Winter flying in Maine requires immense physical effort to clear heavy snow and intractable ice around the aircraft, often exacerbated by insufficient airport snow removal practices.
Navigating icy conditions presents significant hazards, leading the author to develop extreme caution and implement practical solutions like using copious sand or a winch to safely move the airplane.
The accumulation of essential survival gear and specialized tools for winter operations leads to "baggage creep," paradoxically adding significant weight (75 lbs) that could compromise flight performance despite intending to enhance safety.
This is about flying in winter—when you are on a scheduled commute. It’s about adding extra time towarm up the airplane and clear the ice and snow from in front of the hangar. And, it’s about all the things that can go wrong when you are trying to warm up the air-plane and clear ice and snow from in front of the hangar.
CREATE A FREE ACCOUNT
Sign up to keep reading
Create a free account to continue. Already a member? Sign in below.
Chuck Boyer was an engineering graduate of Penn State, a former Army Ranger, and a retired corporate consultant. He commuted from a grass field in western Maine to Boston for 12 years in his 1957 Piper Tri-Pacer, logging about 2,000 hours, all VFR. He flew west in 2021.
