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The view: An advancing storm
The pilot: Rob Schneeweiss
The airplane: 2006 Cessna 172SP, N5522S
The mission: My long solo cross-country on June 19, 2019
The memory: I was on the first leg of my long solo cross-country, where the route was FMY-OBE-PGD-FMY. The storm was forecast to stay west of OBE, and this picture was taken as the storm cut off my path to OBE. I had clear skies to my right, so I executed a 180-degree turn to the right and returned to FMY from the southwest while remaining clear of clouds. I repeated the flight the following day to completion.
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Latest posts by Rob Schneeweiss (see all)
- Friday Photo: an advancing storm - August 7, 2020
This is some VERY tough weather for a student X/C!
It was not as bad as it looks when I took off initially. This system was forecast to stay north of OBE, which it did not do. Unfortunately for me, while it was mostly clear to my right, once I turned around and went a few miles I wound up approaching an area that would have taken me between layers. As I didn’t know how far that would extend, I elected to go underneath it, which worked out for me, as I was able to maintain 1000agl until I cleared it and could climb again. I’m pretty sure my instructor knew what the storm was going to do and was testing my ADM. He has admitted since that he knew I would make the right decision and was confident sending me out that day. A bit over a year later, I’m working on my CFI, having gotten IFR and Commercial single and Multi, and spent 80-some hours in Cirri, both the SR20 and SR22, and I flew the SR22 on a true 2000-mile cross country, FMY-BUF and back, with 2 hours of solid IMC on the return. Things are good.
KFMY is home for me. Afternoon storms will test your metal and brains.