first time in the rain
 

I would like to relate to you all this episode I had last sunday while doing circiuts:I was into my 6th circuit at Seletar airport in Singapore[WSSL].ATC came on tho adivse of WX warning.We dicided to terminate the session and do a full stop.From my position ,early downwind I looked down at the threshold and observed the rain already sweeping over that end of the runway.

Now on finals, I actually had trouble see the threshold of rwy 03.
By the time we were over the threshold there was a deludge of rain awashing the windscreen.I had trouble seeing the runway but could just make out the edge light through the rain.Now deep in the flare, I could make out the centre line but I felt a real sense of disorientation by the effect of rain water on the runway surface moving across my vision from right to left.It was a real weired expreience.And later while taxing to park we stopped for after landing checks and I had to fight myself to ignore the effect of wated sweeping across the tarmac -it presented the illusion of movement even though we were stationary.

I know what you mean, I've had a similar thing before in snow. It feels like you're flying sideways!

Very interesting.... and I hope it's not dragging the thread too far from the topic to suggest that it's probably extremely relevant to anyone undertaking an IR or IMC rating who finds themselves, quite legally, in this kind of whether for the first time?

Although we can simulate flying in cloud with foggles, screens, hoods, etc, we always take off these devices for landing. I can't see that practicing low-level circuits in bright sunlight is going to help very much, either.

The solution? I don't know. We can't decide what the weather is going to be like on the days we do our training. Obviously if we encounter this weather during instrument training, we should go flying - but if we don't? Any thoughts from experienced instrument pilots or instructors???

As for encountering this weather on a VFR flight - if it happened to me, and it wasn't something I was used to, I think I'd probably be going around, and either diverting or waiting for it to pass (depending how big the shower was and how fast it was moving). That's just me, though. Have flown in very light rain once or twice, and that was hard enough.....

FFF
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