April 8th

We flew!!! ...sort of.  Ron and I went over to general aviation, got all set up for a 12:30 take off, waited for a huge rain shaft to pass, and then took off through the thick cloud deck over Martinique.  Upon approach to Dominica, the pilot Brett asked Guadeloupe ATC for permission to fly at a lower altitude but they said no.  Before takeoff we had gotten confirmation that we could fly at 5,000 ft IFR upstream and downstream of the island, but over Dominica, 7,000 ft was the lowest we could go.  However, Guadeloupe ATC would not allow IFR lower than 7,000 ft.  Partly in a way to send a message to the air control people that it is absolutely necessary to go lower, we decided to scrub the flight an hour in. 

Ron in the mission scientist seat up front.

 While the flight was short, I did get to try a hand with the science display and help monitor equipment on the way!  It is really neat to be flying through clouds and be able to see the high relative humidity, both numerically and in a skew-T plot, or be able to see the number concentration and liquid water content peak instantaneously.  The window was next to was tinted with some sort of polarizing film so my pictures won't be very impressive...I'll have to get some from Ron for future posts.

My view out the side window.

My science display.

 In other news, we've moved out of the bed and breakfast to a new house!  It is much closer to the airport, and has a much larger kitchen.  We even have a view of the airport runway and a pool.

Back yard view.