I met Nick’s Dad, Steve, at the airport at 5:20am for our early morning flight to Asheville to pick up the boys. Our goal was to get up there and back before the typical afternoon thunderstorms began raging in Florida. I love before-dawn departures: We enjoyed a smooth ride, hushed radio’s, direct routing, and a beautiful sunrise as we made our way north. There was quite a bit of bad weather northwest of Tampa over the Gulf of Mexico and more to the northeast over the Atlantic near Daytona. Luckily, most of Florida remained clear…for now…
Fog was forecast for Asheville through 10am, so it was no surprise to see low ceilings and visibility when I checked in on our destination weather periodically during the flight –we could only hope the sun would burn it off before we arrived. The weather was clear at our “Plan B” airport, Greenville, SC, about 50 miles to the south. As we neared our destination, we got the weather one more time and it wasn’t good: 100’ ceilings and ¼ mile visibility. We decided to shoot the ILS instrument approach –we didn’t have high hopes, but you never know; sometimes fog is patchy. When we got down to 200’ above the runway, we couldn’t see a thing. It was as if there were a white blanket covering the windshield. I executed the missed approach and requested to fly a holding pattern while waiting for the weather to improve. There were several other aircraft in the hold waiting to get into Asheville as we flew a big, slow racetrack-pattern in the sky.
After 15 – 20 minutes, the controller advised that the visibility was improving and shortly thereafter another airplane was able to land. I requested another approach and we were soon on our way back down to 200’. I stayed on the instruments while Steve kept his eyes out the window scanning for the runway lights. Just as I was getting ready to add power and execute another missed approach, Steve called runway in sight. What a welcome sight! We touched down around 9am, jumped in our rental car, and headed to camp to pick up the boys.
Upon arriving at camp, the counselors loaded up the boys trunks in our SUV, then directed us to parking. As we stepped out of the car, we spotted Justin & Nick running toward us from across the parking area. I’m not sure who was happier to see who! There was a lot of hugging and even a few moist eyes. We walked with Justin & Nick to their cabin to pick up their backpacks and then headed back toward the car. Soon, we were on our way to the airport for our return flight to Tampa. During the drive, the boys told us all about their adventures. They both were homesick a few times, but generally seemed to have fun.
We took off again around 11am and headed south while I pulled up the latest radar for our route. The storms in Florida were converging, but there was still a clear route down the center of the state. I thought for sure we’d ending up landing in GA or northern FL to wait it out, but we were really lucky: We had a narrow, clear corridor all the way to Tampa –we didn’t even get wet! Steve said I must be living right. We got back home around 2pm, just in time to meet up with the family at Kent’s pool party.
Fog was forecast for Asheville through 10am, so it was no surprise to see low ceilings and visibility when I checked in on our destination weather periodically during the flight –we could only hope the sun would burn it off before we arrived. The weather was clear at our “Plan B” airport, Greenville, SC, about 50 miles to the south. As we neared our destination, we got the weather one more time and it wasn’t good: 100’ ceilings and ¼ mile visibility. We decided to shoot the ILS instrument approach –we didn’t have high hopes, but you never know; sometimes fog is patchy. When we got down to 200’ above the runway, we couldn’t see a thing. It was as if there were a white blanket covering the windshield. I executed the missed approach and requested to fly a holding pattern while waiting for the weather to improve. There were several other aircraft in the hold waiting to get into Asheville as we flew a big, slow racetrack-pattern in the sky.
After 15 – 20 minutes, the controller advised that the visibility was improving and shortly thereafter another airplane was able to land. I requested another approach and we were soon on our way back down to 200’. I stayed on the instruments while Steve kept his eyes out the window scanning for the runway lights. Just as I was getting ready to add power and execute another missed approach, Steve called runway in sight. What a welcome sight! We touched down around 9am, jumped in our rental car, and headed to camp to pick up the boys.
Upon arriving at camp, the counselors loaded up the boys trunks in our SUV, then directed us to parking. As we stepped out of the car, we spotted Justin & Nick running toward us from across the parking area. I’m not sure who was happier to see who! There was a lot of hugging and even a few moist eyes. We walked with Justin & Nick to their cabin to pick up their backpacks and then headed back toward the car. Soon, we were on our way to the airport for our return flight to Tampa. During the drive, the boys told us all about their adventures. They both were homesick a few times, but generally seemed to have fun.
We took off again around 11am and headed south while I pulled up the latest radar for our route. The storms in Florida were converging, but there was still a clear route down the center of the state. I thought for sure we’d ending up landing in GA or northern FL to wait it out, but we were really lucky: We had a narrow, clear corridor all the way to Tampa –we didn’t even get wet! Steve said I must be living right. We got back home around 2pm, just in time to meet up with the family at Kent’s pool party.
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