Day 9 - Monday, 9/17/01 - The OGD->RAP plan.

Oops, the weather has grotesquely deteriorated in 24 hours.  East of the Ogden mountain range we will encounter rain, 20000 to 25000 foot tops and icing above 14000 feet.  We plan to go further North to avoid the dreaded <
thunder storms> and choose to fly at 13000 feet route to Rapid City, SD for re-fueling.  The RAP arrival forecast isn't too bad if we can get going and the altitude is not a problem since we both carry oxygen when flying in the mountains.  We can't scud run because there is no code for that in an IFR flight plan.  Also, we only have current Jepp plates for the North Central Region and all the intervening area plates are "sold out" at the local FBO.  No kidding, just another FAA trap.  Luckily, Arnie and I have plates for RAP from a previous life - the trip out.

After receiving the same weird clearance (we were ready for that), we are off, single file, Arnie leading.  We are each soon turned on course, shortly after reaching a safe altitude.  This is  "fun" since we are only 30 miles apart and can hear each other's communications with center.  However, there are some difficulties; I'm too old to be fighting the weather and Arnie, an excellent pilot, will be hand flying with no autopilot.  Wait a second, he's a year older than me and I'm sitting pretty with a GPS guided AP.  It's getting ugly East of the high mountains and the blasts of noise in my headset signify something more unusual than mere p-static from the visible moisture (clouds) in which we are flying.  Hold on, why am I picking up ICE at 13000 when Arnie hasn't complained of any (Arnie was flying airways and I was GPS direct)?  My request for lower is quickly honored by ATC and the ice instantly melts off at 12000 - this is where I will stay for a while, thank you very much.  During this stretch, the charged clouds were creating havoc - incredible snaps in the headset and loss of GPSS guidance from time to time requiring a recycle of the AP.  And, gulp, the time when I experienced the complete loss of the autopilot.  How did I notice this?  By looking up from an enroute chart and finding myself in an unusual attitude - a 45-degree bank in a rapidly descending left turn.  Surprise!  The recovery was not my finest piece of flying - I snaked my way into an unstable step climb, slightly disoriented, gleefully hitting a bit of clear 1300 feet above my assigned altitude.  Settling down somewhat, I got a semblance of a scan back and returned to the cloud laden 12000 foot level and trimmed out any imbalances.  Ok, either this all happened quicker than I thought or ATC didn't care about my excursion; no one said a word.  The autopilot would power up, but not complete it's self-test.  Now I was sweating because the AP was my sole vacuum system backup since it used the electric turn coordinator for stabilization.  The turn coordinator was working but the AP was not.  Remembering Arnie's recent pump failure and the fact that our tach times were pretty close left me feeling "uncomfortable."  Lesson #14 - Don't rely solely on Otto, thus forsaking the trinity of you, the plane and its' future flight path.  Ergo, I have formulated this rule: For every ½ hour of autopilot managed flight, shut off the AP, re-trim the aircraft and hand fly it for five minutes to ensure retention of some basic scan ability.

Approaching Casper, WY I lost touch with Arnie because he had just changed his center frequency.  Suddenly, I entered a large clear area (the so called sucker hole, probably 15 miles across) that enabled me to see the Casper airport.  I requested landing there because of my difficulties.  After they approved my request, I asked them to tell 96AC that I was going into CPR.

You see, I did officially land first, although not at our planned airport.  Arnie had no problem in getting re-directed to CPR even though the rules under which we were flying should not have allowed either of us to change our destination in flight.  The avionics shop knew exactly what the problem was; a blown soldered miniature fuse that they would have fixed by morning.  The FBO invited us inside their hangar for the night since more rain was coming.

On the shuttle ride to the hotel, Arnie noticed several cowboy bars and I could see that look in his eyes.  Nah!  "Arnie, I don't have my belt knife with me." I said.  Anyway, the hotel restaurant (and bar) worked out just fine.

To Be Continued.

Grayhawk