It's a situation you really don't ever want to be in. Well before you're handed the keys to an airplane, an instructor is supposed to have drilled the idea of proper planning for just about anything into your head. That's all nice information for your average fly-by-day weekend warrior, but it becomes even more important to your instrument flight rules fliers: running out of fuel and not being able to see the ground doesn’t quite give you a fighting chance to set down somewhere forgiving.
I, of course, strapped into a plane, knowing the weather was low even at the departure airport, and set off for an airport buried in mountains. The only thought in my mind when planning fuel was "the flight takes about 50 minutes, so two hours of fuel looks good." Why? That’s the value I generally always use to get there. I didn’t give any thought to hold fuel, alternate fuel, or contingency fuel, which ended up getting me close to trouble.
Here’s how it all shook out:
One of my favorite routes is Dulles (IAD) to Roanoke (ROA) and back. It’s short, and when the weather isn’t ideal – read as “less than nice, but not terrible” – you often have to shoot a somewhat challenging LDA approach that brings you down a valley. Even at the departure airport, though, things weren’t particularly nice.
KIAD 170152Z 00000KT 2SM -DZ BR OVC005 11/10 A3027 RMK AO2 SLP250 P0000 T01060100
For the non-pilots reading this, that's a wonderful combination of low clouds and low visibility, due to drizzle and mist. This makes approaching and landing at an airport more difficult than normal.
Of course, I paid little attention to the fact that bad weather at IAD often means worse weather down near ROA. Sadly, that’s something I should know all too well, having spent four years near ROA while at Virginia Tech. Moreover, one of those years included a trip back to Tech in this same month of November where Interstate 81 got shut down due to an accident caused by poor weather. I chose the Blue Ridge Parkway as an alternate route, assuming it was something others wouldn’t think of, and would choose Route 11 instead. Unfortunately, the November weather was all too similar, and I ended up crawling along the Parkway in heavy fog. My assumption that nobody would be driving on it proved correct, however.
That lesson was apparently forgotten. Had I bothered to check the weather, I would’ve seen this:
KROA 170254Z 14003KT 1/2SM FG VV002 11/11 A3025 RMK AO2 SLP244 60001 T01110111 56004 $
Again, for the non-pilots, that’s worse visibility than at IAD, because of fog. Beyond that, I would’ve also checked a few alternates around ROA to be sure I could land there if the weather at ROA was too bad. Alas, I did not.
Everything was normal until I got closer to ROA and finally decided to check the weather. Even then I didn’t really put the weather together with the minimums on the charted approaches (the weather was below the minimums for all of the approaches at ROA). As I got closer to the airspace controlled by ROA Approach, the controller restated the weather and asked my intentions. My response was what most pilots say while still in denial: “we’ll give it a shot and head to an alternate if we can’t make it in.”
At that point, I reduced my thrust to slow the aircraft down in hopes that arriving later would mean the weather would clear up some. This move ended up costing me extra fuel though that I really didn't have, as I didn’t add any contingency fuel. Of course, had I actually looked at the forecast I would’ve seen that the move was futile, as weather wasn’t supposed to improve until the following morning.
Getting closer to ROA, I started looking at the weather at other fields:
KBCB 170255Z AUTO 00000KT 1 3/4SM BR OVC016 11/11 A3025 RMK AO2
KPSK 170255Z AUTO 00000KT 10SM OVC013 11/11 A3024 RMK AO2
Since Blacksburg (BCB) was a little closer, I chose to try an approach there, despite the lower visibility. I flew the LOC/DME Runway 12 approach, which is an approach I’ve flown before outside of the sim, one snowy February day in a Cessna 207. I flew it down to the minimums twice before deciding to try somewhere else, making nervous glances at my fuel on the second approach. Having looked at Pulaski (PSK) before, I decided to try an approach there.The ILS Z Runway 6 approach into PSK was nice and easy. With the glideslope and increased visibility, I was able to spot the approach lights while still pretty far out with no issue.
By the time I’d landed, I had about 45 minutes of fuel left, so I ended up landing with a reasonable amount. The issue, however, is that it all came down to chance. I got lucky that the weather at PSK was as good as it was. Had it not been that good, 45 minutes of fuel may not have been enough to get to another destination, make an approach, and land. Had I properly planned, I would have planned better for the weather by adding fuel to accommodate any issues it might have caused.
While the sim doesn’t have the same dire consequences as the real world, the stress I was feeling in the situation will hopefully stick with me. I’m hoping it’s memorable enough to push me to plan all my flights such that I won’t find myself in a similar real world situation.
Actual/Simulated Instrument (Act/Sim): 0.0 - 13.7 (of 40)
Despite all of this happening in a sim, it wasn't in a sim approved by the FAA for logging time.
