Icy Conditions

Canberra is dissimilar to much of the rest of Australia in many ways (just ask the average Australian what they think of Canberra to see some of the ways that Canberra is different). One of the more quotable complaints about Canberra is the weather. For a country full of people used to hot and sunny summers, and warm and sunny winters Canberra is most unusual. Canberra routinely gets down to below freezing during winter, and while I know that is not anything of worthy note to an American or European, to the average Australian the typical reaction to below freezing temperatures is to turn on everything single appliance in the house that makes heat, not only in the hope of the short term benefit of warming the house, but also in the hope that the coal burned will release enough carbon dioxide to permanently alter Canberra's Climate. Either that, or they just go back to wherever it is they came from.

There are colder places in Oz, but probably not any colder capital cities in Oz. Even Hobart is rarely as cold. So, why all this prattling on about the weather - well be patient I am getting there.

The other morning we had a real pea souper (as opposed to a pea soup floater - best we can figure the radiation from Maralinga genetically mutated the tasted buds of much of SA's population - the good news is that the condition dissapears after only a generation provided the person leaves SA). However, it was a week day morning and we all knew we had to get off to work reasonably quickly.

The fog lifted enough for a good 100metres visibility so DJ and I put our Tigermoths in the air. The fog was still there so we were tending to keep the planes very close to us, including not letting them climb to high.

After about 3 minutes I found that I had gradually, without realising it, pushed my TM's throttle to full, and that despite this, she was still unable to maintain altitude. Fearing some sort of battery issue, or the oft-warned death of my speed 400 by running it on a 3s (they last for ages - don't stress) I quickly brought her in. After I landed I realised DJ had his bird on the ground - I thought he was just landing, but he was worried he might have finally nuked his battery. We were both wrong. A layer of ice had formed on the props' leading edges, making the prop heavier and also altering its airfoil shape enough so that the motor could not keep the plane in the sky. Some ice had also formed on the leading edge of the wings - wow.

As the fog cleared a little more I also took the Mini Pulse for a spin. It was also affected by the ice, although having so much more power than required for level flight was able to easily keep itself up there. All the same, there was a layer of ice to clear from her prop when she came down.

So, there's a new one for me.