When the heavens open again

Different day, different crew, different place but very much the same theme as my last post. I wrote it a while ago but then lost it in my flight bag for a while.

The sun has set behind us as we race towards Kuching. Singapore Radar says good bye and Kuching Radar says hello. The super advanced weather radar is telling me that our destination is sitting right under a very active raincloud, and the HUGE clouds which are now barely visible in the dwindling sunlight confirm this. I ask for 20 miles off track to avoid the worst of it.

...

10 minutes and 20 000ft later we're getting into the thick of it. Weather avoidance has become futile - the best I can do is avoid the red bits on the radar. Outside the rain is giving us a good planewash and the odd embedded CB I can't avoid massages the passengers, quite forcefully at times. We eventually clear the worst of the weather and accept vectors for final. The weather radar is telling us the approach and landing should be dry-ish. We have flown 30 extra miles by now.

...

Director turns us onto final approach at 12 miles and I intercept the localiser and glide path at the same time, just as we reach the interception altitude. I always get a kick out of flying a constant descent and keeping the engines at idle and even the weather hasn't ruined it too badly today. The runway appears ahead of us and it looks like this will be an uneventful approach.

...

4 miles from touch down and I realise this won't be an uneventful approach. Surface winds are reported calm yet I'm flying straight into 25knots which can only mean that there is a big nasty thunder cell nearby. There suddenly is a whole lot of red right over the runway and some drops are hitting the windscreen. My senses are on high alert for any sign of windshear.

100ft above the ground and the few drops are now a torrential downpour. The wipers are flapping uselessly and the rain repellant (some sort of goo that should make it easier to see out when it's raining) is not working - as usual. All I can see is a blur of light either side where the runway edges should be and a whole lot of black everywhere else. Head down, I fly the ILS to 50 feet then flare on the radio altimeter half expecting the resulting landing to break my back ... and it doesn't. The touch down is beautiful and more or less on centreline - although I can't see any sign of it. Full reverse, full brakes and we're off a few seconds later.

...

After shutting down (20 minutes later because of a gate mixup - but that's another story) I discuss the landing with the captain. He reckons we had about 1000m visibility on touch down and we both agree that it was a rather unpleasant final approach. The rain thunders down for another 15 minutes then suddenly stops, as if someone switched off a tap somewhere. Take-off back to Singapore is uneventful, most of the nasty weather has gone to play elsewhere.

S.

When the heavens open...

I can see the CB drift in as I prepare the aircraft, willing the ground staff to get on with it and allow us to depart early. The huge mass of very dark, almost black cloud is slowly but steadily moving towards the airfield.

...

I call for pushback clearance as the first drops are starting to fall. This will be tight. In the 3 minutes it takes us to push, start the engines and get the checks done the few drops have turned into a steady shower. Tower has just reported a 180˚ change in wind direction, and the intensity is increasing rapidly. Taxi please.

We reach the holding point, #2 for departure. The departure path looks very unpleasant. A company 320 backtracks the runway from the far end where it had been almost ready to go before the 20kt tailwind appears. Just as it starts to roll the heavens really open up and the visibility drops to 2000, 1000 then only 500 meters. That's 500 meters in RAIN. The plane is shaking from the power of the gusts and I feel like I'm sitting in a car wash.

...

20 minutes later it's still raining hard. 2 aircraft have gone around, one has diverted, there are 3 of us on the ground waiting to depart. The rain eases slightly and the other side of the airfield reappears - the visibility is about 1-2000 meters now. Side ways glance, nod, and I call ready.

Lining up I can see maybe 1/3 of the 3000 meter runway. Not a lot but well above our minimums. The runway looks like a swimming pool. Take off.

Hundred Knots! I think to myself that I can't really see much runway at all - the rain is completely defeating the wipers which are frantically flapping up and down and outside is just a blur of grey with some light either side.

Vee-one, rotate! Thank goodness we are flying now - no runway edge to worry about, just the menace of downdrafts and windshear. With TOGA power set and the gear stowed away the rather light 'bus powers into the sky.

...

5 minutes later we are at FL140, 20 miles from the airport and the sky ahead is a clear summer blue with only a few little clouds here and there. The muscles in my legs start to loosen and I stop squeezing the side stick. Captain K is also looking a little more relaxed now, the take off was bad enough for me as pilot monitoring - actually keeping the bus on the very badly lit runway (which we couldn't see) in a 20 knot crosswind (which we could feel) can't have been much fun.

...

Landing at destination, only 100 miles away, is in CAVOK weather. The return leg is only slightly bumpy and by the time we're back the monster CB, 50 miles by 30 miles, has gone to play elsewhere. I see the runway at 12 miles and grease a landing on what is now only a slightly damp runway. Yet another day in the topics.

S.

Eyjafjallajökull

I think everyone who isn't living in a cave knows about this now - how one medium sized volcano in Iceland can take Europe's travel options back 100 years. This pesting volcano (excuse the language) has affected me personally, I was scheduled to fly on one of the first flights that got cancelled and now my 2 weeks off at home are very much in danger of evaporating.

There are a few reasons why this volcano is affecting travel so much more than others in the past.

1. For reasons I don't fully understand, but are related to ice and snow, the ash plume is getting propagated into the higher atmosphere - the place modern aeroplanes hang around - with stunning violence. The ash also seems to be extremely fine and lightweight which means it could remain airborne for weeks or months.
2. There is a jetstream - a high speed current of wind - located roughly over the volcano which snakes it's way towards the North sea before dying out, and there is little movement over Europe itself. Think of a strong river pouring in to a rather stagnant estuary.
3. The affects of ash are not very well documented other than the fact that they ruin gas turbine engines. As no one really knows what intensity is considered a cut off between 'safe' and 'unsafe', and there is very little data available about the actual intensity of the ash floating over Europe.

Through reading forums and news comments a lot of people are mentioning that volcanos erupt all the time in Italy, Japan, Indonesia, and aviation barely takes any notice. This is because either the volcano isn't powerful enough to propel it's ash into the atmosphere, the ash is thick enough to fall to the ground in a fairly limited radius and there are no strong winds overhead to move the ash quickly.

Until one of the three points above is removed from the equation I doubt conditions will change much in Europe - infact as the air in the "estuary" area slowly moves, and ash continues to be fed in, the volume of closed airspace will increase as the ash propagates slowly... As I doubt there will be any breakthroughs in ash knowledge in the next few days we can only hope that the wind conditions change and/or the eruption becomes less intense... But the high pressure is forecast to last well into the week.

S.

What visibility?!

It's Saturday morning, my second morning after 3 days off. I'm flying with a Captain I know well on a brand new, healthy aircraft. The sky is completely clear and the weather forecasts are optimistic ... I'm thinking this will be a good, easy day flying to Singapore via Kuching.

We board quickly and depart 10 minutes ahead of schedule and are granted unrestricted climb to FL380 and more or less direct to destination, there even is a nice 30kt tailwind pushing us along through the clear blue sky. I'm thinking this is a good start, and things can only get better right?

40 minutes later the Captain has just checked Kuching's ATIS. Visibility 200 meters, overcast 100ft. The look on his face is indescribable: "what was the forecast?!" I fumble for the weather... "unlimited visibility, CAVOK" So much for optimistic weather forecasts...

A few miles later Kuching Director confirms the conditions ... the visibility is now 600 meters but that still is below our minima of 800m. We decide to hold for a while to see if this surprise fog will burn off. As I plan the diversion I'm starting to think today isn't really a good day after all. Kuching comes into view about 50 miles ahead and it looks like a winter wonderland with the rather steep cartoonish hills poking out of a very low layer of cloud which is inconveniently sitting on the ground.

Just as we reach the holding fix the visibility increases to 800 meters (or minima) so we decide to give it a try and get vectored onto the ILS. It's still a beautiful clear day at 3000ft but instead of seeing ground when I look down I see cloud, which isn't normal.

1000ft descending on the ILS and we're still above the layer of cloud but there are holes here and there through which I can see bits of a city - the odd road, half a house, etc.

We enter the cloud at 500ft - the lowest we can descend to is 245ft before going around - and right on cue at minima there is a tiny gap in the clouds and the runway comes into sight so we continue and land, smoothly, 15 minutes ahead of schedule and I have enough time to go for a walk in the terminal and find some breakfast. Today is a good day.

Throughout the approach we were constantly seconds from holding/going-around/diverting when the weather conditions changed and allowed us to continue - as if the whole thing was a well scripted suspense novel. I only wish I had remembered to get the camera out of the bag and film it all.

S.

Real weather

Settling in at my new base in Borneo. The letter said I would be here at least 6 months but if I compare the lifestyle here to that of KL there really is no reason to ever leave.

Today was my third and last day, and as a payback for only working 3 in a row I got to do 6 sectors on two of those days. Some people may think all the landings and take-offs are fun but I can honestly say the amount of paperwork versus flying makes it a very very bad deal. The weather today - huge thunderstorms pouring down enough water to flood the sahara desert - didn't help much either.

This thing was sitting over the airport when we left, and an hour and a half later it hadn't gone far. Picture taken from about 60 nautical miles (100km) at FL110.

S.

Hmmm...

Arriving into Brunei there was plenty of colour on the radar but the airport itself looked clear and I was able to go visual from about 7 miles. As I touched down (softly) the heavens opened up and it started to pour. Cats and dogs, and probably elephants too. It rained throughout the turnaround, so much so that the aerobridge anti-drip whatever-it's-called couldn't cope and the poor passengers had to walk through a shower to get onboard. I could't help but think of that song "the rain in spain falls mostly in the plane" as it was sort of raining inside the aircraft.

As we pushed a Royal Brunei 767 bound for London taxied down runway 21 to depart from the other (03) end... We didn't think much of it and requested taxi for 21 as it was the advertised runway. As we were taxying another Royal Brunei 767 departed 03 ... Hmmm.

Ah. Quite. As we lined up and switched on the radar we found ourselves looking at lots and lots and lots of red in the departure path of runway 21. It was the sort of red that had killed people in the past, so we also taxied all the way to the other end, span around and departed 03 with an insignificant tailwind. Next time I'll pay more attention to aircraft departing the "wrong" runway, especially when the weather gods are playing around.

Arriving into K-L 2 hours later we were given an especially outstanding display of lightning and ATC incompetence, but that's another story for another day.

The landings are getting much better, I have managed to log 20h in the last 4 days.

S.

Windshear

We were on final for runway 32L. The the radar picture on the navigation display looked like a child's colouring book, with greens, yellows, reds and even some purple here and there.

There was a nice sploch of red (thundercell) on the approach path about 3 miles from the runway and it was producing the most powerful rain I have ever seen.

The wind was 320/25 gusting 30. Strong, but right down the runway.

We saw the approach lights about 2 miles out, and the swimming pool of a runway shortly afterwards. We already knew this would be an interesting landing and we were all psyched up: positive touchdown, full reverse, pay close attention to directional control and braking at all times.

"Two Hundred - Minimum" - "Visual, continue"

"One Hudred"

Then it happened, like magic the wind shifted 30° left and we shifted 50 feet right so that we were approaching the runway edge lighting rather than the centreline. It was too late to make a heroic sideslip and continuing could have meant putting one wheel in the mud. Captain called "go-around" and we did, as the radar altimeter read 75 feet.

We went around, calmed down and landed 10 minutes later without further ado. The aircraft ahead of us and behind us didn't feel anything.

There's a saying in aviation that you haven't committed to a landing until the airplane is too slow to fly. How true.

S.