Snow on the ice - runway

[magnum mike]

We are thinking of flying to LOW this weekend and I am looking for ice conditions. Since we will need a fairily large area for takeoff & landing, we will likely come in from the north and the deeper areas. My ideal conditions are wind blown clear & smooth ice. We had these conditions a few weeks ago but things have changed. We have had a few snow squalls on The Range but looking for current LOW conditions. Thanks for any intel.

[northerndave]

Wow...

Be careful, I have heard there is a lot of this sort of thing out there this year.

In years past I've seen a lot of that sort of thing out in the middle of the lake while on snowmobile.

[bturck]

magmum: Just curious are you flying wheels down, or ski's down? Can you land on basically slick ice with skis? Sounds like the way to go though. As mentioned above watch for the heaves. Good luck

[shamrock7]

Son had our 150 up to Zipple on Tuesday with no problem.

[magnum mike]

We are on conventional wheels in a Skyhawk. Clear ice or hard packed spring ice is a piece of cake. You can see the big problems during a fly over. When everything is white and you can't see the humps & bumps, that can be bad. Thanks for the reports everyone.

[bturck]

Thanks for the info. I'll bet that is a real site to see flying over the lake. My son is an Air Traffic Controller in Farmington and we get up several times a year, usually over Mille Lacs Lake. I love it, wish I would have gotten a license when I was younger. I do get to fly some when we're up, so part of my bucket list is accomplished.

[magnum mike]

We had kids from the neighboring houses come over and ask questions and take pictures on Red Lake a few weeks ago. A plane on the ice does draw some attention.

Your son must be a radar rat. I was a tower controller in the Air Force back in the 80's. The best combination of skills in my opinion is experienace on both sides of that radio. Get you ticket. It is the most fun you can have with your clothes on!

Thanks for all the updates but it looks like the weather is going scrub our flight. It looks like poor visibility and low ceilings over our entire route tomorrow.

[bturck]

Yes he is a radar rat. I go down every so often and sit in and listen to the action while he works traffic. He just completed 24 years at ATC, all of it in Farmington. His Xmas present to me this year is a flight in a Cirrus. Take off planned for 2/2/12 from Anoka airport. Looking forward to that big time. Another controller friend of his is an instructor and our pilot on these little ventures. I think the yoke time he gives me is intended to move me toward that ticket....Sorry to hear your flight might get scrubbed, never fun to be grounded.

[magnum mike]

The fishing / flying gods smiled on us and we made the trip Saturday morning. We ran into a little snow about 20 miles south of Baudette but nothing too bad. We landed safely over Pine Island in 31 feet of water and had the first fish on the ice in under 5 minutes. The fishing was steady all day. Pink jigging spoons and chub heads did the trick for us. Jigging and bobbers were about even. When the fish came through, they bit. It was nice to see several year classes. We caught 5" cigars to 21" walleyes and everything in between. We packed up around 2:30 with 2 limits of walleyes & saugers. It took a bit to get airborne since 3 houses set up on our runway and we had to find a new area of smooth ice to take off. After a few passes over the crowds we departed to the south. We decided to make a few passes over Red Lake on the way home. There isn't much left for "open areas" to fish. There are houses all over the lake. There are quite a few areas of broken ice, heaves and pressure ridges.

[vexi]

So that was you who buzzed our sleeper house from border view, pretty neat how low you were lol, sure got our attention.

[magnum mike]

We actually had 2 people duck on one of our passes. We weren't that low. You get a whole differnt feel of how many people are out there from a few hundred feet up.

[CigarGuy]

I saw 2 planes on the ice Saturday, was that you? Looks pretty cool!

[magnum mike]

The green & white one and the other one were Pipers and they came from Eveleth area. They were about 20 minutes behind us on the way up. We talked to them on the radio and buzzed them when we left. They were meeting up with buddies in sleeper houses that were spending the weekend. We were in the white & blue Cessnna and were headed south around 3:00. We fished on the outside edge of the "village".