Crosswind Landing Practice

It had been exactly 1 month since my last trip in N470DS, and I was feeling the winter blues. Work had been piling up, and the clouds had been scudding their way across Ohio. Friday morning dawned bright with the promise of clear skies and brisk winds. A perfect day to brush up on the landing skills and work on some tricky cross-wind landing skills. Did I mention that it was windy? At 7500MSL, I picked up a 40KT tailwind, just so that I could get feeling of speed. Not a personal speed record, but still up there. I need to see if I can acheive membership in that exclusive DA40 200KT club...of course, that will require 60KT tailwinds. Fastest winds I've ever flown in have been 50KTs. So, when I see 60KTs, I'll try to see if I can head up in the air....then maybe I can also register a groundspeed of 0KTs as well as that 200KT speed record. Well, my purpose for flying was not to set any speed records, but to practice my landing skills. Since my flying has become infrequent of late, I knew that I really needed to get out and do some serious practice, especially if I wanted to carry passengers this winter. Winter flying has its own share of hazards without me failing to execute safe landings.

Conditions were perfect for a challenging crosswind landing practice session. I contemplated flying west to get into more clear air, but I decided that the gustier conditions in Eastern Ohio, near the Ohio River would give me a better educational experience. Plus, there's lots of hills to create ground turbulence. I've landed in flat land with signficant cross-winds before, and it's just a question of the proper rudder-elevator cross-control slip down to the runway. It's a totally different situation, when you're bouncing in gusty ground turbulence. It's a lot more fun, for starters.

First stop was at Carroll County (KTSO), Ohio, but unfortunately, the wind was straight down the runway. No challenge whatsoever. Just keep the groundspeed up, and angle of descent right, and you can land in 500ft. So, I flew over to Steubenville (Jefferson County 2G2), OH for a more challenging 60degree cross-wind landing practice. There's no AWOS at Jefferson County, so I didn't know what my landing conditions were, but the GPS told me 14kts at 60degrees right before touchdown. The approach was challenging, because this airport is on a bluff and has a lot of ground turbulence right at the touchdown end of runway 32. It seemed to be a fairly nice airport, and I waved at a few guys working on the erection of a new terminal building. I'll have to stop over next summer when it's completed. 5 landings later, I was done with Steubenville, and thought that I would head south to Wheeling (KHLG), because then I would get to talk to someone. I flew over to the Ohio River, and circled the very cool asymmetrical "Veterans" Weirton-Steubenville cable-stayed bridge. It's really a striking piece of engineering and architecture, especially when viewed from the air.
Further on down the river, over Mingo Junction, OH, I flew over a super-cool steel mill, run by the Wheeling-Pittburgh Steel Company. It basically took up the entire river bank, and was a massive operation, albeit not as big as the USX Steel mill in Gary, IN. Apparently, there is a lot of hot-rolled coiled steel in thicknesses up to 3/8" produced here. I'd like to get a tour.
I continued down the Ohio River and headed into Wheeling Class D airspace. Funny how your radio skills get rusty when you don't practice radio communications. I asked the tower controller if he minded me doing a bunch of touch-n-goes - "Nope. There is absolutely nothing happening today", he responded. Wheeling had 14kt winds at 70 degrees from the runway heading, gusting to 18kts - it was fun. Not my personal maximums, but healthy enough for some serious crosswind practice. Like all airports along the Ohio River, Wheeling is on a high bluff over the Ohio River, and it was bouncy and turbulent all the way down to the threshold. I punched out 6 landings on the 100ft wide runway, and had a great time, but it was soon getting to be time to head back. Back in Coshocton, I practiced another couple of landings at the home airfield, and then put 470DS back in the barn with a full tank of 100LL. It was a beautiful day for flying. Now, just to get my night currency again!