Looking at my pre-flight weather brief, not sure I would have gone ahead with this…
On the other hand, if my destination was in that nice, calm centre, maybe not so bad?
More info: https://goo.gl/Rf2g1Q
If I understand correctly, in this picture, they’re leaving (despite where the nose is pointed).
You could be right.
How about this?
They came to evacuate Delta staff who would otherwise have had to ride out the hurricane on the island. AFAIK, there were no fare paying passengers on the return flight, but a rather long standby list.
Isn’t it nice if your employer takes good care of you?
The thing is that these planes have radar, excellent ice protection, a +5000fpm rate of climb and in about 10 mins are above almost any “organised IMC”. If you tried this in a TB20, you would never outclimb the icing conditions which will be encountered on the way up, in the time it takes for the whole wx system to move east and swallow your desired track.
This is how it feels from the inside. Hit the wrong spot and 5000fpm climb doesn’t save you.
I’ve flown into Hurricane Floyd (1998, IIRC) with the Hurricane Hunters and while it was a pretty interesting ride, it wasn’t as wild as I expected. That said, being bounced around for 12 hours (that’s their shift duration) does get somewhat tiring and is obviously very draining on the crew.
Here’s what the eyewall looks like from the inside (Floyd didn’t have well-defined eye, there was an undercast, through which occasionally islands were visible):
