Trip to Montana
October 1-3, 2014
Bill Schertz and Dave Spano
As many of you know, I moved to Lolo, Montana in July. I
had not moved my plane N343BS to the new location, being too busy packing,
shipping household goods, and moving the Motor Home. In late September, I
finally felt that it was time to go get the plane.
Since I had not flown a lot during the packing and
moving time, and since it was a long
cross country, arranged with Dave Spano to come with me. This was a good
decision, as it provided extra eyes, and a lot of help getting frequencies and
communicating with centers and flight following.
The original plan was to leave Tuesday, September
30th, on a route of Aurora to Fairmont, MN (KFRM) to Pierre, SD
(KPIR), to Billings, MT (KBIL) to Stevensville, MT (32S). As in combat, all
plans change once you are engaged.
Woke up Tuesday morning with low overcast, and a long
line of thunderstorms and nasty weather to the west. IFR all over the place in
the direction that we would be going, so the plan was delayed until the next
day.
Wednesday still had the long line of weather to the
west, and no way to go around it to the North, so we altered the flight plan to
go South on our first leg. Planned to go to Columbia, Missouri (KCOU) to skirt
the bottom of the weather system. Launched and proceeded on our way. As we went
south, the weather started getting closer, so we had to deviate East for a few
miles, and replan to go to Rolla, Missouri (KVIH). We landed and refueled, and started
moving Northwest.
Our plan was to overfly Lawrence, Kansas (KLWC), and
then proceed to Grand Isle, Nebraska (KGRI) for refueling. We did accomplish
this, with a deviation south of the direct line to KLWC due to several
thunderstorms. Landed and refueled at KGRI, and launched for Pierre, SD. Flight was smooth and uneventful, except
for picking up a load of bugs. This was the only leg where bugs were
pre-eminent. Spent the night at Pierre. Basically burning ~10 gal/hr at
150ktas.
The next morning, the plane had heavy dew, which made
removing the bugs very easy, they were soft and wiped off quickly. We left
Pierre for Billings, MT as our next fuel stop. Weather was clear, good
visibility, but a strong headwind. About 60nm from Billings, we decided that we
needed to divert to Sheridan, Wyoming (KSHR) to get fuel. We were burning at a
higher rate, ~11 gal/hr trying to fight the head wind. Nice thing was, when we
turned South towards Sheridan, the tailwind component really helped us scoot
along on Ground Speed.
Refueled at Sheridan, and took off for Billings. About
20nm north of Sheridan, a weather system started moving in and lowering the
ceiling. Still VFR and adequate ceiling, but it became clear that we were going
to have to overnight at Billings. Terrain under our route was very rugged, and
with the wind, we had a somewhat bumpy ride getting to Billings. At Billings, we were cleared to runway
28R, (long runway) with a pretty stiff wind out of the North. Strongest
crosswind landing that I have ever made. Weather became increasingly poor,
raining and snow showers, low ceiling. Met a fellow who was ferrying a Tri-pacer
from Brownsville, TX to Spokane. He was stranded at Billings also. Got a room for the
night.
Next morning dawned bright, clear, and cold. We should
have had the FBO put the plane in a hanger overnight. It was covered in frost,
plus numerous lumps of ice where the water from the rain had frozen solid. We had to put it in a hanger to melt off
the ice. It was below freezing when we left Billings, but was warming
up.
From Billings, we basically followed I-90 to avoid
flying over the higher granite formations. Set an altitude of 8500 ft, then went
on up to 9500 as the terrain rose. This gave us 4-5000 clearance over the
ground. Crossed over into the Bitterroot valley at Missoula, then turned South
to Stevensville (32S). Overall, we covered 1509 nautical miles due to the
weather and fueling
diversions.