to rise when you encounter an area of lift and then descend in the sink you will end up with a higher overall speed through the wave area. Depending upon your desired direction of travel relative to wind you may be able to alter your course left or right a few miles and pick lots of extra airspeed. 

Beware though, I didn't mention that under the crest of each wave, at about the altitude of the producing ridge you will find truly horrendous, potentially life threatening, potentially airplane breaking, very much so "spouse will never fly with you again" turbulence called the rotor. Also, even if you're above the the rotor you may not be able to out climb the sink, sometimes the air will sink at 5000 feet per minute! You've been warned!

All of this high level flow was a precursor to a winter storm coming and I forgot to mention that we "had" to make our way back the next morning... So here is what the prog chart looked like in the morning:

That cold front passed Norcal overnight and it along with the low pressure system was also kicking up some serious winds in Redding: gusting to 39 knots when we took off at 7AM. The outside air temp at 6500 feet was a balmy 17 F(-8 C). You'll notice that the cold front is located right at the southern end of the cesspool, I mean Central Valley. Cold fronts are masses of cold air moving in the direction of those blue pointy things. Cold fronts travel along the ground because cold air descends so it consequently lifts the warmer air ahead of it. Meanwhile at temps below 20 F(-7) my RV-8 becomes uncomfortably cold. Keep those things in mind.

Here is the wind situation at 12000:

So going home I can pick up a huge tailwind if I can just get up to 12000 and stay a little west of the direct route but it might be really cold up there... What to do?

Well, firstly always have an out. The central valley had good weather because the cold front passage cleared the cesspool out. The weather at the actual cold front, as expected was bad, ice, low clouds, rain. Once we got to the area of the cold front we were forced to either bag it or climb over. The unknowns here are how high, how cold and for how long? 

Flight service tells us that all the stations from the front south are reporting overcast skies so that means that if we can't go on instruments to descend into our destination then we must turn around and land in the CV. We(pilot and plane) are instrument rated so we go for it, climb over the cold front and find out that it is clear above 10000 and even better, just as advertised in the meteo books, the cold front lifted the warm air ahead of it, so after freezing my tokus off at 6500 in 17 F(-8C) I'm up at 11500 in 39 F(4C) basking in the warm sunshine. This is exactly the opposite of a usual temp profile during a climb: all things being equal every 1000 feet climbed should reduce the temperature by roughly 3 degrees but cheerfully there are exceptions and this was one of them.

We(PAX, Pilot and Plane) shot the instrument approach back in to home base and we(wife and I) made it to work by 11 AM. 

Not a bad 22 hr trip.

Run to Avalon

Get in Shape! 

Date: November 8, 2014
Time: 11:00 AM
Place: KAVX

Does this look familiar? Then, do something About it! 

Big Thanks to Randy Martinez for the image!

I challenge any and all GA pilots and passengers to meet me at 11:00 AM on November 8 at Catalina airport to run or jog down ~10 miles to Avalon, swim in the ocean a little bit, and grab a bite to eat with me and anyone else who shows up. The route looks like this. Note: There is about a 1500 ft drop in elevation on this route, there is a bus from the town to get back to the airport.

It will be interesting to see how big the intersection is between runners and pilots. I'm not a fast runner by any means but I'm going to give it my best.

Why?

Setting a date for a long run and inviting everyone I know will force me to train, keep the weight off, stay healthy, and fly another year. I think this is something any of us can benefit from. Most flying activities we do aren't very active or healthy in nature... like flying for a hour, eating a second breakfast, with a second helping of bacon, and flying an hour home... Here is an opportunity to fly and do something good for your body.

Disclaimer:
This is an unsponsored, unsupported, no host event. I'm providing nothing but encouragement and expecting nothing but your best effort. Any takers of this challenge should expect to offer up the same. If you need water, gatorade, chocolate, caffeine, morphine or anything else you should bring that with you. There will be no water stops, no sag wagon, and no trophies provided.

Running is tough, and flying is a mentally and physically demanding activity. If you don't currently run this sort of distance with relative ease and want to do this I suggest consulting your doctor and doing one of Hal Higdon's fantastic training schedules. Running and flying are dangerous, be responsible, do not participate if you are going to put yourself or your passengers in any danger whatsoever.

See you there!

Hypothetically Speaking...

Someone, or some people, from Seaford High School in Seaford, Delaware, presumably in the graduating class of '94, surreptitiously painted a giant "94" on the roof of the high school. Aerial photos of the giant rooftop "94" were published in the local newspaper, but the culprits were never punished. 20 years later, I'd like to postulate how, hypothetically, this could have been done.

You can't do this during the day. It must be done at night and you'd need three nights to complete it. The job is too big for one person reasonably, so it would require two malefactors.

First, measurements of the roof would need to be made. 1994 predates widespread use of the internet so Google Earth/Satellite-based measurements would be out. Sneaking satellite maps out of some secret agency would have been far riskier than a mission to measure the roof. If you wanted to get on the roof, the easiest way to do so would be to climb on top of the freezer outside the cafeteria and then make your way to the roof top. Trivial. Looking at Google maps I'd estimate the dimensions to be about 35x75 feet. Tools needed for the first night: tape measure. This would be a two person job for one hour, maybe less.

The measurements could then be laid out on graph paper, (computer aided design would have been beyond the dastardly miscreants' reach in 1994) and then reasonable dimensions could be made for the characters. The geometry of the roof would dictate that the characters be almost square rather than rectangular, so making it look "good" would be challenging. Geometry and trig would come in handy for scaling from graph paper and drawing a giant "4". The "9" presents a more difficult challenge, the round part is an ellipse, so you'd have to do a bit more algebra to calculate the foci of the inner and outer ellipses making up the "9" with the intent of using the "pins and string" method of drawing a 35 foot wide ellipse. I imagine making constant the ~7 foot width of the line making up the ellipse of the "9" would be challenging, skills that the perpetrator(s) may have picked up from Mrs. R.R or Mr. D.G in that very same building. Not a bad final exam given that so many school days were missed in the harsh winter that final exams were canceled for seniors that year.

After developing a reasonable layout on graph paper, measurements could be scaled up, and markings could be made on the roof using something like an upside down marking spray paint along with the "strings and pins" method of drawing an ellipse and using the same line for a giant straight edge. Tools needed for the second night: tape measure, spray paint, rope. This would be a two person job for two hours.

Finally, the criminals would have to figure out how to actually paint the "94" and paint rollers might come to mind. They might even have tried rollers and found that they get bogged down in the stones on the roof. From there they'd have to return to "Crime Central" and borrow something like an airless paint sprayer and extension cord from a now complicit parent who may have caught them returning to regroup. They would need a means to power the sprayer. They could take apart one of the ventilation fans and then access the power with a homemade version of something like this alligator clip to AC outlet converter. From there, painting inside the lines would have been a task probably picked up in kindergarten for at least one of the perps, maybe not both. Tools needed for the third night: airless paint sprayer, paint, alligator to AC outlet converter. This would take approximately eight hours, nearly all night during that time of year.

The rope used for the ellipse and straight lines could have been used to take supplies on and off the roof. Regrettably, it may have broken bringing down the only unused can of paint, leading to something less than a gallon of paint splattering on the grass outside of the back of the school by the tennis courts.

Shortly thereafter the offenders would probably have rented a skydiving plane with the door removed to get pictures of the giant "94" on film, that would then have to be developed and submitted on paper, by hand, to the Seaford Leader which doesn't even exist any more. My how times have changed.

All in all a lot of effort for a prank that hardly anyone saw directly and that in this day and age could have easily been faked by a 12 year old. It was also mildly audacious or perhaps foolhardy given that the police station was across the street. At the time the prank was heralded as anything from genius to heinous but the overall impact was minimal at most, but as Mr. B.D. said just before the class of 1994 shuffled out to get their diplomas we "put the 94 where Mr. Baltz could see it." I sure miss Mr. Baltz.

Sometimes Airplanes are Stinky...

So after traveling to Mexico three times to see the whales, twice to go kitesurfing and once scuba diving I decided I had this sort of thing dialed in and that I could easily knock out the whales trip in a day. Previously I had always planned at least a weekend, and everything went off without a hitch. The whole idea of having an airplane is to squeeze more from your life right? A few weeks ago the plan was to take a 6-passenger plane, a Cherokee Six, loaded to the gills with friends and check out the whales in Guerrero Negro rather than Laguna San Ignacio as I have done in the past.

All indications were that the whale watching in Guerrero Negro was just as good as Laguna San Ignacio but the Guerrero Negro routing would be short enough to only have to stop for fuel in San Felipe where as the Laguna San Ignacio route  with the Cherokee Six would have to stop in Loreto to get fuel in addition to San Felipe. Nothing like going 110 miles further than you wanted to go just for lack of fuel.

Flying in Baja is dominated by worries about getting fuel. In an attempt to squash the drug trade the Mexican government decided to tightly control where you can get fuel. Generally the only places that sell fuel are international airports. If flying has not forced you to become a logistician, then flying in Baja will. Luckily the RV-8 has a fantastic range so I haven't had to stop at Loreto for fuel, but even still, careful planning will let you avoid getting stuck somewhere with no fuel and not enough fuel to get to where there is fuel. That is a harsh place to be.

Well, the weekend where I had lined up the Cherokee Six approached and then entered the horizon of the 10 day forecast. That forecast was also accompanied by fanfare of some relief in the drought that the west has been experiencing... So small airplanes and weather can mix but this mix must be done carefully, throw in 5 passengers and crossing the mountains a few times and you've got something really interesting on your hands. At this point I had spent significant time and money getting prepped to confidently take 5 passengers to go see the whales in Mexico... so I really wanted this trip to work. When the time came to go the forecast was just ugly, if the flight were to happen at all it would have been very turbulent but what really killed the flight was the potential for icing. Ice can bring down any plane, in a little plane with no icing protection to speak of it's a non starter. So I called the flight off, I should have called it off earlier, the other plane that was planning on doing the same itinerary call it off on Friday, wishful thinking pushed me through till Saturday AM.

So we canceled, and my wife and I resolved to give it another try in 2 weeks along with the other plane. The friends I had initially lined up to fill all the seats of the Cherokee had other commitments so we decided to just take the RV-8. A few days before the trip the other plane's pilot ended up with the flu so they canceled.

Now it was just us going to see the whales, my plane is a bit faster than the other that was planning on going so... back to my earlier idea of squeezing more from life, we decided to make a day trip out of it rather than stay overnight in Guerrero Negro. The plan wasn't too onerous, if we woke up at 6 AM we could easily be at Guerrero Negro by 10 AM, 1 hr before the tour starts.

30 minutes out of Gillespie, and well into Mexico now, my wife starts to complain of nausea from the turbulence and asks if we can turn back, at this point I don't think I can with out rankling some feathers with US customs. I do my best to work our way out of the turbulence and we land 30 minutes later at San Felipe. Even though I planned for a hour on the ground 30 minutes and one "turbulence can't hurt you" pep talk later and we are on our way to Guerrero Negro. The flight isn't too bad, we fly high, and for the most part it's a smooth flight.

After landing we find the taxi we ordered isn't there so we call and by 10 AM we are at the tour operators rendezvous point and restaurant. Once there the man I pay for the tour mentions something about the Minister of Tourism being in town, some roads being blocked and potential delays. I do some quick calculations and we can tolerate about 3 hrs of delays before we have to start worrying about getting stuck at San Felipe because Mexico looks suspiciously at flying after the sun goes down.

So we wait and have a wonderful breakfast in the amazingly authentic restaurant attached to the tour operator.

2 hrs pass and I finally talk to a woman tour guide on the phone and she tells me that they, along with all the guests from the morning tour, are trapped in the area where they put the boats in the water, the security folks won't let them go past a certain gate, and they have no idea when they will get out.

So that was it, we grabbed a taxi and went back to the airport, flew to San Felipe to clear customs out of Mexico, flew to Brown Field to clear US customs and then we were back home sipping margaritas by 5:30 PM wondering what we should have done differently...

In retrospect if we got off the ground at Guerrero Negro before Sunset would could have flown back to Ensenada and filed an instrument flight back to Brown, maybe anyhow... we also could have been stuck somewhere along the line.

We saw amazing beaches and beautiful mountains but that has all become a bit old hat... All along there were obstacles to doing this trip, we overcame all of the ones in our control, some might say that they were all signals that we should have just bagged it right there. Although if the trip yesterday, or 2 weeks ago, actually happened as planned then those obstacles would have just been thrown in the category of character building and the normal frustrations of getting anything done in life. Nothing worth doing in life is a sure thing and nothing fulfilling in life comes easy. My perspective is we were just unlucky... but I also don't know when I want to try to do this trip again...