The radar is showing splotches of green and brown ahead as the landing gear thumps into the wheel well. It’s my leg to fly (and the 6th I’ve worked today) but the end is in sight, at least on my display screen. 300 miles to the west, and still well over the visual horizon the runways at Montgomery, AL are waiting for us. I’m much more interested in the hotel room bed that is waiting for me, but for now the runway, depicted on my screen, will have to do. Tower hands us off to Departure just as we pass through the first bands of rain.

The sun is still up, although as of right now it’s behind a wall of clouds. Despite that there is plenty of light to see where we are going and I’m able to dodge around a small buildup of clouds off the nose. Coming around the backside of the buildup I run out of options and we slam into a solid line of clouds. The radar still isn’t showing much so we accept the turn to the west Departure gives us.

The world goes momentarily dark and the control yoke bucks in my hand as we hit moderate chop. Before I can even reach up and arm the ignition to protect the engines from a flameout we are out the other side and the setting sun is clearly visible through cloud layers, hanging like a red beach ball just over the horizon. The radar depicted view of our path westbound is mostly clear now, but looking forward I can see a fuzzy gray blob of rain clouds just to the left of our route, plus a higher overcast we will likely have to claw our way through as we climb up.

I duck my head below the glare shield as the sun breaks through the clouds, suddenly blinding me. My FO grabs a sun visor and snaps it on the overhead rail. I can’t find my visor so I position my head so that the center pillar on the windshield blocks most of the light. Through the pinkish glow spreading across the windshield I can see giant raindrops splattering on the glass, streaming upward and out of sight.

Both the rain and sunlight levels increase as we continue climbing through 10,000 feet. I comment to my FO that with this much rain and sun you’d think there’d be a rainbow somewhere. With the autopilot now driving I take a few seconds to look around and sure enough, just to our south is the vertical stripe of a rainbow, running from the ground up into the cloud layers above us.

Departure Control hands us over to Atlanta Center who clears us to climb to 23,000 feet. Despite the hot temperatures outside we are lightly loaded and the airplane maintains a somewhat respectable climb rate. Working through 16,000 feet we fly into the base of the rain cloud I’d seen before and the ride roughens. As the light fades the rainbow shimmers, looses intensity and then disappears into the gloom. Seconds later we break into the clear again, now on top of the clouds, just in time to see the last sliver of the sun drop below horizon.

The route ahead is clear. Now just 220 miles away, below a solid layer of clouds and well beyond the curve of the earth, the beacon at Montgomery is reaching out to us.

We are finally up and running, after almost an hour of creeping towards the runway, heading westbound towards Chattanooga and the end of our day. Despite that, for a moment I wish we were still sitting on the ground as the airplane takes a huge lurch to the left and the updated radar sweep on my MFD shows a mass of red and brown ahead of us. The controller is sounding a bit like John Cusack in the movie Pushing Tin, as he spits out a mess of altitude and heading changes to the planes on frequency, trying to keep everybody out of the worst of the weather. After a particularly rapid set of 10 degree heading change instructions I catch my FO rolling her eyes while struggling to find a hand hold as we hit what feels like another large pothole. She verbalizes my thoughts when she laughs and says “I sure hope he knows what he’s doing”.

…

Over an hour ago we were parked at the gate in Charlotte, splitting the time between watching our passengers wander out to the airplane and the mass of gray and black clouds forming on the western horizon. I started to get impatient as both the line of weather and our departure time got closer and the people still continued to trickle out and walk to the plane. Finally we had everybody on board and managed to pushback. My concern was that if the weather hit the airport, with all the lightening the clouds were throwing off, they would probably shut down the ramp, leaving us stranded, unable to push back and go.

As it turned out, there was no rush to get going. Coming around the corner of the International Terminal we were forced to wait while a parade of fire trucks screamed across the ramp heading for the runway. The radio frequency was a mess with several airplanes request taxi and the ground controller trying coordinate with the lead fire truck. After a few moments of confusion everything seemed to be sorted out and we were cleared to taxi out to the runway, now lined with fire trucks every few hundred thousand feet. Looking out on final I could see only one set of landing lights and realize they’d stopped arrivals until the emergency aircraft was down. It was going to be a long night for everybody.

The emergency aircraft touched down just as we ran into the back end of the line of planes waiting to take off. I watched as a fire truck rolled out on to the runway and took off after the landing plane. As they passed out of sight on our right I went into fuel planning mode. There were about 10 airplanes lined up in front of us. We had 900 pounds of fuel above our minimum for takeoff and with one engine and the APU running we were using about 450 pounds an hour. It had been a long day and the math took a few seconds but once I got the number I was happy with it. Assuming the emergency was no big deal and was able to clear the runway we would be able to get out with plenty of fuel. My thinking was momentarily interrupted by a huge flash of white light. I’d forgotten about the weather.

. . .

Lights have started to appear on final again as airplanes are vectored towards the runway. The first one checks in 6 miles out and is cleared to land. Tower advises him that the winds are currently at 12 knots but there have been 31 knot gusts recorded. The only reply from the airplane is a short “roger”. The first drops of rain are starting to speckle the windshield as the landing airplane comes in over the end of the runway. Even from where we are we can see the wings rocking and the nose coming up. It doesn’t look like they are having fun at all. Despite the bumpy approach they make a nice landing and as soon as they are clear the first guy waiting to take off spools up and blasts off into the dark. The conga line slides forward one spot.

We continue this slow roll forward for another 20 minutes with each arrival looking more and more ugly. The winds are up to 25 knots although the gusts seem to have died down a bit. A CRJ clears the runway and reports the ride down was “extremely horrible”. I decide that despite everybody else taking off, if it’s still this bad when we get to the number one spot we won’t be going anywhere, fuel numbers be dammed. My FO agrees as we watch another inbound bounce towards the runway, drop suddenly, level off and then slam into the pavement.

By the time we get to be number 4 to go the weather seems to be moving off the airport. The frequency of lightning flashes has diminished and the winds are holding steady at about 20 knots. The rain is still coming down heavily, but it’s nothing our wipers can’t keep up with. The 757 in position on the runway is cleared to go and his nose light and strobe come on. Even from this far away we can hear him spool up the engines as he starts rolling forward. We still have 600 pounds of fuel to play with so I give the ok and my FO starts up our left engine. By the time we are next to go all the checklists have been read and we both agree the weather is back within acceptable levels to take off.

The wind is only blowing at 15 knots by the time we are cleared to take off but the rain is still coming down. In my head I run through the list of switches I need to throw before we start rolling. The nose landing light clicks on followed by the strobe light. The wipers come on next, momentarily clearing the water streaming down the windshield and giving me a good view down the runway at the centerline lines that are disappearing into the murk in front of us. A quick click of the TakeOff-GoAround button sets my command bars where I want them on my Primary Flight Display, and happy with everything I push up the thrust levers, watching as the engine instruments start to spool up.

Water is spilling off the sides of the front windshield at such a rate I can see it out of the corner of my left eye, streaming across the side window, briefly illumined by our strobelights. Despite the wind and wet runway the plane is staying on centerline without much input from me. At 80 knots everything looks good. As we pass through 130 knots I can feel the plane start to get lighter and by 150 we are off the ground and flying. The gear comes up as advertised and between trimming the nose back down and watching my airspeed increase I take a quick look at the radar. It’s going to get very interesting very quickly. The next five hundred feet of climb is smooth and then we punch into the cloud bases and fun starts.

…

The Cusask sounding controller gives us another 10 degree heading change and I finally see what his plan is. There is weather to the south and some to the northwest, but he has found a passage out to the southwest and then due west to push airplanes through. After 5 more minutes of rough air and heavy rain he clears us direct to a fix down the road just as we pop out the backside of the weather and into clear air. Off in the distance, well to the north of our route, a large thunderhead is visible, throwing of electricity into the dusky sky. To the south is nothing but darkness. Straight off the nose, 200 miles away is Chattanooga and the end of our day. The horizon is a clear deep blue, fading to black above, punctuated with the pinpricks of the first stars of the evening.

With apologies to Ms. Markham

Out the window the whole southern sky is alive with flashes of light amidst the dark clouds. Off our nose to the left is nothing but darkness, illuminated by the constant flickering of cloud to cloud lighting, which stretches all the way back and fades out of my field of vision behind our wingtip. Straight of the nose is a patch of dark blue, the last evidence of the setting sun, now long since dropped over the far western horizon. Fortunately for us our destination this evening is Jackson, Mississippi which lies in front of us to the west and away from the worst of the weather. A small flash of white light momentarily draws my attention away from the light show to the south. Just visible through the murk below us are the red and green position lights and strobes of a southbound aircraft. Their evening is just about to get interesting.

An hour ago we were holding short of the runway in Charlotte watching a Mainline 737 break out of the low overcast, its landing lights cutting a path through the darkness and rain. The last radar snap I got from my phone before shutting it off showed a solid line of weather to the south of the airport slowly working its way north. Taxiing out in a heavy rain, what little light that was left in the sky was clearly to the north west. To the south was nothing but darkness. The fact that arriving aircraft, heading towards the airport facing the wall of weather, didn’t sound too concerned about things when they checked in with the tower controller made me feel better, but only a little bit.

With the 737 exiting downfield we were cleared into position and hold on the runway. The FO ran the last few items on the Before Take Off checklist and I flipped on our landing lights, leaving the strobe light off until we were actually rolling down the runway. The radar had been warming up for a few minutes and I now set my display range to 10 miles and tilted the dish to 4.5 degrees up. Radar is something of a dark art and often times the best you can hope for is to guess correctly. Now the display was a mess of splotchy green and brown bands, indicating moderate precipitation and probably turbulence. The good news was the first band with red in it was well beyond where I expected us to make a turn to the west and probably not a factor. Also the planes taking off in front of us hadn’t reported any issues on the way out.

Once the 737 was out of the way and Tower cleared us to go I flipped on the strobe light. There was a cloud of moisture hanging over the runway kicked up by the previous arrival’s thrust reversers but as our engines spooled up and we started rolling forward the windshield wipers, now operating at high speed quickly cleared the water that stuck to the windshield. Through 80 knots everything was in the green and I spent the next few seconds focusing on keeping the nose wheel on the runway centerline, barely visible through the rain and mist. As we passed through our rotation speed of 143 knots the plane was ready to fly and it took just a light pull on the yoke to lift off the rain soaked runway.

With the nose pointed skyward I called for gear retraction and settled back in my seat. As soon as we were off the ground I had made the somewhat awkward reach with my right hand, across the yoke to the aircraft sidewall to turn off the wipers. Once they stopped the front window was immediately obscured by water streaming past. That was ok though as between the rain and darkness there wasn’t much to see anyways. Climbing through 1000 feet I lowered the nose slightly and began to accelerate to 200 knots. The flaps came up as tower handed us over to departure who gave us a turn to the west and away from the bands of weather that were now painted bright reds and yellows on the radar displays.

Around 12,000 feet the rain rushing by the airplane, briefly illuminated in our flashing strobe light, started to turn into ice. Fortunately the ride was mostly smooth despite several airplanes to our south desperately quarrying ATC in search of a less turbulent altitude. Due to our light load and the cooler air temperatures we were able to keep a good climb rate and somewhere near Athens, Georgia we leveled off at 32,000 feet, with frozen precipitation still blasting by the airplane at over 400 miles per hour. A quick check of the numbers showed we could climb higher in the hope of getting out of the clouds. Moments later we had a clearance to 38,000 in hand.

We exited the clouds around 35,000 feet and what few bumps there had been immediately disappeared. Leveled off over 7 miles above the darkened earth, the visibility now unrestricted ahead of us, I put the radar back to sleep and took a few minutes to update our fuel and speed numbers in the flight computer. After pondering things for a few seconds the computer decided that we would in fact have enough fuel to get to Jackson and it should take us another 50 minutes to do so. With that business taken care of I adjusted my seat slightly and stared out the window at the light show to our south.

With Jackson now just 150 miles away and the last of the dark blue fading from the sky in front of us, Memphis Center clears us down to 19,000 feet. As I pull the thrust levers back to idle and the nose of the plane starts to drop towards the dark clouds below I take one more look at the strobing thunderclouds to our south. The sky to the west is now completely dark and a few stars are visible against the velvety blackness. The lights of the other traffic we passed have long since faded into nothingness and I wonder how their flight is going. It’s more than just a passing curiosity as I know that despite my luck with the weather this evening there will be plenty of other times where I’ll be that airplane heading into the heavy weather, Southbound with the night.