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Old 7th Nov 2021, 11:20
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Pilot DAR
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Ontario, Canada
Age: 63
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Aircraft should be tied down if high winds are forecast with proper tie down points or concrete blocks.
Not so much to the concrete blocks. If you have concrete blocks heavy enough to be useful, they're probably too big the park over/around. I have not seen data for a PA-28, but Cessna, for the 182, in some POH's states that each tiedown should have a capacity of 700 pounds. I learned that lesson forty or so years ago...

I used to fly a kindly lent to me 172M. It lived at a private grass runway near my home, with its only co airplane there being a Seabee, parked across the field hundreds of feet away. Both were tied down to stacks of concrete patio stones (I'll estimate 300-400 pounds per stack). I got a frantic phone call at dawn one morning from the non pilot farmer who lived at the farm where the runway was. "In the big wind last night, the planes blew into each other!!!". I had been last to fly the 172, I was worried - I rushed to the plane. Sure enough, they were now "together". The Seabee had cartwheeled all the way across the apron, and its wing (now devoid of a wingtip float) had passed over the 172 wing. The stack of concrete patio stones, still tied to the Seabee tiedown point, were now under the 172 wing, with the rope a little deflected by passing over the aileron. Aside from a very small bend on the trailing edge of the aileron, the 172 was otherwise undamged - the Seabee was a mess - dented and wrinkled at all corners. I gently pushed the 172 out from under the Seabee to prevent further damage. I learned that day that if you mean it, to have to tie planes well, and I believe Cessna's 700 pound value.
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