After we got the thumbs up from the bucket guy, captain got out to do a visual and tactile check of the airplane. It’s a damn good thing too, because they left a ton of snow and ice on the airplane. I taxied over to the pad on the right engine only so that side was mostly clean but he never sprayed the left props at all, they were in the prevailing winds all night so were very snowy and icy. He missed an entire area between the engine and the fuselage and there were still ice chunks attached to the leading edge of the forward wing!
Just use caution, they’re supposedly trained for this, but they left an unsafe amount of contamination on the airplane.
Believe me, if there was hangar space available we would’ve taken it. There was probably a 20 airplane waiting list.
If it’s calling for inclement weather we almost always try to hangar. Not only is is often less expensive, it’s much better for the avionics, it’s faster, and it’s easier on us pilots.
That’s a pretty efficient plane – your DOCs are very similar to ours – Avantair spent $4k on deicing not to mention the intangible cost in time to pax – might have it been better for Avantair have you repo somewhere where there was hangar space available? Or, was it that bad everywhere else too?
I am fascinated at how and why the frax do things they way they do – there is so much to be learned. Thanks, in advance, for sharing with us on this icing subject.
We were trying to repo to PNE the afternoon prior, but we were running out of duty time waiting for deicing, and the weather wasn’t much better there nor was there any hangar space available. Hence the wicked early repo to get there in time for a 0700 departure.
It’s just the cost of doing business.
James, just saw your IAD icecube photo. Very nice. We got snowed in there a couple years ago in the Beechjet, something like 20 inches in a day or so. We go out to the plane in the “Zulu pad” at Piedmont and find that: 1.) The plane was coldsoaked and the snow dry, so no sticking, and 2.) the wind had blown most of the snow off the airframe. So, a big ladder to get to the tail, a couple of those snow broom thingys, and we’ve got a perfectly clean airplane. We’re sitting in the cabin, getting things ready for the boss, when the Lear nextdoor fires up and starts to taxi out, through the foot or so of snow on the ramp. Tons of power, lots of noise, he starts to roll and chops the power. Then he starts his turn, power at idle in a foot of snow! He managed to get his engines pointed directly at us, about 100 ft. away before he came to a dead stop. What’s a smart pilot do?!? Of course! He HAMMERS the power. The Beechjet is arockin and, when we manage to get the door open, our formerly clean airplane is now a block of ice. Happy happy joy joy. Luckily a lineman saw the whole thing, so the Lear got to buy us a deice. Don’t ya just love snow?
for the same chemical composition approved for everything else