This whole thread brings to mind what one of my training captains taught me during my airline training. One day as we were approaching an area of what looked like prime icing conditions, he turned to me and said. “Do you know the two rules of icing?” Feeling very dumb, I replied in the negative, to which he responded. “ Rule number one is ‘Don’t get in it’. Rule number two is ‘If you are in it, get out of it!’.

Whilst I appreciate that it is not always possible to comply with these rules, I think that it makes the point very well that icing is not something to be taken lightly, no matter what aircraft you are flying. It was only a short time later that one of the aircraft in our fleet (a BAe 146 ) encountered severe icing at night near a thunderstorm, and suffered a 4 engine roll-back  which was identified as resulting from severe ice build-up in the intakes to the core of the engines. Fortunately it occurred over flat Australian outback terrain, and in spite of descending over 20,000 ft, the ice dissipated before the aircraft reached ground level, allowing engine power to be restored. And this was all in a fully certified aircraft, not an experimental aircraft like we fly.

Be careful out there.

Rob Stevens

Perth

Western Australia.

good tape.   What would you have done and when?