Training Tip: Frozen (a tale of winter flight training)

From frigid preflights, frost, and “ficons” to fickle freezing levels, winter flight training won’t disappoint when it comes to offering you a new perspective on flying.

Fortunately, you can begin your adventure not alongside an iceman but at room temperature at home by looking over the cold-weather operating information in your aircraft’s pilot’s operating handbook and perhaps getting a few practice weather briefings that include careful checks of notices to airmen for runway and taxiway closings, plowing operations, and ficons (field conditions) such as these noted December 12 for Casper/Natrona County International Airport in Wyoming: CPR 12/179 CPR RWY 21 FICON 10 PCT ICE AND 25 PCT 1/8IN DRY SN, 10 PCT ICE AND 10 PCT COMPACTED SN, 10 PCT ICE AND 10 PCT COMPACTED SN OBS AT 1912111805.

Your POH may include guidance on cold-weather operation; the book for a Cessna 182S Skylane mentions topics including keeping the fuel system water-free, the hazard of airframe frost accumulation, ensuring that control surfaces are snow- and ice-free, using preheat before start below 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and cold-weather starting.

How would you explain to a designated pilot examiner whether the aircraft has a winterization kit, and what is in it? That’s discussed in a Skylane POH supplement; the installation also includes a placard on the instrument panel.

VFR pilots may not fly in clouds, but checking the freezing level aloft before you fly, as instrument pilots do, is important. For example, if there’s a temperature inversion—warmer air above the cold air you are flying in—falling rain could freeze on contact with your aircraft, a scenario that should always be avoided.

Exploring the performance charts for a normally aspirated piston-engine aircraft may reveal power and true airspeed gains at below-standard winter temperatures—but they likely come at a cost of increased fuel burn.

Short-field takeoff performance and climb rates shine in winter—and in a flip of the script from summer, it’s not uncommon to see airport density altitudes lower than the field elevation.

Getting back to the opening question: Procedures are case-by-case, but for the aircraft noted, the published recommendation is to warm the engine at 1,000 rpm for a “suitable period” (two to five minutes) and accelerate the engine several times to higher rpm. If acceleration is smooth and oil pressure “normal and steady,” the aircraft can be deemed ready for takeoff.