850 hours PA31 on the west coast of Canada. Typical MEA's 11-15,000ft, designated mountainous region...lets see now...
- severe icing - unforecast as such - seeing the airspeed bleed back past 130kts when our crz IAS was 170. Unable to descend due to restrictive MOCA's, but descending anyway with power on cuz' staying up there at cont 40" MP is gonna cook the engines.....
- nasty, mountain valley LOC/DME approaches. Tailwinds all the way down the approach, GS often over 200kts until a couple of hundred off the MDA resulting in butt clenching rates of descent. Add a bit of moderate ice with boots blow like a pre-historic whore (i.e. they don't) and a nice sharp angle of attack and it was a whole bundle of fun.
- knowing, that despite what the POH says, if you lose an engine at that altitude and that weight, you ain't gonna maintain altitude, let alone make the missed approach climb gradient!
- actually losing an engine - oil leak on the left side in flight, next thing flames licking out of the inspection panel as the leak worsened and spewed all over the turbo charger. Happy days!
- Gear not down and locked. Pumping it down with no nosewheel locked indication and then trying to grease her on and hold her off...no pressure there then! (in more ways than one!)
- no wx radar. Regularly in the summer trying to avoid/spot build ups, flying into embedded stuff and then watching as the world around you goes black...
Yup, Air Taxi is a real ball..........you better have some big ones too!
