Expedition 50 Flight Engineer Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency photographed the Rocky Mountains from his vantage point in low Earth orbit aboard the International Space Station. He shared the image with his social media followers on Jan. 9, 2017, writing, "the Rocky mountains are a step too high – even for the clouds to cross."
Image Credit: ESA/NASA
Maybe it looks like so what to you but we're seeing weather systems on each side of the Rockies and neither can get past the barrier.
If you're flying at a lower altitude, Denver can be a problem. It won't be if you're headed East because Denver is on that side of the mountains. However, if you're headed West, you may get a thrill ride if it's at all windy.
We were on the runway at Denver and headed for San Francisco when the pilot revved up the motors to take off. Almost immediately there was a colossal explosion from the back of the aircraft. The immediate reaction was to assess, nope, I don't seem to be dead so wtf happened. At least we won't go flying in this crap now.
Shortly after, the captain announced, "There's some crosswind tonight and one of the engines, in effect, backfired. There's nothing wrong and we will take off shortly."
This is where the dark and stormy night part begins since that was the aviation thrill ride of my life. When you're heading West, you don't build enough altitude before crossing the mountains to miss all the turbulence blowing around them and that makes for a ride you won't soon forget.
Ed: that was scarier than being in the air for 9/11?
It was far scarier because people in the air were the only ones who did not know of the attacks. We didn't hear any of that until we were back on the ground in Atlanta and that was the destination anyway. We didn't have any idea of it.
In fact, there was another great thrill ride coming back from that 9/11 excursion since there was a commuter flight back from New York to Providence in Rhode Island. In that flight, there was wine dripping on me from the ceiling ... and it wasn't even my wine.
For some reason, I lost all fear of flying from 9/11 and everyone was laughing on that commuter flight. The flight attendants were sitting just in front on their fold-down seats and were having a ripping good time with it. They knew we appreciated them sucking it up to go flying again so everything was strangely good and no-one had to say anything about it.
Note: that laughs didn't come from booze and, amazingly, I wasn't stoned either. I hadn't been high for years.
Fortunately, I saw the error of my ways and the Great God Mescalito is my friend once again.
We were on the runway at Denver and headed for San Francisco when the pilot revved up the motors to take off. Almost immediately there was a colossal explosion from the back of the aircraft. The immediate reaction was to assess, nope, I don't seem to be dead so wtf happened. At least we won't go flying in this crap now.
Shortly after, the captain announced, "There's some crosswind tonight and one of the engines, in effect, backfired. There's nothing wrong and we will take off shortly."
This is where the dark and stormy night part begins since that was the aviation thrill ride of my life. When you're heading West, you don't build enough altitude before crossing the mountains to miss all the turbulence blowing around them and that makes for a ride you won't soon forget.
Ed: that was scarier than being in the air for 9/11?
It was far scarier because people in the air were the only ones who did not know of the attacks. We didn't hear any of that until we were back on the ground in Atlanta and that was the destination anyway. We didn't have any idea of it.
In fact, there was another great thrill ride coming back from that 9/11 excursion since there was a commuter flight back from New York to Providence in Rhode Island. In that flight, there was wine dripping on me from the ceiling ... and it wasn't even my wine.
For some reason, I lost all fear of flying from 9/11 and everyone was laughing on that commuter flight. The flight attendants were sitting just in front on their fold-down seats and were having a ripping good time with it. They knew we appreciated them sucking it up to go flying again so everything was strangely good and no-one had to say anything about it.
Note: that laughs didn't come from booze and, amazingly, I wasn't stoned either. I hadn't been high for years.
Fortunately, I saw the error of my ways and the Great God Mescalito is my friend once again.
2 comments:
Its interesting to see the actual size of those wind shifts in the sand--the camel pics really make it clear. ML
This may not be where you meant that to go but it works either way. The scale of those dunes was just astounding to me. I don't think I ever imagined they could get so big.
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