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Advice/Guidance: November Touring / Winter IFR Weather

39 Posts

21-Nov-18 15:57

Administrator

Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

21-Nov-18 15:55

For simplicity a straight line between EGSX and EDMA works. The route will be something along the lines of:

EGSX N0168F160 NEPNA DCT DET L6 DVR L9 KONAN L607 GILOM M624 DIK M150 KRH Z729 LBU L173 RIXED Y161 DODIL EDMA

EGSX

21-Nov-18 15:47

What is the proposed route?

Administrator

Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

21-Nov-18 15:37

As I am planning the above trip for the upcoming weekend, and having looked at the weather patterns over the last few days there are a couple points I’d like to get some thoughts on:

On a given day assuming temperatures at departure field are ~+3c with an overcast layer at 1200ft. For those with TKS equipped aircraft, how many thousands of feet do you find acceptable to “punch through” in the attempt to get VMC on-top?
Presuming an IAP is required on arrival.. it appears that this time of year in a lot of cases the platform altitude of any approach will be right around the 0c range (especially as you get closer to southern Germany). I realise some views are “you are landing anyways” but wondering if anyone has any specific considerations (operational or otherwise) as to how best deal with freezing levels at such low altitudes. I guess one simple approach would be to have a cloud base of >1000ft agl so as to ensure that you can remain VMC on any missed / no icing conditions on last bits of landing.
Scenario: what would be your views on crossing this occluded warm front over the border of Belgium & Germany. Presume this was “missed” on the pre-flight brief / launched anyways and encountered in-flight at say FL140-180. In other words, you are flying along in VMC at FL140 and you see this weather phenomenon ahead. Some relevant meteorological information posted below.
Looking ahead it seems like freezing levels around the MVA are going to be common throughout Germany. This really emphasis the need for VMC on-top conditions and likely a good VFR margin on landing (to not be stuck in freezing IMC at all low levels)

Any thoughts are welcome and again really appreciate all this helpful ground learning.

EGSX

13-Nov-18 22:49

__Peter wrote:

Does Topmeteo present the EUMETSAT IR image spectrally corrected for actual temps aloft?

what do you mean by “spectrally corrected”? But, that’s sophisticated. My impression is that in regions where clouds are more scattered than overcast the temperature signal is distorted by radiation from ground which translates to too warm temp. / low tops. The temps aloft would be of minor relevance then. You can check it out via “test topmeteo” found elsewhere on the landing page. You have all the information of the last two days at hand and can compare your flights with the fcsts / measurements. The only problem you have is to remember :)

__Peter wrote:

I believe quite a lot of data is returned by airliners, over ADS-B, though perhaps not the OAT.

Hm, OAT would be the first I would expect from airliner measurements. Temperature, humidity and wind, what else. But I don’t know. LH sends data to ground stations, thats what I know, and for sure the data is used for initialisation processes of global weather models. Dont’t believe the data streams use ADS-B.

13-Nov-18 21:37

Assuming we are talking about 1200Z today, let’s look at some real data – baloon ascents. Select Europe / GIF-Skew-T and click away.

The closest is perhaps “EDZE” which yields this

“ETGI” is here, with tops at 3000m (9600ft)

Does Topmeteo present the EUMETSAT IR image spectrally corrected for actual temps aloft? I believe quite a lot of data is returned by airliners, over ADS-B, though perhaps not the OAT.

Administrator

Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

13-Nov-18 21:28

@Peter and @TimR
here is a second opinion. The “green” area is found on the left side of the picture near Bru (=Brussels)

13-Nov-18 18:09

@TimR

Yes, definitely a front (in this case cold front) with freezing level forecast at around FL65 around Munich. In this case, I would have gone ahead with the flight, especially as the front was moving E/SE-wards and I would have had the option to turn around in case the freezing level ended up being lower (and I actually picked up icing as well) and land somewhere enroute (e.g. Egelsbach EDFE which has immigration onsite without prior notice).

And conditions seem fine until at least Saturday evening (I am going to fly the route again this Saturday).

Last Edited by wbardorf at 13 Nov 18:11