Told December 28, 2001 by Ken Kopp
Just returned from a three day trip from St. Mary's, MD (2w6) to the Adirondack mountains of upstate NY with my wife, 10 yr old son and 4 yr old daughter all packed in the BD-4 with lots of room for all our bags, my wife's portable beauty salon and toys from Christmas. We averaged 180 mph over the ground at 7000 going up but only 120 mph coming back. Flew up non-stop to Glens Falls (GFL) in just under 2:15 and 26 gallons of $$. Filed IFR and was re-routed twice through Philadelphia and then again near NY City but it was fun. Trained my wife to keep the charts folded the way I need them and to remind me answer radio calls. Using the crew function on my 4 place portable intercom was a blessing as it allowed the kids to fight and scream at each other while leaving my wife and I to fly in peace. Weather was VFR all the way up. The return trip was a little more involved as we encountered unforcasted snow, moderate turbulence and a wife who had trouble keeping her food down (Yuck!). Never forget to put sick-sacks in your pride-and-joy, I was more worried about that than flying! We broke into the clear near Pottstown-limerick, PA and decided to stop for a break and restroom call (and to clean my airplane). The rest of the flight was VFR along the Chesapeake bay with 35 knot headwinds and an 20 knot crosswind landing to end the adventure. Took us 4 hours to get home (including the stop). So.... 7.0 hours of flight time versus 18 hours of driving.....that's motivation!
I just ordered the new TPAS (Traffic Proximity Alert System) featured in next months Flying for $545.00. I will complete a full systems evaluation and report back to the group. If it is as good as they say it will really be a neat safety enhancement. Go to http://www.surecheckaviation.com/services/info.html to check it out for yourselves.
Regards,
Ken
LT Kenneth G. Kopp
US Navy Test Pilot