Here comes my roommate along with other fellows, back from Melbourne beach. I wonder how they did, but according to him, they have managed to get wet by nothing but the ocean. The rain must have missed them. Lucky guys.
I was lucky, too, today; but not for making it home dry, but making it to land safe (or should I say “alive”? No, not that much). Actually, today was good for anything but flight practices; particularly landings. Me and my instructor, however, were in the air; unaware of trouble forming up ahead of us. The “METAR” (one of the weather information sources for pilots) was not looking bad. Also, since we were going to stay local; the scattered clouds at 1500 ft. with a 10-SM visibility would not be an issue for a dual flight (1). We took off under my control with good visibility, turned southbound and flew to the practice area, which is roughly 20 NM to the airport. I was, as usual, struggling to keep the horn beeping and stay coordinated during my slow flights, as well as remaining at the same altitude during steep turns. Common stuff for a student pilot, trying to convince his instructor to release him for the “stage check” exams.
It is also common for all VFR pilots, who use outside visual references during flight, to encounter clouds. Students are no exception for this. Depending on the airspaces they are in, it is usually ok for them as long as they keep certain vertical and horizontal distances from these seemingly innocent, puffy, white objects. On the other hand, what we saw in front of us while flying southbound was neither white, nor innocent. I asked my instructor about turning back and received a definitely positive answer. We were looking at a developing thunderstorm!
Thunderstorm - We were higher than that, though! |
Microburst - Only if it were as apparent as this... |
KLMB - Runway 27L We landed on the long runway, as the biz-jet used the shorter 27R. First-come first-served, huh? |
While we took the final approach to the airport, I saw some small particles whirling around in front of us, as the tower’s warning for a small tornado over the runway was heard on the radio. Right before Kyle decided for a go-around, the plane twisted 50 degrees off of its heading. Avoiding the aproaching traffic toward the 27R, we made a 180 turn to the left. The tower’s next transmission was the small tornado seemed to disappear. It was time for another attempt, which needed to be executed quickly, since the storm was getting close.
Reminding me about the wind correction and the gust factor to be applied during the final approach, Kyle kept the flaps at 25 degrees, throttle at around 1600 RPM and the airspeed at around 80 knots. He banked to the right a little during the approach, a standart crosswind landing technique called “side slip”. I swear, I barely noticed that we had actually landed while touching down on the right-main wheel first, the left one second and the nose finally. During breaking, he yelled like “right on the center line!”. A moment of celebration happened in the cockpit.
Over radio, the tower was chatting with a Delta Airlines jet which had just landed on our parallel runway, as all small airplanes were taxiing back the hell out of that weather. I wonder how Endeavor will take off tomorrow…
Edit: Endeavor's launch is scheduled for 16th of May, not on Sunday.
Edit: Endeavor's launch is scheduled for 16th of May, not on Sunday.
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(1) Flight with instructor.