First Trip into the Dreaded SFRA

Velocity wanted to show a company in the D.C. area a Velocity XL with a glass panel. Rather than fly one all the way up from Sebastian, Florida, they asked me if I would fly mine down from Pennsylvania and drop it off for a few days so the prospective customer could look it over.  It's only 100 miles from me and Velocity has gone above and beyond to help me out (and generally put up with me) through two airplane projects. I was more than happy to help out.

The only thing that gave me pause was that the airport in question was Gaithersburg, Maryland, which is located in the D.C. Special Flight Rules Area. This is the one where you keep seeing hapless pilots on the evening news after they have been intercepted by Blackhawk helicopters and forced down, to face fines and loss of licenses. In other words, it's no place to fool around if you don't know what you're doing.

I had taken the required course, which I reviewed again. I went over the procedures with several flight instructors (thanks guys!). Then I filed my SFRA flight plan for 15:30 Zulu through the Wooly gate into the SFRA direct Gaithersburg.

Saturday morning was only about 20 degrees, but sunny and calm. Not too bad. I don't have any sort of preheat system installed, so I swiped the wife's heated lap throw and put it inside the bottom of the cowling with a wool blanket on top of the cowling a few hours before I left.
My friend Peter offered to go with me just for the fun of it.

Click on any picture for a larger view. 

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Departing 29 Chester County

We did the preflight and loaded up the plane. It started right up and we let it idle until we got to 100 degrees on oil temps and 200 for the CHT's. We taxied up for takeoff right on time for our planned 10:10 departure to make it to the gate in time to activate our 10:30 flight plan. As you can see, it was cold, hazy and still.

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 The ride was nice and smooth above the haze and well below the cloud layer. This was the first time I had flown in really cold temperatures and I had never tried the heater. We were both bundled up just in case, but it turned out that the heater kept the cabin plenty warm - surprisingly so, in fact.

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Peter settled down to taking pictures. I engaged the autopilot and altitude hold and watched as our waypoint at Carrol County Airport approached. When we got a few miles out, I called Potomac Approach to activate our flight plan. We were given a discrete transponder code, then cleared direct into Gaithersburg. We were only 15 minutes into our flight!

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It actually seemed colder in Maryland. There was a light dusting of snow on the ground. 

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We made great time and, even though I was holding the speed down a little to make sure I gave the controller plenty of time to tell me if I was going astray, we were still doing 175-185 knots indicated.

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As we got within a few miles of Gaithersburg, we were given permission to switch over to their CTAF frequency and continue squawking our SFRA ident code. We sequenced into the pattern and the above is a shot of the airport right after we turned final.

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On short final, Peter took this great shot of a flight of two RV's waiting in the hold short area. They took off as a flight right after we landed. It looked pretty good.

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...and we're here, in suburban Washington, D.C. only 35 minutes after leaving home in Pennsylvania. This drive takes HOURS. Actually, I'm not looking forward to the drive home in the rental car. Peter is amazed at how fast we got down here. I'm happy with what turned out to be a very easy experience coming into the restricted area. Overpreparation is the key. Next time I won't even stress about doing it.

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We taxi past an L39 that has just flown in for the day. Very cool. If I ever win the lottery.......
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I tuck the Blackberry under the headset for the obligatory call to Nancy to let her know we're down safe and sound. Then a call to our host to lead us to our hangar. He pulls through the gate in his car and we follow him right back to their hangar. Nice.
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We shut down and unpack the plane prior to putting it away in our host's hangar. This was a nice flight which expanded my envelope on several fronts. I'm a happy camper.

Here is a link to the track on Flightaware:

Click here for flight track

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Our host, Bruce. Thanks for the hangar and for the ride.
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It was only a 35 minute flight down, but it's a 3 hour drive home through heavy traffic in D.C., Baltimore and Pennsylvania. This is a graphic demonstration on how much nicer it is to travel in your Velocity than in the family car.


In a couple of days, its another drive and short flight back to bring the plane home. The following week it gets flown over to the paint shop to finally put the primer stage behind me. It's supposed to be done by the end of January. I then plan to fly, fly and fly some more. We are renting a house in the Bahamas with some friends over the kids' Spring break for our first international flight. We hope to do that a lot, which  is why the design incorporates 12 inch N numbers.

More to come....
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