Flying the G1000 Turbo 206

Life is good, I’m a fortunate person and the new Cessna Turbo 206H model with G1000 is everything that has ever been written about it. This story begins in Palo Alto, Ca. and has not ended yet though I parted company with this fine airplane in Kingston, Jamaica. It is a treatise about my experiences with Turbo Stationair N65556. Those that have tested and promoted the airplane were spot on with their adjectives. I concur; this airplane is truly the SUV of the sky.

It was mid-April 2007. My buddy Bert Postma-who has been running the Stanford Flying Club just about since Orville and Wilbur first flew-called me in to ask if I could help him out during a short term CFI shortage. “Sure”, I say, however, I’ve never flown the G1000 C172SP that Stanford Flying Club uses exclusively.

Two weeks later and more or less proficient in G1000 ops, I am at the airport Monday thru Friday. I met some very nice student pilots. Among them, Anders Jones, an energetic Stanford Economics major trying to finish up his PPL before school was out for the summer. He hadn’t soloed yet and school was out in three weeks.

What’s the hurry, turns out, his family business does much of its work from Kingston, Jamaica. In Jamaica a four or five hour drive is a 30-minute airplane ride. Being the entrepreneurial type, he believed (and convinced Dad) that the right airplane could easily pay for itself there as an air taxi.

Coincidentally, his father and he were working a deal for a new (125 hours) T206H. He wanted to be able to fly it, perhaps even to Jamaica, where he would work this summer. He still had a lot to learn about insurance requirements and cross-country flying. Not to mention complete his PPL. None-the-less his enthusiasm was infectious.

We tried but could not quite complete his PPL. He did however ask me if I was available to ferry the T206 to Kingston from the Boston area should they make a deal. As luck would have it, my wife would be able to cover my absence so I accepted. He and I would be flying this beauty, N65556 from Boston, MA to Kingston, Jamaica.

Fortunately for me I had a bunch of T206 time in a late model (1999) doing an insurance checkout and instrument rating with another client before 9/11. The major differences were the King Avionics stack versus the Garmin G1000.

As good as that King stack was in its day, the current all glass approach Garmin has taken, will, in this pilots opinion, provide a whole new level of utility to this type of airplane. This is true primarily because of capability. Garmin has integrated all the good stuff, right down to XM Radio. When it comes to weather flying, the G1000, dollar for dollar is about as good as it gets. Simply stated, with full G1000 capability, there is no good reason to take the airplane into harms way.

The G1000 in N65556 had all the bells and whistles. We would use them to their fullest capability traveling the convective eastern seaboard at the end of June.

As these journeys go, this one was not extraordinarily different from my others, though I have never flown outside the borders of the contiguous 48. I should also preface by saying that whenever I have a long cross-country flight the weather inevitably turns from CAVU to marginal VFR or IFR. The east coast enjoyed mostly clear skies and little convective activity the week before our planned trip south.

By the time I was driving to SFO for my early afternoon flight to Boston, the dominating high-pressure system that had produced such nice weather had moved east and north, now sucking hot moist air up from the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean. The temperatures dew point spreads from Boston to Ft. Lauderdale were nearly identical with highs hovering close to 100 and humidity’s about the same. On the backside of the high over the southern and mid west huge thunderstorms and a few tornadoes were reported. Things were heating up weather wise. No pun intended. The weather in South Florida was being influenced by a small low-pressure system that was sitting south of Miami and causing trouble of its own. We would deal with that two days later.

Of course the flight I was booked on became delayed due to weather, yep you got, it Boston. It was becoming clear that the sleep I was hoping to get before tackling this flight was going to be limited. Indeed my departing flight was delayed five hours. I finally arrived at my clients’ house at 0330 EDT. Clearly we would be getting a late start.

Conventional wisdom on these sorts of flights during thunderstorm season is to leave early land early. By early I mean wheels up before sunrise and land before too many cumulonimbus’s block the way.

Postponing our departure until the next morning would really throw scheduling off. So before I made that decision, we headed off to the Norwood, MA airport (OWD) at 1000. One does need some sleep.

At Norwood, we would acquaint ourselves with N65556. There was also work to do. Before we could think about departing we needed to review all the logs and test fly the airplane. I have made it a rule not to just hop in an airplane and go. Especially if we departed IFR, as we would likely do. This was a new airplane and confidence was high but a short flight to verify everything was working still was in order. It was.

The weight of our cargo, (five cases of very fine wine, baggage and a box Cessna parts) and how to load the airplane took some time. We would be at max gross weight with two souls on board and we wanted to be sure we were inside loading limits as well as have a way out if needed.

By 1430 we were finally ready. The forecast had been for hot, humid, hazy air and scattered thunderstorms along our entire route of flight from the Boston area southwest toward Kinston, NC (KISO), our intended evening layover destination. The forecasters were right on. Our look at radar and satellite images confirmed what the briefer was telling us. The thunderstorms were scattered and because there was really no frontal activity along our route, no thunderstorm lines to deal with.

This Stationair is very capable. With turbo charging, Nexrad Radar and storm scope like capability we filed IFR at 10,000 feet, expecting to spend little actual time in the clouds. We figured we could go up, down and around, all the while using direct to GPS navigation as well as the more conventional Victor Airways. We were wheels up at 1435.

We were sure ATC wouldn’t change our initial routing due to a presidential TFR over Providence, RI. Departure and integration into the ATC system went as expected. We were soon cleared 10,000 while joining our first leg. Of course looming dead ahead as I turned 556 on course was the first of many thunderstorms. It was time to start that sometimes-delicate deviation request dance with ATC.

Any of you that have flown the Boston, NYC and Washington airspace will know that it is some of the most crowded airspace in the country. With airliners coming and going from at least 10 major airports and us flying over all of them at 10,000 feet, deviating around big clouds was an exercise in the art of negotiation.

The Nexrad radar was an invaluable aid in picking our routing around the worst of the weather.

I haven’t flown an airplane with real-time weather radar in a while. But if memory serves me right, the pilot was limited to relatively small field of view and had limited see through capability. Those systems were very helpful to be sure, but are incredibly outclassed by the Nexrad on the G1000.

It was here, still early our flight that we discovered one of the downside risks of such electronic wonders as the G1000. Written by many authors before me, the key to successfully using the downlink Nexrad is its refresh rate.

Just when we were in the thick of NYC metro airspace, the frequencies jammed, and buildups everywhere, with ATC vectoring us around traffic, what we saw through the windscreen was not being depicted on Nexrad. Whatever weather ATC saw on their radar, did not correlate to the vectors they gave us directly into some of the largest clouds I’ve seen from a cockpit, ever.

Sitting in the left seat, and trying to view the Nexrad image on the MFD in sun and shade proved more difficult than Richard Collins ever mentioned in his, “On Top” series. Moreover, Anders, sitting in the right seat, was making an effort to deal with frequency and routing changes, valiantly trying to be my first officer, albeit, with no experience.

He just did not understand ATC jargon or have any experience in the IFR system, creating this question/answer environment that was increasing workload for me. Fortunately, he is quite proficient at knob spinning, and on the G1000, proficient knob spinning is paramount.

Trying to keep ATC from flying us into thunderstorms, making sure my helper was not helping wrong, resolving the Nexrad discrepancy and hand flying the airplane was knocking rust off my IFR skills at an amazing rate. Here I must pay tribute to the G1000 PFD, for it simplified scanning the instruments and as such reduced my workload significantly.

Since my first IFR lesson, I’ve learned never to trust the old round gauge gyros. Betrayal is their middle name. Relax for a second and over the spiral precipice you fall. Ironically, while scanning that glass PFD, I never gave betrayal a thought.

During a break in the fog of IFR, I was able to ascertain that the Nexrad was not refreshing. We were looking at old information and it was getting older just when we needed new. No warning, no flag, just a small window displaying the time since refresh.

This seems like a good time to mention that a capable airplane, an instrument rating and a G1000 does not automatically qualify one to tackle weather conditions such as we were seeing this day. Indeed, my weather flying experience was called into play because in a manner of speaking the G1000 let me down when I needed it the most.

And so it went on our way to KISO. The one forecast our briefer got wrong however were the winds aloft. Now that we had sorted out our avionics issues, established a relationship with ATC and divided the cockpit workload, we began to suspect that we’re not getting anywhere very fast. Once again the G1000 MFD paid for itself informing us-via another little window-that we were facing 40+ knot headwinds. If the amount of time we were on frequency with New York controllers were not enough, comparing the fuel gauges with the distance to and ETA on the GPS confirmed our suspicions. We did not have the fuel to reach Kinston…

I once flew with a CFI who used to say that Turbo charging was God’s gift to airplanes. The added capability sure warrants such observations but with the added capability comes additional cost and that cost is fuel consumption.

Manifold pressure set to 30 inches and prop RPM at 2300 and leaned to POH recommended TIT (turbo inlet temperature) N65556 was sucking, in round numbers, 23 to 24 gallons per hour. On a true airspeed of 150 knots were making about 110 across the ground. Time to find a place to land and explore our options.

Three hours and 30 minutes into our first leg we touched down in Salisbury, Maryland. I was close to exhaustion. Though we were cleared for an ILS approach to the tower-controlled airport I was able to do a visual once we were below 3000 feet. That was ok with me. I didn’t feel like shooting an approach to minimums.

It was early evening. I was tired from all the travel and IFR flying. The very nice people at the local FBO suggested nice places to eat and stay overnight. For the record and with no malice to Salisbury, MD, this place is in the middle of nowhere.

As tired as I was, these suggestions were sounding most acceptable to me, counting on an early start the next day to make up lost ground. Anders however had other ideas, like, someplace near an actual city. Staying the night in Salisbury was not setting right with my young energetic client. We needed a plan.

Having spent nearly the entire month of June in an airplane with Anders I knew he could fly. I was too tired to think and fly but ok put on my CFI cap while he actually handled the controls.

We agreed to continue VFR from Salisbury to Norfolk, VA. He would fly under my supervision. Norfolk was only an hour or so away. A weather briefing told us nothing we didn’t already know…scattered T-Storms all over the southeast. It was certainly clear in Salisbury. We needed one more hour of clear. Little did I know how true that would turn out to be.

We departed climbing to 2000’ over the flat coastal plain of southern Maryland GPS direct to Norfolk. Our route from Salisbury to Norfolk took us back inland from the Atlantic coast, a beautiful flight with the scenic Chesapeake Bay coming into view over the cowl of 556. Also coming into view on the horizon were huge and building cloud formations. Of course they were in line with our route to Norfolk. We were too far out to see Norfolk International located on the coast of the Chesapeake, but could tell these clouds were close. Nexrad – updating regularly now – located the cells west of the airport. Based on the refresh rate of the Nexrad and our ground speed it was shaping up to be a close race to Norfolk between N65556 and the weather.

Here the real beauty of Nexrad comes shining through. By adjusting the viewing area scale on the MFD, we could see the big weather picture over Virginia, even the whole southeast, facilitating several high confidence escape routes should the weather beat us to Norfolk. I cannot find the words to describe just how great this tool is for in flight planning.

30 miles from Norfolk (Class C) we listened to ATIS warning of local Thunderstorms. After contacting the local approach controller we were told to plan on a straight in landing to runway 23. So far, so good. Anders was doing a fine job flying 556. Ten more minutes and we would be unloading and on our way to a fine steak dinner.

Ten miles out, crossing the Chesapeake and descending toward the airport now clearly in sight, I could see the towering build-ups on the other side of the field. At the same time the Nexrad refreshed showing red about five miles west of the aerodrome. Moreover, in the small little box in the upper right corner of the MFD I noticed a significant increase in head winds. They had gone from under 20 to 40+.

Not a good sign. By my calculations, we would still get there first, but not by much. Not exactly the peaceful one-hour flight I was hoping for 50 minutes ago. Reviewing everything I knew about microbursts and thunderstorms in general, it was time to decide, continue or divert. My decision was to continue. I felt certain we would be on the ground before the storm passed over. If necessary, we could still turn and outrun it to the south, hold and return after the cell passed.

If you are wondering if my decision to continue was influenced by my desire to get some sleep the answer is, yes but. The greatest value in the G1000 cockpit is information, most of it real-time. All the bells and whistles indicated we would be wheels down before the storm passed and our headwinds sheared to tailwinds. It wasn’t hard to look out the windscreen and judge the same thing. It would be close to be sure, but there was wiggle room. We had our escape plan in place knew we could execute. We also had plenty of fuel and a fresh pilot.

Just the same, I told Anders to keep his speed up. Understanding quickly displaced his look of confusion as I pointed out front. The rain had crossed the fence at the other end of the field. Handed off to the tower and cleared to land we could see a long line of airliners waiting. I like to think they were waiting for us to land but…they were waiting for the storm to pass.

Just as the rain started to moisten the 50 numbers tower called, “N65556”, do you have any wind information?” A quick glance at the MFD and I keyed the mike, “556 at 500’ showing 47 knots on the nose.” “N65556 cleared to land runway 23, wind 230 at 18 variable and gusting to 30”. Was this their way of alerting us to a thunderstorm on the very edge of the runway?

With only 10 degrees of flap and 90 knots indicated we crossed the fence and flared, globules of oversized raindrops starting to pelt the windscreen. Facing 30+ knot headwinds we were not using up very much of the almost two miles of cement. It didn’t take long land and find us still on the numbers. As we taxied along the runway the cell finally passed over us before we could reach the first taxiway to turnoff, deluging us in rain. We had beaten the storm by only minutes, perhaps less. The ground controllers were happy to let us sit on the runway to wait for the rain to pass and we could see again. After all, no one else was using it.

When Anders reviewed this narrative, his response was that the experience was far more epic than retold here. I think that viewed through the eyes of a new pilot that would be one way to describe the experience. Indeed, on this day, fate was hunting somewhere else. Yet, the fundamentals of flying inside an angry sky have not changed with technology. You can’t go wrong with good planning, a flexible mind, trusting your gut and good old fashioned seat-of-the-pants flying.

That evening, Anders and I toasted the first leg of our adventure with a bottle of his Dad’s fine red wine. We ate a steak and fell fast asleep by 10.

We launched around eight the next morning. The skies were clear and the temperatures almost cool. Our destination was Savannah, Georgia. This would hopefully be our first and only fuel stop on our way to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

The weather briefer gave us the same information we’d been hearing. Hot, humid, hazy and scattered Thunder storms over our route. At eight in the morning, as the sun and N65556 ascended, there were already cumulus clouds forming…squadrons of them, building in size and height threatening, to grow and challenge some other pilot later in the day.

Of more concern was a small but pesky low-pressure system centered due south of Miami that had been spinning there for the last couple of days, not really going anywhere or away. It was not what I would call a huge storm, just a meteorological annoyance, its influence was being felt in all of southern Florida from Tampa to Key West. Despite my best wishful thinking, there seemed little hope of it moving out our way by early evening. We would have to deal with it as we neared Ft. Lauderdale.

We were at 10,000 feet VFR, over the growing cumuli and GPS direct Savannah. As we climbed we noted the winds aloft again to be significant. Anders, already bored, (he was in the left seat but I had the KAP 140 flying) was requesting his first experience of operating in thin air and sucking oxygen. Perhaps, we joked, we will find tail winds up high.

Since we were turbo charged and O2 equipped, how could I deny him. I did fore warn him this was not as much fun as it seemed – those masks not being all that comfortable – as we set the autopilot to 16,000 feet and began our climb.

On our way up Anders figured out how to use the XM radio. We found an excellent comedy channel. Most humorous was the built in capability of the G1000 to squelch the XM when ATC or we were talking. Predictably, ATC always cut in during the delivery of the punch lines. We decided on Jazz as we winged our way toward Savannah.

With jazz playing in the headsets, the autopilot flying, we had plenty of time to watch what the low-pressure system south of Miami was doing. Nexrad was depicting weak frontal like activity from the onshore flow creating lots of green with yellow and red spreading across southern Florida.

How cool is that? When I started flying weather – many years ago - I could only dream of such capability. Indeed there were times I would have traded all my worldly possessions just to glimpse inside a distant sky.

Today over the rolling Carolina hills, while still almost 1000 miles away, I could watch the weather over southern Florida. Moreover, my young student and I could plan in ways never before available to us lowly GA pilots tooling around dodging the weather.

Unlike our brethren - turbo fanning in the mid thirties above the hot humid chop below – we were VFR, enjoying the view, the music and loving it. Not worried at all by the perpetual doom and gloom reports from flight service specialists – formerly a pilot’s only source of in flight weather information – we could look out the window and seemingly see the future.

By the time, sucking O2 got old; the cumulus clouds that were below, are now looking very cumulonimbus like. And, we didn’t have to look down to see them.

So, 60 miles out, we started our VFR descent toward Savannah picking our way around towering clouds that were – fortunately for us – well spaced.

While N65556 was being refueled, Anders and I - enjoying the air-conditioned FBO - happened across some delicious home baked Chocolate Chip Cookies. A wonderful adventure in a great airplane equipped with the latest high tech avionics, air-conditioning and homemade cookies. It was, for the moment, good to be us. Still, we had southern Florida to deal with before tonight’s steak dinner.