Mike Hoover’s Aviation Journal

On a recent business trip, Pam and I enjoyed flying what was our very first cross country business flight together. We flew my Cessna 172, “Betsy”, to Gwinnett County/Briscoe Airport in Lawrenceville, Georgia. It was mid-January and the weather was a concern as wintry weather was forecast, so I had been checking the weather forecasts several days in advance of our planned trip.

Of all the weather information available on the internet today, there are a few sources that I rely upon regularly: AOPA, NOAA, and Weathermeister.com. AOPA has all the “official” and highly dependable aviation weather and airport information, and NOAA gives local forecasts in simple laymen’s terms. Weathermeister.com however provides pilots with a collection of weather and airport information from various sources and displays that information on a single webpage.

Weathermeister.com is a result of ten years of development by Dan Checkoway, a pilot, airplane builder, and computer software engineer located in Chino Hills, California. His initial intent was to have quick and concise weather information for his personal flying. Over the years, tweaking the website led to Dan’s offering it to other pilots.
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On December 18, 2007, Pam and I decided to take an afternoon flight since the weather was so nice. It was very chilly, but otherwise nice flying weather. The sun was working its way down at around 4:45 pm as we did a preflight inspection and pulled Betsy out of the hangar. Sunset was to be at 5:17, so we had a little daylight to fly in yet.

We got airborne and flew over downtown Columbia, right by the State Capitol building with the big Christmas tree out front. Its lights were on, but there was still a little too much daylight to make them look bright from our viewpoint, but pretty none the less.

The sun was setting blindingly bright to our west so we flew eastward over Forest Acres. What an incredible view of the vast “forest” of the Forest Areas area as the low lying sunlight had shone on the trees, lighting them up intensely with an almost glowing golden hue on their westerly sides, and casting shadows beyond them to the east in a way that only the setting sun can.
The mystery continues…

On Saturday morning, December 8, 2007, Pam and I arrived at the airport (CUB) around 10:00 a.m. to see that plenty of folks - pilots and YEs - turned out for the last planned Young Eagles Day of the year. I had planned to fly one or two YE flights, and Pam said she would find something to do at the SAC to help out.

We had to go thru the north gate to get into the airport as the gate nearest the SAC was out of order. That was just fine since my hangar is up that way. Once at the hangar, I gave Betsy (N2878L) a good looking over and pulled her out onto the tarmac. Since Pam and I had this weekend to ourselves - kids gone to Dad’s - we decided to forego the YE flights and take a trip to Aiken to see my mom.
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