Night flying in the mountians in a cessna 150,

Hello, I had a fun trip Friday 02-18-05 during the day I went from KVUO to
KDLS to 63S "Colville Municipal Airport" 3.6 hours that drop off "cliff" at
the end of 19 is very interesting. Well went to see a relative I hadn't seen
for a long time was a fun day and ended back at my airplane about 7pm and
was wished a safe journey back home.

I departed 63S about 7:30pm calm winds and clear skies were being reported
for the entire trip home over the mountain ranges. I can say that yes it is
black out there at night and every little noise is amplified when flying
over dark mountainous terrain. The winds were not as expected took 2.7 hours
to fly VFR GPS direct to KYKM. From KYKM to KVUO it took another 2.4 hours
pluss the high clouds blocked out the stars and almost all the moon light.

What a day 8.7 hours of flying 5.1 at night got to see some relatives I
hadn't seen in years. My flight time in the last 4 weeks as of today has
been 69.2 hours total I expect to put in another 30 to 40 hours in the next
week or two if this weather holds I may even fly my 150 down to Las Vegas or
Something now that I can go 50 hours between oil changes.

My goal is to be have 500 hours Total Time by 12-31-2005 I am sitting at 234
I hope my pocket book and 150 can handle it.

--
Steven Rhine
PP-ASEL
Instrument Student
N7676U 1976 C-150M

Just a word of caution:

As an instrument student, you should be painfully aware that night
flight, with high clouds over mountainous terrain can cause
disorientation.

I love to fly at night - easy to see other a/c, and if on IFR, the
clouds can appear as pastel apparitions. But in the dark with few
lights below and none above, you can have a real battle making yourself
believe the guages - "I am not inverted. I am not inverted."

Later,
Steve.T
PP ASEL/Instrument

"Steve.T" wrote in message
ups.com...
Just a word of caution:

As an instrument student, you should be painfully aware that night
flight, with high clouds over mountainous terrain can cause
disorientation.

I love to fly at night - easy to see other a/c, and if on IFR, the
clouds can appear as pastel apparitions. But in the dark with few
lights below and none above, you can have a real battle making yourself
believe the guages - "I am not inverted. I am not inverted."

Later,
Steve.T
PP ASEL/Instrument


Yep, it was a real Erie feeling like the feeling I got my first time in
actual IFR what was even weirder it was so calm it did not even feel like we
were moving just standing still in the black open space. I had the airplane
trimed up so it would almost fly itself. My son went to sleep on me and the
batteries died in the CD player and there was no traffic for about 2 hours
on the last leg. I called Seattle on the radio "I was on flight following"
to make sure they were still there every now and then.

--
Steven Rhine
PP-ASEL
Instrument Student
N7676U 1976 C-150M

"NW_PILOT" wrote in message
...

Yep, it was a real Erie feeling like the feeling I got my first time in
actual IFR what was even weirder it was so calm it did not even feel like
we
were moving just standing still in the black open space. I had the
airplane

I'm a low-time pilot (~220 hrs), recently instrument rated. I've only truly
scared myself a few times in an airplane, one of which was my first night
flight a few months after getting my private. It was a crystal-clear night,
early fall in New England. It had been six months or so since I'd flown at
night, first time solo. I took off, and within about a minute got that
"ohmigod I don't know wtf I am" feeling. I fly near Boston so there was just
a carpet of lights everywhere below me. Very pretty actually. After a few
nervous moments I said, "ok, relax, you've got 4 hours of gas and the
plane's A-OK." I bumbled around until I hit a major highway, followed that
to another airport, then was able to orient myself to get back home, which I
did within about 30 minutes of taking off.

I'll confess that I haven't flown at night since then. I decided I would
wait until I got my instrument, and that I'd go at night on IFR flight plans
for a while until I felt more comfortable with it. Just haven't had time
since then but I should do it while it still gets dark nice and early.

Oh, and did I mention the landing light burned out? Luckily I'd gotten a
floatplane rating about a month earlier, so I just went into "glassy water
landing" mode and did a power-on approach. My field is lit up like a
christmas tree at night so it actually wasn't so stressful.

I was lucky enough to have a CFII who really liked instructing in the soup,
and near Boston it comes around pretty regularly. One of the other times I
got good and puckered up was about 25 hours into my IR, we went into the
scud and I got good and spun. He liked to keep the AI covered most of the
time, and looking at the DG and TC spinning and banking I just couldn't
figure out left from right. I could feel our airspeed and G forces building,
and after we turned about 270 degrees, he looked over and said, "boy, you're
sure confused," and within about 15 seconds had us back on course &
altitude. ATC didn't even mention it.

-cwk.

In rec.aviation.owning Colin W Kingsbury wrote:
: I'll confess that I haven't flown at night since then. I decided I would
: wait until I got my instrument, and that I'd go at night on IFR flight plans
: for a while until I felt more comfortable with it. Just haven't had time
: since then but I should do it while it still gets dark nice and early.

Hey CWK, I fly with a group of good folks out of lovely 1B9, and we go
out most Wednesday evenings. If you'd like to join us, even as a passenger,
drop me a line and we can work something out. You're at BED, no?
fasto at shell dot theworld dot com.
--
Aaron C.

NW_PILOT wrote:
My son went to sleep on me and the
batteries died in the CD player....


Steven,
I think we have roughly the same experience. I have just over 400hrs
in 4 years and have owned a plane the last two years. I agree that
night flying is a great experience but we have limited ourselves to
only local airports on full moon nights. We attend Wings Safety
Seminars regularly and at least once a year, there is a review on
accident statistics. The most deadly combination is always some
various combinations of IMC (terrain), out-of-fuel, equipment
malfunctions AND night flying.
I cringed in reading the heading of your post: night flying +
mountains + single engine plane, but thought to myself that everybody
had their own flying comfort level. Some are more willing to take a
risk than others.
The batteries in the CD player died. The batteries in your GPS
may die suddenly too. In our short two years of plane ownership, we
had seen our engine need replacement with 3 cracked cylinders without
any warning signs (compressions were in the high 70's, oil analysis
were fine, engine ran great etc.). We had a complete electrical
failure in one trip due to bad crimped job of one of the alternator
wires (the logbook indicated that it was done 5 years ago). The carb
heat failed to work suddenly one day due to a crack in the box.
Everytime that we opened the hood (at least every other month in the 25
hrs oil change), we inspected everything carefully. We also do at least
15- minutes preflight check, but we always expect that someday
something in that 30-years old plane may break.
My discomfort level went sky high in knowing that your son
(presumably a youngster) was with you. I would never want to tell a
parent how to treat their children. I just want to register my feeling
as a pilot and a mother.

Hai Longworth

Single engine
Night
Mountains


Pick any two.

That is, if you've ever lost an engine. If you haven't, pick all three and
hope that your engine failure will not be this time.

Jim

RST Engineering wrote:

Single engine
Night
Mountains


Pick any two.

I was kind of thinking along the same lines. Having flown across the
Sierra Nevada's only a few times in the day, I sure wouldn't want to do
so at night. Even a cloudless full moon night in a brand new high
performance single engine...nope, wouldn't want to do it. Way too much
cumulo-Granite down there. I'd much rather limit my mountain crossings
to the daytime.


--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-IA Student-Arrow Shopping Student

"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the Earth
with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there
you will always long to return"
- Leonardo Da Vinci

(Remove the obvious from address to reply via e-mail)

"Jack Allison" wrote in message
...
RST Engineering wrote:

Single engine
Night
Mountains


Pick any two.

I was kind of thinking along the same lines. Having flown across the
Sierra Nevada's only a few times in the day, I sure wouldn't want to do so
at night. Even a cloudless full moon night in a brand new high
performance single engine...nope, wouldn't want to do it. Way too much
cumulo-Granite down there. I'd much rather limit my mountain crossings to
the daytime.


--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-IA Student-Arrow Shopping Student

"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the Earth
with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there
you will always long to return"
- Leonardo Da Vinci

(Remove the obvious from address to reply via e-mail)

Agreed.
I fly over the Sierras all the time.
I fly at night all the time.
I never fly over the Sierras at night.

Adam
N7966L
Beech Super III

"Jack Allison" wrote in message
...
RST Engineering wrote:

Single engine
Night
Mountains


Pick any two.

I was kind of thinking along the same lines. Having flown across the
Sierra Nevada's only a few times in the day, I sure wouldn't want to do
so at night. Even a cloudless full moon night in a brand new high
performance single engine...nope, wouldn't want to do it. Way too much
cumulo-Granite down there. I'd much rather limit my mountain crossings
to the daytime.


--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-IA Student-Arrow Shopping Student

I have flown numerous times single engine, day, over both rockies and
sierras. I don't know what the actual realities are but the sierras are much
more "scary". They rise faster, fewer valleys and more bare rock. I have
always felt that I have had an "out" when flying over the rockies not so the
sierras.

Howard