You can't go to a party in Florida where I live and escape a conversation about real estate or hurricanes. There's no doubt that the state is still adding to its population base and the interaction between the growth, the weather and the price of real estate makes for an underlying hum of concern. One of the things I like about where I live is that I'm just seven minutes from the airport where we keep our airplane. Our back yard has a terrific view of Tampa Bay and the airplanes headed for 36 Left at Tampa International Airport. This is the closest I've lived to an airplane I've owned in 35 years of paying hangar rent.
There are even more intimate living arrangements, though, and I've started to think about them. Specifically, what about living at an airport? I had never been to a "fly-in" community until a friend called and invited my wife and me for a visit featuring a "gathering" and a night's stay. We jumped eagerly at the possibility of seeing a new living arrangement.
It was to be a short trip, just 105.9 nautical miles, from Tampa to the Spruce Creek flying community near Daytona Beach, but there were plenty of thunderstorms about on a warm October afternoon. We called our host, Bob Blankenship, just before taking off and he said he'd be listening on his handheld radio for us to call the Unicom frequency. "I'll meet you in my golf cart and direct you to a parking space I've picked out for you." Bob is thoughtful that way.
We climbed to five thousand and started dodging the build-ups. I could see a large cell on the Avidyne EX500 located just almost on top of our destination, or maybe just a hair north of the field. The Nexrad picture for our route looked okay, but I watched with motivated interest as we neared the destination. I knew I wouldn't have to wonder for long, as the whole trip was planned for 28 minutes.
We got vectored around a bit by Orlando and then Daytona Approach, both doing an admirable job of mixing big jets with practicing airmen in small airplanes in an airspace festooned with showers. When cleared to descend to 1,600 feet, I cancelled IFR and started looking for the field. The picture on the MFD was not encouraging. The field appeared to be covered by green if not yellow returns and there was a large red splotch just north of the lighter precipitation. The runway was not easy to spot and by the time I had it in sight I had a decision to contemplate. I could do the right thing, over fly the field and enter a left downwind for Runway five, but that looked like it would take us into a dark wall of forbidding precip. I switched the Avidyne to onboard radar, confirmed the unfriendly skies, and opted to abandon any niceties, make a 360 off the approach end of the runway to lose altitude, announce my intentions and get this thing on the ground. I hoped not too many experienced aviators were watching our inelegant but practical arrival. We touched down softly.
