As I got everything situated, I made sure to charge the cameras so I could try out a new idea I came up with for some of the flight videos. My intentions were to fly from Leesburg (JYO) to Winchester (OKV), land a couple times, and then head back to JYO. It's a short flight, but it's all I need. I have a big trip coming up soon that I've been saving for, so as you may have noticed, I've trimmed a lot from the flight budget to accomplish that.
...and everyone says you can save a ton of money if you quit smoking.
In any case, I was pretty excited even to get a shorter flight in and have my night currency for passenger carriage back. After parking at the airport and shutting the car down, I could hear the wind howling as I glanced up at the flags in front of the terminal. I pulled up the latest weather on my phone as I was sitting there.
KJYO 292255Z AUTO 30015G23KT 10SM OVC035 05/01 A2963 RMK AO2
For the non-fliers reading this, the important part in that METAR (Meteorological Terminal Aviation Routine Weather Report) is the 30015G23KT. That's wind coming from 300 (northwest) at 15 knots, gusting to 23 knots. Wind like that is strong enough to give you a hard time without the gusts, but it being at a 50 degree angle from the runway's direction makes things even more difficult. The TAF (Terminal Aerodrome Forecast) said the wind was supposed to die down as the night went on, so I went inside to get everything situated and get a look at the weather station inside that updates more frequently.
The weather station inside showed a similar story, and the wind at OKV was just as bad. Soon enough, the station showed the wind dying pretty steadily, and when it hit 9 knots I took my stuff and walked outside. By the time I had gotten out to the plane again, however, the wind wasn't just stronger, it was also more erratic. I pulled out my phone again to confirm and saw this:
KJYO 292335Z AUTO 32017G25KT 270V330 10SM BKN039 OVC046 05/00 A2966 RMK AO2
Again, for the non-fliers, you know what the 32017G25KT means, but the piece right after it - 270V330 - is saying that the wind is out of anywhere from due west to north-northwest. It was at that point that I pulled out a sticky note out of my bag and wrote "didn't take the plane up: wind 17G25." I locked the plane up, stuck the note in the book, dropped the book back in the overnight box, and drove home.
There are a ton of overused sayings in aviation, but a lot of them are overused because we often need to be reminded of them. As I sat in my car convincing myself I made the right call, one of my least hated overused phrases came to mind: "Every takeoff is optional. Every landing is mandatory." I was really sure I could taxi out and take off safely, but a safe landing was questionable. I was able to put a plane on the ground on a small runway with 12G21 direct crosswind a month ago, but that was in the middle of the day. As much as I like night flying, landing at night offers its own challenges.
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| ...especially when someone jacks the lights up to their brightest when you're on short final. |
Up until this point, my decision to remain on the ground was always a made between me and another person. Initially, it was a flight instructor and myself. Since then, it's often been between a friend of mine and myself. This time, it was all on me.
If you doubt yourself, don't go. If you're anything like myself, there's a significant amount of pride that's associated with how you fly. Sitting in the car admitting that the wind was too much of a risk for me to handle did seem like I was admitting I wasn't good enough. Similar to a memorable quote from Abe Lincoln, I prefer to look at it like this:
Better to remain on the ground and be thought an amateur than to take off and remove all doubt.
If you doubt yourself, don't go. If you're anything like myself, there's a significant amount of pride that's associated with how you fly. Sitting in the car admitting that the wind was too much of a risk for me to handle did seem like I was admitting I wasn't good enough. Similar to a memorable quote from Abe Lincoln, I prefer to look at it like this:
