Wing Icing and Datalink Weather

Risk-and the management thereof-is a diffuse concept, for it remains true that one mans risk is anothers Saturday afternoon recreation. But its also true that in order to place degrees of risk into categories remotely capable of being ranked requires as much information as it is possible to have. It applies to airplane systems, to stick and rudder skills and above all, to weather. Weather has always been the stickiest thorn in the FAAs concept of "all available information." Even in the era of five-minute Nexrad loops and ever more sophisticated ice prediction products, theres occasionally a large disconnect between what is expected to happen and what is really happening. The advent of real-time weather data in the cockpit has reduced the surprise factor, but it hasnt eliminated it. And it cuts both ways-having lots of information thats just wrong can be worse than having no information, and it can lure you into a decision you might not have otherwise made.

Key Takeaways:

• Real-time datalink weather, while useful for avoiding convective weather and accessing METARs, can be dangerously misleading when forecast products for conditions like icing and cloud tops are significantly inaccurate.
• The author's flight demonstrated that visually compelling datalink forecasts for freezing levels and cloud tops can diverge dramatically from actual severe icing conditions, luring pilots into poor decisions and leading to necessary diversions.
• Pilots must critically evaluate datalink forecasts, especially for icing, as the technology is currently too coarse for reliable prediction, making it essential to prioritize conservative decision-making and the "ice is where you find it" principle.

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