Irony and ADM

Where does irony meet ADM (aeronautical decision-making)? For me, it's when you're getting a rating designed to make you capable of flying in clouds, but the weather is still too low to get off the ground.

All kidding aside, today was a nasty day in Waco (and most of north-central Texas, from what the METARs are reporting). Parker (the guy I'm going to CFI for) and I had breakfast this morning. He was itching for some actual, and I was more than willing to go along for the ride. We kept watching the METARs and most of the area was reporting OVC0010 and 1SM (overcast at 100 feet and 1 statute mile visibility for you non-pilot types).

Couple of hours later, we got some reports of overcast at 400 and 3 miles visibility. This put us well within minimums for PWG's VOR 17 and even more within minimums for ACT's ILS 19 approach (ILS approaches incorporate a glideslope for you to fly, so they almost always have lower minimums, close to 200 feet off the deck).

Off we race to the airport. We get 50G out of the hangar and preflighted. By the time we get into the cockpit, we can't even see the runway sign for 4-22, about 1/2 mile away. ASOS is calling about 1 mile and 100 ft, but this stuff has been moving around all day. We taxi out to 35 (nearest calm wind runway) and can't even see the 1000 foot hatchmarks. Being the self-preserving living creatures that we are, we scrubbed and took it back to the FBO.

Needless to say, my instruction flight for tonight also got scrubbed, and tomorrow morning isn't looking good either (freezing rain possible). So, I'm on the ground till Thursday, probably. Oh well, good excuse to work on ground school stuff and maybe actually pay a little bit of attention to grad school stuff.

Not flying sucks, but I won't lament the weather. I'll just say that irony and good ADM won the day.

"It's better to be down here wishing you were up there, than up there wishing you were down here." ---Anonymous