Ferry Flight

My cell phone rang at noon on Friday. On the other end was an airplane broker I'd done some work for in the past.

He: “Hey, how'd you like to ferry a 182 to British Columbia?”

Me: “Um, ok. When?”

He: “Tomorrow.”

The next 10 hours were a whirlwind of phone calls, preparations, more phone calls, more preparation and finally a bit of sleep.

The deal with simple enough: A broker in Victoria, BC, had purchased a 182 and needed it delivered as soon as possible. The weather was looking fantastic on Saturday all the way from Minneapolis to Victoria, a rare window of opportunity.

We agreed on a price, he faxed me the required paperwork for crossing the border legally with his airplane and told me to call him before I landed in Victoria so he could meet me.

I did a careful preflight, verified all the paperwork was in order, filled the 182 with gas and was wheels up by 8:30 a.m. Saturday.

It wasn't just any 182. This one had been modified with a Texas Skyways conversion, which basically entails removing the old 230 h.p. o-470 motor and bolting on a monster O-550, 285 h.p. Engine and equally monster three-bladed prop.

A 182 can hardly be called low on power, even in stock form. With another 55 ponies and three-bladed prop it turns into a real rocket ship.

I wasn't quite sure what to expect on the first takeoff, so I carefully warmed the big motor before takeoff, slowly fed in the power and after an absurdly short ground run the old 182 just sort of levitated and started climbing at well over 1,000 feet per minute.

I pointed the nose toward Aberdeen, SD and was on my way.

Since I wasn't familiar with the airplane I'd decided to keep my first few legs to right around 2 hours until I'd figured out the real-world fuel consumption, cruise speeds and any quirks lurking within it's 34-year-old hull.

The airplane ran beautifully. The logbooks showed only 26 hours on the new engine and prop so I was extra cautious and kept my power reductions and mixture adjustments nice and gentle. The last thing I wanted to do was break my client's beautiful new motor.

The winds aloft at 6,500 feet were between 35 and 40 knots but with the 182 turning a true airspeed right around 150 knots my ground speed was still respectable. In keeping with my “be conservative dummy” philosophy, I ran the engine fairly rich.

At 22 inches of manifold pressure and 2,250 RPM on the digital tach I leaned to about 100 to 150 degrees rich of peak EGT and saw 16.5 gallons-per-hour on the fuel totalizer. The engine seemed happy enough running there but with some more time and something other than a single-probe EGT I'm sure I could have easily gotten the fuel flows down around 14 gallons per hour with similar airspeeds.

I was amazed at how smoothly the engine and prop combination were. There was virtually no engine vibration but with cruise airspeeds easily into the yellow arc I kept a careful feel out for any turbulence and was ready to slow down if things got bumpy.

Aberdeen showed up right where I expected it so I landed, filled up with gas, took a quick bathroom break and headed for Miles City, MT.

My plan for getting to Victoria was simple and conservative: My route loosely followed US 12 to Miles City, then I-94 down into Billings, MT. That ensured there were several airports along the route, plus it avoided the more desolate portions of the Dakotas and Montana.

From Billings I'd stick to I-90 through the Rocky Mountains, passing over Bozeman and Butte before stopping for fuel in Missoula.

After Missoula it was still along I-90 up past Cour d'Alene, ID, over Spokane, WA and the central plains of Washington state toward Moses Lake and finally as stop for fuel at Ellingsburg.

At Ellingsburg my plan was to re-fuel, contact Canadian customs to coordinate my border crossing, file and activate a flight plan then head across the Cascade mountains to Seattle before turning north to Whidby Island then across the San Juan Islands to Victoria.

No single leg was more than about three hours, which meant I'd always be landing with at least two hours of fuel on board. In addition, by following I-90 I not only could stay at 8,500 feet comfortably but I'd always have a place to land if something bad happened to that big motor up front.

Plus, I estimated I'd be across the Cascade mountains still in daylight, which was important as I'd set some hard personal minimums for the trip, one of which was that there was no way was I going to fly across the mountains at night.

It turned, as it usually does, that things didn't quite go as planned.

After Miles City I flew near Billings, picked up I-90 and followed it through the mountains, crossing over Bozeman and Butte before stopping in Missoula for more fuel.

The winds were relatively light in the mountains and the ride was thankfully smooth. I launched out of Missoula a little later than planned (the headwinds earlier during the day had put me behind schedule.)

The Rocky Mountains were beautiful and it was comforting to trace the familiar I-90 into Idaho and Washington, knowing I had a place to land should the worst happen.

As I flew out of the western Rockies and onto Washington's western plains the winds aloft picked up and my ground speed dropped under 120 knots for the first time in the trip. I knew it would be tight making Ellensburg before the FBO closed for the night so I dropped down to pick up a few knots of ground speed and started calling ahead on their Unicom, hoping to convince them to stay for a few minutes longer than their 6 p.m. closing time.

Turns out, I shouldn't have bothered. I touched down in Ellensburg at 5:59 p.m. local time and as I was taxiing up to the pumps saw the light snap off at the FBO and a lone figure dash out to their car then speed off toward town.

So much for kindness for weary travelers. I'll never go to that airport again.

I took stock of my situation and confirmed what I'd known all along: I had plenty of gas to cross the Cascade mountains and get into the Seattle area. In fact, I could have easily flown from Missoula to Victoria. That still would have left me with at least an hours worth of fuel when I arrived.

With the light fading I jumped back into the airplane and launched for Everett, WA, on the north side of the Seattle metro area and home to Boeing. I'd never been to Everett, but they had a control tower so I assumed they'd have fuel as well. There weren't a lot of other options until I got to the Seattle area anyway and I figured I might as well get as far north as feasible as long as I had plenty of gas on the airplane.

I dug out my lo-altitude en-route charts even though I was VFR and climbed above the MEA for V2, which runs from the Ellensburg VOR to Seattle and contacted Seattle Center for VFR flight following up to Everett.

With my navigation and communication housekeeping chores squared away I relaxed and tried to enjoy the view. I knew it got dark quickly in the mountains but I also knew I had a fairly short leg before I would be into the Seattle area. Sure enough, as I watched Mt. Ranier slide past my left wing the sun finally set just as the last of the Cascades fell away behind me.

Seattle approach cleared me into their Class B, gave me a helpful vector north then turned me direct to Everett. Tower cleared me to land and I made a bit of a clunker but it was certainly decent enough.

I tip-toed around in the maze of taxiway lights, cursing the burned out landing and taxi lights on the 182. Ground control was helpful enough and I found the self-serve pumps then filled up with $200 worth of 100LL.

I called Flight Service to file a VFR flight plan to Victoria (CYYJ) then called Canadian Customs to inform them I was coming. The drill for crossing the border is simple enough: Call 1-888-CAN-PASS, tell them who you are, where you are and what you want to do.

They asked some questions about the airplane, but were mostly concerned about how much the buyer had paid for it. I had no idea so I gave them the buyer's cellphone number. They called the buyer than called me back on my mobile to tell me I was good to go.

I was amazed at how friendly and helpful Megan at Canadian Customs was to an obviously clueless American pilot. The fact that she called the buyer then called me back on my mobile just blew my mind. Their service was quite simply fantastic.

I did try to push my luck a bit and get Canadian Customs to waive the minimum 2-hour notification so I could launch right then (it's only about a 70-mile flight from Everett to Victoria) but they couldn't. So I wound up sitting in front of a locked FBO, pacing in the cold for over an hour before I fired up the 182 and picked my way through the maze of taxiways.

The flight from Everett to Victoria was simple enough. I picked up VFR flight following, activated my flight plan to cross the border then enjoyed the sights as I flew directly over the Naval Air Station at Whidbey Island then over the San Juan Islands.

The islands and the Strait of Juan de Fuca was illuminated by a full moon and I spotted Victoria International Airport's beacon while I was still over Whidbey.

Whidbey approach turned me over to Victoria Terminal (which I assume is similar to what we call “Approach control” in the states). Never have the words “Radar identified” sounded so good as it meant I was clear to cross the border.

Victoria Terminal turned me over to Victoria Tower and since the winds were calm they offered me a straight in for runway 27 and clicked on the approach lights.

I landed at Victoria, taxied to two waiting customs officers and shut down the 182 for the last time in 12.5 hours of flying.

Clearing customs took only a few minutes and I handed the keys to the new owner who took me to his house, fed me a slice of pie before I staggered into a guest bedroom and passed out.

It had been a long day and an almost surreal experience but one I'm glad to have done.

I was up early the next morning, grabbed a bowl of oatmeal, got paid then hopped on a Kenmore Airlines Turbine Otter from Victoria Harbor to Lake Union in Seattle. From there it was a quick shuttle ride then on to a United flight to Chicago and finally back home to Minneapolis.

I crawled into my own bed at 1 a.m. on Sunday, still a little disoriented from having flown half-way across the country on my own and then back on the airlines in two days.

How to brief an instrument approach

Wow, I'm behind in posting. Too much flying lately. I'll cheat a bit and post something I've written for my instrument students on briefing instrument approaches. It's a distillation from several different sources, including my own experience.

Amazingly, approaches seem to go better when they've been briefed ahead of time. Not always, but most of the time.

The goal of a good approach briefing is to lay out a plan of action for conducting an instrument approach. Saying the briefing out loud, even if you're flying alone, helps strengthen your understanding of what you'll be doing on the approach.

When flying with an instructor, a verbal briefing eliminates some of the “I wonder what he's going to do next” factor (which, admittedly, we love) and gives the instructor a chance to prompt for any items you may have overlooked. In other words, we know what you're doing but not what you're thinking and the thinking is really the most important -- and difficult -- part of instrument flying.

The briefing can be fairly detailed (down to the actual mechanics of flying the airplane, setting the OBS, tuning the radios, etc...) or more generalized (i.e, the “big picture” with the details of OBS settings, radios, etc... assumed.)

At the very least, a good approach briefing should include the following:

• The destination airport

• The type and name of the approach being flown

• The transition onto the approach (vectors or via an IAF or transition)

• The inbound course

• Approach communication and navigation frequencies

• Target airspeeds

• Flap settings

• Step down fixes, procedure turns, etc...

• Final approach fix

• Missed approach fix

• Decision altitude or MDA

• Missed approach procedure.

It's fine to check the approach plate several times after the briefing and you should always review the final fixes, altitudes and missed approach procedure prior to reaching the final approach fix.

From the final approach fix inbound, your only task should be to fly that segment.

In other words, don't wait until you cross the FAF to discover there is a step-down fix or to start looking up your MDA while trying to complete the pre-landing checklist. (Having flown many an approach while committing that exact sin I can tell you from experience it's not fun. Having had a student stop flying the approach and start asking questions about the fourth step of a missed approach procedure 700 feet off the ground while flying an ILS to near-minimums in actual conditions I can tell you is downright terrifying.)

An example approach briefing for the ILS 27 into Anoka

"We're going to the Anoka County Airport and this will be an ILS to runway 27 via radar vectors.

Our inbound course is 269 degrees and once we're established on the localizer and cleared for the approach we can descend to 2,600 until glideslope intercept. Runway 27 is 5,000 feet long and the airport elevation is 912 feet. Decision Altitude is 1,110 feet and we need ½ mile visibility.

The altimeter is 29.97 and confirmed set.

The localizer is 111.15, Anoka Tower is 126.05 and ground is on 121.85. I'll set the localizer in my number one and number two nav radios and tower is already in my standby on number one comm. Ground is the active on number two and the approach is loaded and activated in the GPS.

Two miles from BOKYA I'll set the power to 2,100 RPM for a target approach speed of 90 knots and drop 10 degrees of flaps then complete the pre-landing checklist. At glideslope intercept I'll set 1,900 RPM then adjust as needed to maintain the glideslope and 90 knots.

Our decision altitude is 1,110 barometric and the wind is out of the northwest so we'll have a slight right crosswind and the runway should be slightly to the left of the nose. There is a PAPI on the left side and a medium intensity approach light system with a rabbit.

If we have the runway at or before minimums we'll land and plan to turn left after we've crossed 18 then contact ground to taxi to the FBO.

If we don't have the runway or get more than a half-scale deflection on the localizer or more than a dot low on the glideslope we'll go missed. The missed approach is a straight climb to 2,700 then hold at Gopher. On the missed I'll go full power, pitch for 80 knots, positive rate then flaps up. Once we're established in the climb and navigating toward Gopher we'll report our missed to Anoka tower."

An example approach briefing for the VOR-A into Crystal

We're going to the Crystal airport and this will be the VOR-A approach via Gopher.

Our inbound course is 166 degrees and we can descend to 2,500 once we're established inbound and within 10 miles of the VOR. Our MDA is 1,360, I'll use 1,900, we need one-mile visibility and we'll circle to land on 32R.

The altimeter is 29.94 and is properly set.

Gopher is 117.3, Crystal tower is 120.7 and ground is 121.6.

We'll proceed to Gopher using the number two then fly outbound on the 346 radial, which I'll set in number one. We're approaching Gopher from the west so it'll be about a 110 degree turn outbound so we'll lead it by one mile.

Once we're established outbound and cleared for the approach we'll maintain 3,000 and I'll do a procedure turn to the left four miles from the VOR. I'll set the inbound course of 166 once we begin the turn and once we intercept we'll descend to 2,500.

Two miles from Gopher I'll set 2,100 RPM and flaps 10 for an approach speed of 90 knots then complete the pre-landing checklist. At Gopher I'll set 1,700 RPM for a target descent rate of 600 feet per minute at 90 knots and start timing. The missed approach point is at three minutes, sixteen seconds.

The approach brings us in at an angle, so the runway will be lined up slightly to the left of the nose and we'll plan to cross over the airport to put the runway off the left side of the airplane where I can see it better.

We'll stay at 1,900 on downwind then fly a normal VFR traffic pattern. There's a VASI on the left side of 32 right.

We'll plan to land and roll to the end, turn right and contact ground to taxi to Wiley North.

If we don't have the airport at 1,900 feet and three minutes we'll go missed, which is a climbing left turn to 2,500, direct Gopher and hold on the inbound course with left turns. On the miss I'll go full power, pitch for 80 knots, positive rate then retract the flaps. Once we're established in the climb and navigating toward Gopher we'll report our missed to Crystal Tower. I'll leave the number one nav set to the inbound course and go direct to Gopher using the number two."

So there you have it. It looks like a lot, but it only takes a couple of minutes.

I've also added the checklist I use for flying instrument approaches. A good time to start the checklist is before beginning your descent and it's helpful to finish the approach briefing before beginning your descent as well.

Usually, ATC will tell you what approach to expect before you begin your final descent, so it's a good idea to study the approach plate enroute, study it again when you've been told by ATC which approach to expect then brief the approach.

When in training, we know the approach we're going to fly next, or request from ATC, so as soon as that decision is made it's a good time to conduct the approach briefing.

There's a lot going on in the final 15 minutes of an IFR flight so getting the approach briefing done while there's still a period of relatively low workload can help smooth things out, leaving you with the ability to concentrate fully on just flying the approach.

Approach checklist and briefing

• Destination weather obtained

• Altimeter set

• Landing light on

• Plate -- Selected and verified

• Nav. Radios – Set and ID

• Comm. Radios – Set

• Marker Beacons – Test

• GPS – Load Approach, Activate

• Fixes and Altitudes – Review

• Times – Review

• Missed approach – Review

• Airport diagram – Ready and Review

FAF +2 miles

• Power/Mixture/Flaps/Fuel set

• Fixes, altitudes, minimums, missed review

• Approach speed

FAF checklist

• Descent power set, Gear down and green

• Time – Note

• Position – Report

• Fixes, altitudes, minimums, missed review

• Activate PCL

• Callouts: 500, 200, 100, 50, Minimums

Missed Approach

• Climb power set

• Positive rate

• Flaps up

• Gear up

• Nav/OBS set

• ATC – Report