Ice Ice Baby

[Scott Ducey]

[Chris7359Y]

[N3322G]

[Kristin Winter]

[ComBE]

[Jay]

[ics-12766]

[MV Case Jr]

[N3322G]

[N8632Y]

[ics-12766]

[steen]

[Kristin Winter]

Steen,

Ice is not a bonus on any aircraft. One should never sit in ice without an exit plan, at least unless you are flying anything without heated lifting surfaces. It is all relative as no light aircraft is a good ice hauler in any absolute sense of the word.

Having put significant amounts of ice on Aztecs, Navajos, 300 series Cessnas, Twinkies, I can tell you that a good rate of climb is often more important than the aerodynamic characteristics of the aircraft. Relatively speaking, the Twinkie isn't that bad under many common situations. I would not hesitate to penetrate icing in the usual midwest stratiform clouds, in most circumstances. Again, it is all situational.

Which gets to the point that one shouldn't fool around much with ice if you aren't quite fluent in understanding the weather and planning your flight to minimize any exposure, and preferrably a strategy to get rid of the ice before landing. I am happy to say that I do not have personal knowledge of the limits of any of these aircraft in terms of how much ice they will carry. I have very rarely put more than one inch of ice on the lifting surfaces, and never more than two. How dangerous that is, again depends on the situation. Landing with a load of ice is more hazardous than flying along above the clouds while the ice sublimes.

You are absolutely right about minimizing the load on the tail and not using flaps when landing with a load of ice.