Winter flying for a commuter pilot involves significant ground-based challenges, including extensive snow and ice removal, difficult aircraft maneuvering on slippery surfaces, and often inadequate airport snow-clearing services.
These ground operations are physically demanding, time-consuming, and can be hazardous, as illustrated by the author's experiences with dangerous ice conditions and manual labor.
Pilots tend to accumulate substantial survival gear and tools for winter operations, a phenomenon termed "baggage creep" which can add significant weight to the aircraft and potentially affect performance.
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.
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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.
