Thanksgiving '07 - Part 1 of 8: KJYO-KRDU
This is the first leg of this year's trek to Wrens, GA to visit family for Thanksgiving. I had technical difficulties with the audio capture so none of this year's Thanksgiving series has the audio I normally have on tape.
This video shows an IFR departure from Leesburg, VA (KJYO), my climb through the clouds and my breakout to crystal blue skies on top at 9800'.
.bmp "KJYO-KRDU")
We had planned to fly straight through to Thomson, GA (KHQU), but biological needs necessitated a stop in North Carolina. My original plan was to land at Person County/Roxboro, NC (KTDF), but the Raleigh controller told me he had a plane go missed there 20 minutes before without seeing the field. (The glideslope was out of service.) That's when we decided to divert to Raleigh/Durham International (KRDU).
This is where having my tablet PC in the cockpit with a current installation of Sporty's ChartViewer (and a fully charged battery) really comes in handy. I was able to pull up all the relevant charts quickly - including the airport diagram for KRDU, which was very much appreciated.
.bmp "Short Final Rwy 23R KRDU")
You'll see me being vectored to intercept the localizer, my landing and taxi to the ramp at KRDU.
Landing a Cessna 182 at a large airport like KRDU will often result in "keep your speed up as long as possible" on the approach. I obliged the controller's request, but keeping that extra 30 knots makes those localizer deviations more pronounced. You really have to keep on those needle deflections to keep the localizer captured.