Aircraft Down in Angelina County, TX (C-421 KIWS-KRVS)

[ppragman]

Just fly the hell around it. It's pretty easy, go around it. Avoid the really heavy stuff, and if you do have to go through a line, figure out the best way to go through where you'll be the farthest between cells. Everyone wants to be a billy badass, but Tstorms are unpredictable - what's OK oneday could kill you the next - I think the FAA's "20NM from the nearest cell" is a little much, but use some discretion, don't go through anything greater than green and you should be alright.

 

[ackeight]

I think you might want to re-think that technique. There are several reasons why that one could kill you one day.

Heavy snow and hail don't reflect as much energy as rain will and developing thunderstorms can contain killer turbulence before it contains heavy precipitation that will reflect enough energy to show red. This is just a couple of reasons off the top of my head.


Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

Joking. Chill. I'm not going to contribute to a measuring contest but i'll be more than happy contribute to keep y'all alive. Good advice if you need to fly in that sorta stuff is find a friendly freight dog. There are many techniques to read the weather on the ground and in the air to help you fly safely through the nastiest of weather. You are correct that hail does not show up on onboard radar. However it is usually found at the core. So if you see green turning to yellow turning to red and if you have a great radar magenta in a circular pattern avoid the middle (duh!) but also know the winds aloft and avoid going directly downwind as the hail could be thrown from the storm. I prefer passing on the rear of the storm and preferably north since tornadoes generally form on the southwest of a cell. Obviously this won't work well with a squall line since you will be between two cells and will be downwind and on the southwest side of one of the cells. If you can find a big enough comfortable hole, fly as close to the upwind cell as you can because those cells are moving north along the line usually at a very fast pace. These are some tips and may not work in every circumstance since weather is so dynamic and decisions should be adjusted as such. Also, you are never wrong if you divert or turn around if you don't think it's safe.

 

[Pilotforhire587]

As a controller nothing makes me curse a pilot more than a ga guy trying to push his way through weather. I will go blue in the face fron describing the weather trying to get them to go a different route....just to have them to either fly through it and report severe turb...or drive up to it and in a panic request vectors around.

We have had quiet a few go down due to weather in the past couple years. Please be smart out there.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2

I wish more of you guys were like this. There are many controllers who will force a pilot to go through something, I am talking airlines here, because he doesn't want to make a phone call to hand me off to someone else.