Blog Post #6 - Fall Flying at WMU!

This week at Western Michigan University was a slow week for my training. Unfortunately when you fly in Michigan you are subject to some pretty crazy weather patterns and unpredictable fronts. I fly every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday through the week, and this week I had to cancel two of my three flights which just pushes my training back, and makes for a slow week. We have had 70 degree days, crazy winds, hail, and rain all in one week... which is almost normal for a week in Michigan. I cancelled my Tuesday flight to Lansing (KLAN) due to high winds in the pattern. Westerns supervisor of flying issued a warning that winds in the pattern were reported at 45kts, which is definitely outside of my personal minimums especially flying a Cirrus SR20. On Thursday we tried to fly to Lansing (KLAN) again, and we were halted again. This time there were icing conditions reported at the altitudes we were going to be flying at, and the winds were really high again. On Friday, I finally got to complete our flight to Lansing (KLAN) and it was a successful flight.

Michigan can be tough to fly in for 6 months out of the year, and this is something that people consider when deciding to train in Michigan, or to fly in another state. I personally like the Michigan flying because I feel that it has made me a better pilot, and it makes you make decisions as a PIC would. We do not fly when the conditions are dangerous and could possibly harm us as pilots, but when we can fly we have to learn how to prepare for hazardous weather as well as landing in strong winds.