cleared to land
are the three most important words you need to hear before
touching down at an airport with an operating control tower.
It is a good idea however to have checked the current weather
conditions as well. Most airports have an automated system
for reporting the weather and broadcast the information on a
frequency listed as ATIS, AWOS etc. Before depature you can
get the same information in a report called a METAR. Below
you will find a list of metars for a variety of airports I
have flown to. To solve this puzzle you will need to
determine the appropriate runway to use with the given
weather conditions. Runways are numbered with their magnetic
heading rounded to the nearest 10 degrees. For example when
landing to the south at John Wayne Airport the heading is
194°, so the runways are numbered 19R and 19L (right and
left). The left and right do not come into play here. It is
best to land airplanes into the wind. This reduces your
ground speed during this critical phase of flight. To make
things a little more interesting the numbers are scrambled
(if I say anything else I'll be giving away how to unscramble
them) and you will need to use the catalina airport twice
(that's why there are two metars).
Do not use the following data for navigational purposes
F70 041948Z 35006KT 7SM FEW100 11/5 A3009
KAVX 112241Z 01008KT 10SM CLR 14/6 A2994
KAVX 210044Z 07012KT 6SM SCT075 7/2 A3015
KBFL 311415Z 29007KT 6SM HZ CLR 9/4 A3000
KHND 120517Z 19013KT 10SM CLR 13/3 A3006
KMMH 072157Z 09018KT 1SM +SN OVC020 M4/M11 A3012
KMPI 071325Z 11012KT 3SM -RA BKN040 5/3 A2991
KMYF 242316Z 06009KT 2SM BR OVC015 6/4 A3018
KSBA 090954Z 31004KT 1/4SM FG OVC005 4/3 A2985
KSMO 131649Z 05020G35KT 10SM CLR 19/3 A2988
KSNA 131653Z 03025G35KT 10SM CLR 21/3 A3003
When you get to the
cache site you'll probably have poor gps reception, so use your
geosense and look for the cache about 20 feet off the trail. No
bushwhacking will be necessary. You're looking for a camo'd
rubbermaid container.
By the way the
background image is KMPI the Mariposa Yosemite Airport. Although we
have seen that view we didn't take the picture.
More
help can be found here!