I’m in a somewhat familiar position, sitting in the left seat, with my FO to my right, my left hand lightly gripping the wheel while we navigate our way across the Charlotte Express ramp with our bags stowed somewhere behind us. However, the wind blasting my face and the fact that I am using my foot on a gas pedal to make us go faster is a pretty good indication things aren’t as they normally are. A stray pushback tug looms out of the darkness ahead, illuminated by our one weak headlight and the full moon that is filtering through the broken cloud layer above. I turn the wheel to the left and our speeding golf cart loops around the tug. That’s right. Golf cart. I glance over at my FO and shake my head and wonder briefly how we ended up driving around the deserted Charlotte ramp at 2 in the morning in a golf cart.

4 hours ago

The Charlotte Airport is a zoo. I try to find a quiet spot behind the gate podium and stay out of the way. The last bank of the night is getting ready to leave and people are everywhere. I’m starting a modified high speed which is basically a trip where you fly out the last flight of the night and then fly the first flight back in the morning, ended up with somewhere between 2 and 6 hours of time at a hotel in between. The downside is you get very little (if any) sleep during the trip. The upside is that you don’t start your day until after 9 at night are done with your day by 7 or so in the morning. Despite the beating your body takes while flying them, high speeds are popular among a lot of crews and tend to go pretty senior in a bid.

My high speed is actually made up of three legs instead of two. I start the trip with a deadhead up to Akron where there is a plane that needs to be shuttled back down to Charlotte. Once in Charlotte I will go into the “rest” period of my high speed before heading back to the airport at 6:30 in the morning to deadhead back to Dayton and be done for the day. Of course I don’t really plan on going back to Dayton but rather head home on the first flight west in the morning. That’s the plan anyway.

The crew for the flight to Akron finally shows up and after they get the plane ready we start to board. 20 minutes later we are taxiing out to join the line for takeoff. 10 minutes after that the wheels are up and my eyes close as the plane picks up speed heading northward.

2 hours ago

I’m sitting in the left seat of the plane that brought us up to Akron while my FO organizes our bags in the galley. Outside two mechanics have the plane hooked up to a tug and are pushing us back across a rain streaked ramp towards the hangar where our plane is waiting. I’m “brake riding” for the mechanics which sounds way more glamorous than it really is. We are secured to the tug which is more than capable of stopping the plane’s momentum when they get to the hangar, however, just to be safe and just in case the tow bar gets disconnected somebody has to keep their feet on the aircraft’s brake pedals. Through the rain I see the lead mechanic make a kill it gesture and after warning the FO it’s about to get dark I reach up and flip off the auxiliary power unit which is providing power to the aircraft. The lights fade and then turn to darkness as the generator spins down. I flip the last several switches by feel and as the plane goes cold the tug rolls us back into the hangar, joining the three other airplanes already in for the night.

Once secured there the FO pops the door and we drag our bags back out into the rain to the plane we will be taking back to Charlotte. The thoughtful mechanics have powered it up for us and the cabin lighting looks inviting through the midnight rain drops. Once on board I start checking the systems and setting up for the flight south while the FO plunges back into the rain to do a walk around. By the time he’s back on board after pulling the chalks I give the ok to shut the door and we settle down to setting up the flight. It ends up being my leg and after running a few checklists I brief the departure and spin up both engines. A remarkably upbeat for the hour ground controller clears us to taxi and I pop the brake and start towards the runway.

Halfway there we are cleared for takeoff and we run the final checklist just short of the runway. Everything completed, I roll onto the runway, push up the power and start splitting my attention between the increasing airspeed indications and the rapidly blurring runway which is passing by through the rain splattered windshield. The correct speed comes and goes and I rotate the nose skyward into heavily laden rain clouds. The tower controller clears us to 15000 feet and tells us to turn to the south towards Parkersburg, West Virginia and then hands us off to Cleveland Center.

In the clouds the ride gets bumpy but with no passengers in the back I’m not overly concerned and roll to the right to turn south. The radar isn’t painting anything so I let the speed build up in the climb. At 8000 feet we pop out of the top of the clouds into an arctic looking landscape. The moon is full and directly overhead, illuminating the cloud tops like an ice field. Out to the distance in the east a few thunderheads rear up over the landscape, sullenly flickering in the moonlight. Our route to the south looks clear and through 10,000 feet I pitch the nose over and let the speed build up to 310 knots. It’s 1 in the morning and there is another airplane within 100 miles of us.

30 Minutes ago

Charlotte is reporting a broken clouds layer at 5000 feet good visibility so we set up for a visual approach as we descend back towards the dark earth. Dropping through the clouds we find ourselves at 4000 feet with nothing visible below us. So much for the weather report I think. While my FO lets the approach controller know that we will need vectors to an instrument approach I pull the approach plate out of my book and start resetting data for an instrument arrival. Approach Control spins us around to the localizer and I dump the autopilot to increase the rate of the turn. Things work out just fine and we end up riding down a radio beam in the sky towards a runway somewhere in the darkness ahead of us. The clouds break up at 2000 feet and the runway appears where it is supposed to be.

With no passengers or bags on board we are very light and I misjudge my flare and end up thumping down on the runway. Only the FO and my pride are there to judge it so I don’t worry too much. We clear downfield and taxi in towards parking. Ramp Control has long since gone home for the night so I call up Company on the radio and ask where they want me to park the plane. After a bit of discussion they tell us to put it in remote parking which is fine with me as that way we don’t need somebody to wand us in like we would if we were parking at a gate. At this hour of the night finding somebody to do that could take a while as all of the rampers are long gone for the night.

I roll to a stop on the deserted ramp and shut down. While my FO starts to put stuff away I jump out and find some chalks lying nearby to secure the wheels. That accomplished I shut down the plane and start bring my bag down the stairs. While waiting on the FO to finish his walk around a pickup truck pulls up with an operations supervisor. She says she’d offer us a ride back to the terminal but only has one seat in her truck. While she’s explaining this another ops person pulls up in a golf cart and she immediately offers us the golf cart and says she’ll catch a ride in the truck after cleaning the plane. I look across the ramp to the terminal and then think about the long walk through the terminal and immediately take her up on the offer. My FO and I throw our bags in the back of the cart and after reminding myself how to drive a golf cart (I worked at a driving range years ago) we take off across the ramp.

Now

The ramp is silent other than the quiet rumble of our little golf cart motor. I drive around the end of the express terminal and turn towards gate E1, the closest gate to the main terminal and our eventual exit from the airport. We pass underneath tails of darkened airplanes and around rows of empty baggage carts. The lighted jetways pass by in the darkness, looming like something out of Star Wars. I pull in next to gate E1 and turn off the cart. Our single headlight fades away while somewhere above the clouds a full moon continues to shine down.

Dark hills are moving by outside the window, just visible in the evening haze. A patchwork of orange, white and red lights, the signs of modern civilization fill the valley below. I’m hand flying into the darkness and for about the 10th time in the last minute glance back over my shoulder out the side window to require the runway. We are heading into Ashville, North Caroline, one of the few airports we operate at that actually has real terrain around it. To the west the mountains top out at 4000 feet while to the north of the field, where we are currently heading the ridges reach past 5000 feet. I smile slightly in the darkness as I remember a student in Phoenix who grew up playing in the foothills of the Colorado Rockies trying to explain to me the difference between hills and mountains. To her these would be nothing more than rolling hills. To an east coast operator like me, these are for real mountains.

I call for the flaps to 20 degrees and trim back slightly to account for the change in pitch caused by the wing changing its shape. The airspeed starts to roll back and I add a bit of power to hold it. Somewhere in a subconscious portion of my mind I am compute turn and pitch rates, airspeed and thrust vectors and what other numbers are going to have to come together to get the airplane turned 180 degrees around and descending to the end of the runway somewhere out there in the darkness. The loop closes and a little voice tells me to turn now which I do.

We are now heading west across the valley. Below us, somewhere in the scattering of ground lights the grounds of the Biltmore are passing by. Ahead, the western edge of the valley flares upwards, visible as a black wall against an almost black sky. The runway is clearly in sight now, several miles to the south out my window. I call for the landing gear and 30 degrees of flaps, which quickly drop out into the night sky. I push the nose over slightly and roll the plane to the left towards the approach lighting system just forming out of the hazy darkness.

On final now with the last of the flaps sliding in to place I make a few adjustments to our track and trajectory downward. Everything seems to be coming together nicely. With the sun long since set the ground has cooled to an almost uniform temperature and the bouncy thermals that plague daytime operations in the summer are thankfully absent. At 1000 feet I look to the left at the terrain rising to the right of the plane. Off the left, at the eastern edge of the valley the hills slope up quickly towards some the highest peaks in the Southeast.

The runway stretches out in front of us and I remind myself that there is an almost 150 foot difference in elevation between the arrival and departure ends meaning we will be landing downhill. Despite that, Ashville has a relatively long runway for an airport up in the mountains and the downslope shouldn’t be much of a problem assuming my landing is halfway decent. At 500 feet the plane is all but flying itself towards a nice landing. At 100 feet I have to counter a slight rolling motion, probably generated by airflow over the terrain. 50 feet passes by and I bring the nose up slightly while slowly reducing the power. At 20 feet the last of the power comes out and the plane hovers over the runway. The radar altimeter calls off 10 feet and then there is a slight bump and we are here.

Clearing down field I switch over to the tiller and taxi back towards the gate. Above us the airport beacon cuts a path of alternating white and green light through the hazy night.

It’s 11:30 at night and we are 8000 feet over the dark West Virginia landscape when I am starting to wonder if my eyes are playing tricks on me. Ahead in the darkness, just on the horizon line an orange light is flickering. I blink several times and after the light seems to increase in intensity I ask me FO if he sees it as well. He turns his attention from copying down the latest weather report for our destination (now just 60 miles away) and stares out the window into the night.

Spread out below us are the rippling peaks of the West Virginia Hills. I spent an enjoyable 4 years of my life going to College just north of here and roamed the hillsides of the Monongahela National Forest we are currently flying over. My FO tilts his head slightly, looking forward at the light which is now starting to move towards us, or us towards it as at night sometimes it is hard to tell relative motion. “I think it’s a fire” he says and after a moments contemplation I agree with him.

At night there are fewer light sources, namely the sun, to reflect off the particles in the air and hence visibility goes up. On a clear night, it’s not unusual to be able to see splotches of ground lighting hundreds of miles away, just dropping over the edge of the curvature of the Earth. However, just because you can see forever doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll know what you are looking at.

While teaching in Phoenix I would take students on night flights out of the Valley of the Sun to Yuma, 150 miles away, where what is left of the Colorado River, most of its water long since shuttled off into various irrigation canals, passes into Mexico. We’d leave just after dark and slip out underneath the Phoenix Class Bravo airspace towards the West and the darkness of the Sierra Estrella Mountains and then pick up the line of car taillights creeping westward along Interstate 8. Besides the lights on the highway and the periodic scattered ground lighting as the small towns of Gila Bend, Welton and Fortuna passed by, the trip was made in darkness.

I normally instructed from the right seat, with my student in the left seat. Often times on the return trip eastward, I’d press my face against the glass of the side window and stare off into the blackness to the south. Passing by, just a few miles off our right wing was Restricted Area 2301, one of the few military training areas in the contiguous United States that still allows life fire training missions. Defined on one side by Interstate 8 and on the other by the Mexican border, several of my students who flew F16s out of Luke AFB or Davis Monthan down in Tucson had told me stories about flying out there. Most of them involved the wording, almost part of the pilot credo, “so there I was…”

Winging eastbound towards the bright lights of the Phoenix Valley, I’d normally see nothing to the south, but every once in a while I’d be rewarded with a some strange light show that I could only assume was flares or tracer fire or missile trails or who know what. Phoenix has a almost yearly tradition of UFO reporting (just google “phoenix lights” if you don’t believe me) and while I certainly wouldn’t ever classify anything I saw as a UFO in the little green man sense, I certainly can say there were unidentified flying objects out to the south.

All of this is in the back of my mind as we cruise across the dark West Virginia hills. As Washington hands us over to Cleveland Center the fire on the mountain gets closer and closer until the whole sky is filled with a flickering orange light. We drop down to 5000 feet as the flaming pyre passes along the right side of the aircraft, just out my window. At almost 300 miles per hour, the specter quickly slides back into the darkness but as we pass abeam it I see what I think is a clearing on a hill top, lit by what looks like bright white stadium lighting. In the center of the clearing huge orange flames or rising skyward, clearly visible even from almost a mile up. I see no flashing red lights of emergency vehicles and before I have a chance to classify what I am seeing it slides back underneath the wing. I look over at my FO and shrug. He shrugs back and we start looking forward trying to find out destination, hidden among the hills ahead.

An hour later we are airborn again, this time heading south back towards to Charlotte. It’s after midnight and somewhere to the east, hundreds of miles out over the Atlantic Ocean, the rising sun is rushing towards us. Much closer, low on the eastern horizon a flickering blob of orange light is still dancing in the darkness.

It’s 1:30am on day 6 and I’m still about 2000 miles from where I want to be. Below us, visible through a broken layer of clouds the dark, hilly countryside of rural Kentucky slides by, scattered splotches of light the only signs of civilization. Above us the night sky looks like somebody thrown handfuls of white glitter against it resulting in thousands and thousands of points of light. My FO dims his screen lighting so it’s just barely visible and presses his face to the side window, lost in thought. I match the brightness on my screens to his and then move my seat all the way back and stare at the lightshow out the window.

To the west, just visible on the distant horizon a lone thunder head works its way across the countryside spitting out bolts of lightning at the sleeping population below. I turn my focus back inside and adjust the radar to its maximum useful range of 160 miles. 130 miles out and well to the left of our route a red splotch appears on the screen as the radar dish in the nose sweeps back and forth across the cold, empty night sky. To be showing up that clearly this far away it’s got to be a big cell, which judging from the amount of electricity it’s throwing out it appears to be.

The rest of the scope is clear and I go back to watching the stars outside and the distance to go number on my multi function display slowly roll back towards zero. I’d expected to maybe still be in a plane at this time of night (or morning) but I’d been hoping I’d be in a seat in the back or maybe the jumpseat upfront heading west and home. Instead, due to a plane breaking down in Daytona Beach I got tapped for an extra round trip and then flying the last flight of the night back to Dayton. Within seconds I went from walking towards freedom to the reality that I wouldn’t get home until at least the next morning. Such is life on reserve at the bottom of the pile.

The “quick” turn I’d been assigned to Knoxville turned into a nightmare in its own right as the next 5 hours entailed waiting for a Flight Attendant, trying to cool a way to hot airplane, weaving our way through scattered storms, sitting out a 2 hour ground stop to get back to Charlotte, weaving through more scattered storms and then trying to find a gate in the pouring rain in Charlotte. It only got worse from there as I waited another 45 minutes for the inbound plane I was taking back to Dayton to arrive and then for another FO as the one assigned timed out while waiting. Finally, at 12:15am we had a plane, a full crew and 70 passengers.

Airborne finally, ATC wastes no time in turning us north. There is almost no traffic at this hour and before we even pass through 10,000 feet we are cleared direct to our destination. Despite a full load of passengers the engines have the cooler night time air on their side and get us up to our cruise altitude quickly. Once level with the power pulled back the engine noise is barely audible from the cockpit and the only sound is the slipstream washing by in the darkness. Above us millions of stars cover the night sky…

I pull my seat forward again and tune in the weather for Dayton. The next 5 hours or so have become a series of checkboxes in my mind. Get the weather. Land the plane. Walk to my car. Sleep in my car for 2 hours. Wake up (if I ever fall asleep). Go back inside the airport. Get on a plane to finally travel that 2000 miles to home. It’s not glamorous but at the end of the day it’s all worth it to get home.

Florida’s steamy heat is starting to seep through the AC system. Despite the stream of cold air that is blasting the side of my face, I can feel the sticky moisture in it that has slipped by the water separators in the air conditioning packs sitting in the tail of the aircraft. 12,000 feet below, the swamps of inland Florida are sliding by in the darkness, crawling with gators, snakes and who knows what else. I glance at the engine instruments and am happy to see everything in the green and running smoothly.

Years ago I flew over these same swamps in a much smaller plane, with much less redundancy; namely just one engine and a piston driven one at that. Mostly it never bothered me, but every once in a while, while cruising low across the Gulf of Florida or watching the plane’s shadow skip across the mangrove swamps of the Everglades, I’d get a little chill and try not to think about the “what if”…

Today we have two turbine engines purring quietly 50 feet behind the cockpit. Just outside my window Interstate 95 heads south to Palm Beach, Lauderdale and points South. In the distance to the west, Orlando is lit up, it’s ground lighting reflecting against towering thunderheads clear across the State, spitting lightning out at the Tampa Metro area. At altitude, Florida is a narrow state, and even on a marginally clear day it is possible to see from one cost to the other.

The latest weather comes up for Melbourne. The storms have moved off shore (or stayed across the state) and the winds are light. Visibility is slightly restricted by haze, even this late at night, and a scattered layer of clouds has taken up residence 1500 feet above the ground. Despite that, we shouldn’t have a problem picking up the field visually once we get closer. Just in case things don’t work out as planned, my FO loads up the instrument approach.

The engines are still at idle thrust as we pass through 8000 feet. The small towns along I95 start to take shape out of the constant stream of lights that run down Florida’s eastern coast. The Intercostal Waterway cuts a path of darkness between the lights on the mainline and the hotels and resorts that cling to the Barrier Islands, and Route A1A.

The lights on the other side of the Intercostal diminish and fade to nothing as we pass abeam Cape Canaveral. Visible even from a distance of a mile up and 15 miles away, the launch gantries on the Cape are illuminated and look just like the lighted superstructures of coal mines in far away West Virginia. Once upon a time, long ago while flying down this same airway in a small Cessna, I watched a rock lift off and followed its smoke trail as it arced out over the Atlantic. To this day it is one of the coolest things I’ve seen while in flight.

The Cape fades off into the distance as we descend through 5000 feet. Orlando Approach is busy vectoring around airplanes full of people going to visit Mickey. The storms over Tampa have taken an odd turn to the East and from the sound of things the controller who has the Western Sector is starting to see his airspace get crunched. Out on the east side things are quiet and we pick up the Melbourne’s beacon from 10 miles away. Orlando is glad to get rid of us and wastes no time in passing us over to the Tower Controller who clears us to land.

We manage to keep the field in sight as we slip through the patchy layer of clouds at 1500 feet. By 1000 feet the FO has the plane slowed and configured. The air is still and as the humidity increases more and more moisture is getting pumped out of the vents in the form of mist. Visibility in the cockpit momentarily drops to inches and then quickly clears as the temperature changes and the water stops condensing. The runway come up quickly and we gently thump on to the pavement. The exit we want is all the way at the end so I take the plane back from the FO as we slow through 60 knots and let it roll all the way to the end of the 10,000 feet of pavement.

Safe at the gate with both engines spooling down, I flip off the seatbelt sign which cues the Flight Attendant to open the main cabin door. The door pops open and my ears adjust to the change in pressure. Seconds later the rolling wave of humidity and heat engulfs the cockpit and I knew we are here.

The sun is dipping below a solid layer of clouds on the western horizon as the plane levels off at 28,000 feet and starts accelerating. This is actually the third time I’ve watched the sun do this in the last 20 minutes. On the ground in Charlotte as we taxied out to the runway for our last flight of the day the sun had dropped below the tree line in a splash of gold. Then, as we blasted off into the choppy, windblown air the horizon line expanded and the sun appeared to rise again. Momentarily leveled off at 12,000 feet the sun disappeared for the second time as it slid behind the glacially dulled peaks of the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina. A climb clearance upwards brought the sun rushing upwards again, casting a wash of pale yellow light across the solid overcast forming below us.

The top edge of the glowing disc disappears for the third and final time of the day and I take of my sunglasses, wearily rubbing my temples where the frame had been digging in underneath my headset. In the right seat my FO tosses his glasses back in a case for safe keeping until next time and then goes to work rigging the cockpit lighting for night operation. Wedged into the jumpseat between us our extra passenger, a company Dispatcher out on his yearly familiarization flight, is still gazing out my window at the rapidly darkening western skyline and I’m reminded for about the billionth time of how different this job is.

It’s been a long day of 4 legs flown, in and out of the weather and with full loads on all but one leg. We are also carrying our third jumpseater of the day, but the first one who isn’t actually a pilot. Behind the jumpseat, on the other side of the locked cockpit door, our two Flight Attendants are busy doing a drink service for the 70 paying passengers and two lap children crammed into the back. Behind the last passenger, hopefully well secured in the aft cargo bay, is just about one metric ton of luggage.

The sky slowly changes from light blue to dark blue and then to black as night comes flooding in from the east while the distance remaining numbers on the Flight Management Computer slowly spin down until they are in the double digits. We get the latest weather report from Dayton and discover the wind is gusting to over thirty miles per hour underneath a low overcast. My FO jokes that he’s glad it’s my leg and our tag along dispatcher jokingly asks if he should be worried. It quickly becomes apparent that neither one of them has much faith in my skills.

A friendly Dayton Approach controller turns us onto the ILS and clears us for the approach. Shortly thereafter Tower clears us to land just as I call for the landing gear. At 1200 feet above the ground we break out of the clouds and a fine mist of rain drops immediately fills the windshield. Despite that, the approach lighting for the runway is clearly visibly 3 miles away. By the time I get the airplane into a flare at 200 feet the winds have died down some and the rain is holding at a light drizzle. I take a guess at about where the runway should be compared to the wheels and pull back a bit more on the yoke. For once I get lucky and the plane settles to the ground with a whisper as the wheels spin up on the wet concrete below.

As the plane slows to a manageable taxi speed the rain picks up and I flip on the wipers. As I stare through their swinging arc at the dark, glistening pavement ahead I realize how tired I suddenly am, and how glad I am to be done for the day.

I haven’t been this tired in a while. The frozen water blasting by us at 210 knots is hypnotizing in the glint of the landing light and I have to force myself to look away as I feel my eyes sliding from open to shut. It hasn’t been an exceedingly long day but a combination of switching from early mornings to late nights and not having time to eat lunch earlier has knocked me back a bit. I glance over at the FO who is happily munching on an apple and rechecking his approach plate. This is the benefit of a two pilot crew. If one guy isn’t at 100%, hopefully the other one can step it up and cover the deficit.

I briefly consider taking a hit from the oxygen mask clipped into the sidewall next to me but decide against it when I realize that I haven’t cleaned out the mask yet and have no idea what nasty germs are lurking it its dark recesses. The pure O2 might wake me up a bit, but the risk of getting sick from who knows what doesn’t make it worth it. I remind myself for about the 100th time that I need to make cleaning the mask part of my nest building routine.

The new weather report for Charlotte pops up on the screen and as I scan through it I feel myself shedding a few layers of drowsiness. They are reporting a low overcast, hanging just 300 feet above the ground with about 2 miles of visibility due to mist and fog. I make a final check of the approach setup and the minimums for the approach, verifying that the FO has everything set the same way. Happy with that I go back to watching the instrumentation as we bore a path through the darkness.

By 3000 feet we have dropped out of the bases of the higher cloud layer and into a confused world of arching clouds, rain, fog, darkness and light. A solid overcast covers the ground below us, light from within by patches of scattered ground lighting. 5 miles off the right wing a trio of radio towers stick through the ground cover, their bright strobe lights flashing in a synchronized pattern. As my eyes adjust to the change in light I notice several other red lit towers peaking through the clouds below.

Ahead and to our left the tall buildings of Charlotte stick up through the blanket of fog, ablaze in light, looking like rocky islands in the sea . The wind is from the south and the fog is breaking against the south faces of the buildings like a crashing ocean wave. It is truly amazing to see. I call for the landing gear and another notch of flaps as the nose drops down to follow the invisible thread of a radio beam we are tracking to where it terminates 4 miles ahead of us at the end of the runway. The final notch of flaps follows in short order.

I’m completely awake now as I watch the plane in front of us, visible just when its twin strobe lights flash, disappear into the fog bank. A minute later we follow it in and the world suddenly goes bright white from the reflection of our landing lights on the millions of water droplets surrounding us. At 500 feet I glance out the side window and I can make out the indistinct pattern of lights on the ground below us as the fog thins. Forward visibility is still zero and I take one more look at the missed approach procedure just in case we need it. At 300 feet, as advertised, a curtain seems to rise and the runway comes into view. I dump the autopilot, adjust the aircraft pitch slightly and take a deep breath.

My drowsiness is distant memory now as I try to visualize the landing gear reaching towards the wet runway below us. Apparently my visualization is slightly off as we thunk onto the pavement a half second before I’d planned. I mutter a quick “oops” and my FO is polite enough to laugh as we roll down the runway into the fog.

A full moon is rising from across the windswept waters of the Potomac as we taxi out onto Runway 1 at Washington National. The moon, huge and waxy-orange in color, slides between broken layers of clouds, reflecting on the metal roofed buildings of Bolling Air Force Base just across the river. It’s been a dramatic day for weather and now, on our fourth and final leg of the evening, we are being treated to an impressive moonrise out one window and the full illuminated sweep of the Washington Mall, from the Capitol Dome to the Washington Monument out the other window.

The American Airlines 737 that just landed clears the runway downfield and we are given the ok to go. I flip on our nose landing light and strobe lights and as it’s my leg to fly quickly re brief the departure more for my own sanity than anything else. “Runway 1. Up the river. Five thousand. Wind is from the left. Here we go.” I push up the thrust levers, snugging the engine fan speed indicator into the takeoff carrots on the main display screen. There is a slight lag as the engine spool up and then we start moving forward.

Passing through 80 knots the FO crosschecks our airspeeds and I make a mental note that it’s going to take a pretty big problem to keep us from flying now. Problems like engine failures or loss of direction control. Problems I really don’t even want to think about as we now hurtle down the dark pavement at 100 knots. 120 knots comes and goes as does 130 knots. We pass through the intersection of Runway 33-15 and I notice the blur of the runway centerline lights has turned from white to red meaning we are coming up on the last 3000 feet of runway. After what seems like an eternity the FO calls out “Vee One” and after another slight pause “rotate”. The plane has been ready to fly for a while now and all it takes is a slight amount of pull on the yoke and we are airborne.

3 miles away and approaching at 180 feet per second is Prohibited Area 56, also known as the White House, perhaps the most restricted piece of airspace in the United States. Departures off of Runway 1 require a low level turn to the northwest, following the course of the Potomac River, to avoid P56. Every once in a while somebody doesn’t turn fast enough and they clip the edge, both putting their certificate in jeopardy and potentially disproving the myth that there are itchy trigger fingered Secret Service hanging out with Stinger missiles on the roof of the White House. Even if it is a myth (and for all I know it may not be) I have no desire to be heading in that direction so as we pass through 100 feet I roll the plane sharply to the left.

The 5 sided mass of the Pentagon, illuminated in sodium vapor lighting, momentarily fills the windshield, as I lower the nose to keep accelerating up the river. As the speed increases it slides quickly out of view. Amidst the confusion of ground lighting I get a quick glimpse of the Air Force Memorial’s three arching columns reaching skyward before it too fades into the clutter and disappears. I roll the wings back to level and as we pass through 1000 feet I can clearly see the dark waters of the Potomac stretching northward as they cut a path between the masses of city lighting.

30 minutes later we are bumping are way westward into the darkness. We are leveled off at 24,000 feet and I am happily enjoying the now cold french fries that came with my dinner. Air Traffic Control clears us directly to Akron and I use my pinky, the only finger not covered in seasoning from the fries, to punch the information into the flight computer. My FO agrees with my input and on his OK I confirm the entry. The computer chews over the data for a second and then generates a new course line. The autopilot notes the change and gently banks the plane to the right, following the white line into the darkness ahead.

We are tracking eastbound, 18,000 feet over the Long Island Sound, being monitored towards our destination of White Plaines by a very busy New York Center controller. It’s the International Departure push at JFK and Newark and a constant stream of heavy metal, piloted by guys with marginal at best English skills, is transitioning through his airspace on the way to the North Atlantic Tracks and Europe beyond. After repeating a clearance to a Lufthansa pilot he tells us to switch to Boston Center and have a good night. It’s my FO’s leg so I’m on radio watch. I get the new frequency set and check in.

Boston welcomes us aboard and all in one breath lets us know we should have been descending to a lower altitude a long time ago, tells us to hurry down to 11,000 feet and to contact New York Approach control. While I get the radio set up my FO spins in the new altitude, which I confirm with him. With the autopilot dropping the airplane’s nose to start on down the airspeed starts to build, even with the engines spooled all the way back. My FO pulls the spoiler handle all the way back, causing the four wing top panels to pop up into the slip stream. A familiar rumble and vibration accompanies the rapid decrease in speed.

The latest digital weather report from White Plaines appears on the FMS, showing the visibility has improved to just over 1 mile. This is much better than the ¼ mile that was being reported when we left Washington 30 minutes ago. With the weather good enough to now shoot the approach (we need at least ½ a mile) I get busy figuring out our landing speed and weight while the FO gets his charts set up. I do the same a minute later and as the plane levels at 11,000 feet he briefs the approach. That accomplished I hand over the radio duties to the FO and give the Flight Attendant a call. That is followed by a call to Operations at White Plaines to let them know we’ll be there in 15 minutes or so. The computer system normally does this automatically, but we are still required to make the call.

New York turns us back to the west now that we are under the Kennedy Departure corridor and descends us to 5000 feet. From previous experience I know that Interstate 95 which runs along the Connecticut shoreline is passing by our right wing, but tonight it’s hidden by the fog. On my display screen I watch the airports of New Haven and Bridgeport slide by. I smile in the darkness as I remember passing by these same cities in the back seat (and later the front seat and even later the driver’s seat) of a car as I went from my home growing up to visit my grandmother. Although I’m going to a different place and using a different form of transportation this time, sometimes the sequence of things doesn’t change.

The Approach Controller turns us to the north to join the instrument downwind for the airport and clears us to descend to 2500 feet. By 3000 feet we can clearly see the ground. Forward visibility, although restricted is now up to 5 or 6 miles. The controller turns us back to the west and then the south and gives us a clearance to join the instrument approach. My FO starts slowing and calls for flaps. Just as we turn inbound towards the airport I see off to the west the stretch of sodium lighting that spans the Hudson River across the Tappen Zee Bridge. Another set of car rides from the distant past float through my mind, quickly displaced by my FO requesting the landing gear and 30 degrees of flaps. As the gear drops into the foggy air we are handed over to the tower controller who tells us the wind is calm and we are cleared to land.

Despite the calm winds it is a bumpy approach. Due to a combination of geographic position and unique landform, it is always bumpy on the way into White Plaines. My very first landing in the CRJ was to this runway, although in the opposite direction that we are currently landing. It was incredibly challenging (mostly because I’d never actually landed the plane before other than in the simulator) and I was seriously worried I’d have trouble being able to ever land the plane. Now, almost 5 years later, some days I still wonder the same thing. My FO leaves no doubt that he knows what he’s doing however and manages a smooth touchdown. As the plane decelerates I look up to the south and over the Long Island Sound. The fog has cleared, and in the dark sky which is now visible I can see a line of blinking lights heading east. The International Push at JFK is still in full swing and somewhere in a dark room a New York Controller is trying to convey something to a crew whose first language is not English.

As I take the plane back from the FO and start the taxi towards the gate I realize for about the 5th time today that I really do like my job.

The remnants of a New Year’s Eve full moon still hang brightly in the eastern sky, faded only slightly over the last two nights. Below, through a tattered layer of clouds the lights of Washington, DC stretch to the north. We are dropping though 6000 feet on the way down to 3000 and the air is smooth. Overhead the millions of stars I’ve been gazing at on our ride north from Charlotte start to fade as the ground lighting washes them out. Ahead, the Potomac River cuts a path of darkness across the face of the City. Nestled on the western edge of the river, 15 miles away and rapidly approaching are the runways of Washington National Airport and the end of our day.

We pass through the scattered layer of clouds at 5000 feet and within seconds the ride goes from smooth as glass to uncomfortably rough. As the plane rocks hard to the left and then drops to the right, I can hear our Flight Attendant slamming drawers shut in the galley behind us. My FO reaches up and arms the continuous ignition as we take a particularly large lurch to the left. The surface winds are reportedly gusting to 45 miles per hour and here at 4000 feet they are steady at 60mph. For the next 2 minutes I focus on sawing back and forth on the thrust levers to keep the airspeed somewhat stable. As we pass through 2000 feet and fly over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, National Tower clears us to circle to and land on Runway 33. I let out a theatric sigh and mumble “why me?” My FO manages to laugh between the bumps as he goes to work on the Flight Management Computer to load in the new approach.

When the winds are out of the north the normal arrival to DC is to fly up the Potomac River and straight on to Runway 1. Sometimes if they are trying to pump out a lot of departures they will have smaller aircraft circle to Runway 33, which is much shorter and involves a low level turn to align with the runway. Landing 33 can be a fun challenge but if you aren’t ready for it, or don’t make the turn at the right time, it can get a little ugly and it’s not unusual, especially on a windy day, to see airplanes powering up midway through the turn and breaking off to try again.

There is no traffic departing Runway 1 but because of the very strong winds out of the West, tower has given us Runway 33 to be more aligned with the wind. It’s a considerate gesture and in the end will probably make for a better approach. Despite that, it’s causing me to rethink the whole approach and instead of flying a simple straight in final with the autopilot following the ILS to the runway, I’m going to have to hand fly a visual pattern across the Naval Base and then back across the Potomac to the runway, all while getting buffeted by 35 knots of wind.

I dump the autopilot while the FO finishes entering the approach into the FMC. After a few seconds the computer decides it likes things and generates a small white snowflake on my display to give me some vertical guidance. Because the approach won’t be flown in a straight line the FMC can’t help out and the lateral path is all on me. I decide I’ll take what help I can get and call for the last of the flaps as we pass through 1600 feet.

The runway is easy to see despite the darkness and I try to picture a curving path that begins from where we are and arcs downward towards the end of the runway. It’s easy to see in my mind, but with the gusting wind it’s going to be a whole different matter to fly it. My FO calls off 1000 feet and I start the final turn to align us with the runway. I briefly mention that if I don’t have the plane on the ground in the first 1500 feet of pavement we are going around and trying again. He agrees and then calls off 500 feet above the river. By now we are aligned with both the runway and the wind which means at least the plane is now going where the nose is pointed. At 200 feet I make a small pitch adjustment I decide I like how things are going. At 100 feet the power starts to come out.

The white aiming point blocks, painted 1000 feet down the runway appear frozen in the windshield meaning we are tracking straight towards them. The plane calls out 50 feet and I pull the thrust levers back to the stops. In the sudden quiet I can hear the wind buffeting by the windshield as the nose comes up in the flare. We float for a few seconds and then settle to the pavement. I’m on the brakes before I can get the thrust reversers deployed, but then realize our ground speed was very slow on landing because of the strong headwind and we’ll have no problem getting stopped. At 80 knots I stow the reversers and increase the brake pressure. The plane slows to a normal taxi speed just as the runway exit comes up on the left.

As we taxi towards our parking spot my FO turns off the landing lights, turning the pavement in front of us a deep black. Despite the decrease in lighting I can still see debris and trash flying through the air, clearly illuminated by the taxiway lighting. It’s a nasty night out there and I’m glad to be done.