Flight Training - December 2014 - 24

FLYING CARPET

By Greg Brown

ARIZONA'S REMOTE Mogollon Airpark,
100 miles northeast of Phoenix.

AVIATORS' PARADISE

NEW AND DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES

A

mong both the joys and challenges of piloting is that however long we ﬂy, we're continually encountering new and
different circumstances. Recently Jean and I attended an
FAA Safety Seminar at Mogollon Airpark (AZ82), a private
ﬂy-in residential community high on the Mogollon Rim 100 miles
northeast of Phoenix.
Although Jean had lately observed
that, "we don't do enough together, anymore," I was stunned when she cancelled
Saturday-morning tennis to join me
for the highly esoteric topic of ADS-B
surveillance, traffic, and weather delivery
technology. Later it came out that she was
"also a little sore from too much tennis."
Our destination likely affected her decision, too. Picture your favorite childhood
pine-woods summer camp, set at 6,700
feet elevation for nice, cool summers.
Now add a paved runway and homes with
attached hangars on spacious wooded
lots, and you'll appreciate why we enjoy
visiting this aviators' paradise.
Flying into private airports generally
requires planning and permission, so you
can't wait until departure morning to ﬁgure things out. Such airports needn't meet
public-use airport standards and rarely
appear in official publications such as the

24 /

FLIGHTTRAINING.AOPA.ORG

FAA Airport/Facility Directory. Mogollon's
website speciﬁes rules and recommends
safety procedures. As with many private
strips, visiting pilots are required to presubmit aircraft insurance documentation
and a hold-harmless form. The website
also designates Runway 21 as the calmwind runway, speciﬁes right traffic for
Runway 3, and prohibits night landings.

Particularly thought-provoking is that
Mogollon's runway slopes downhill from
the midpoint in both directions. As a
result, departing pilots cannot see aircraft
at the opposite end of the runway-in
fact, they are so thoroughly blocked by
the midpoint rise that pilots may not hear
each other's radio transmissions. Accordingly I studied and printed the airpark's
seven-point "Safety Warning" anti-collision departure procedures list.
Finally, I pre-calculated my course
since you can't just dial it in after takeoff.
Private airports rarely appear in panelmounted GPS navigator databases, so
getting to Mogollon requires manually
entering its coordinates as a user waypoint, or applying old-fashioned pilotage
and dead reckoning.
My homework complete, Jean and I
launched for a 30-minute ﬂight over the
world's largest ponderosa pine forest. I
was concerned about air traffic congestion
for the seminar at the nontowered airport,
but that proved a nonissue. Alone in the
pattern, I was still extra careful approaching the runway. Along with wildlife
hazards such as deer and elk, airparks can
be notorious for vehicular and pedestrian
traffic on and near the runway. We crossed
midﬁeld over the airport 500 feet above
pattern altitude to scout traffic and wind-

PICTURE YOUR FAVORITE CHILDHOOD
PINE-WOODS SUMMER CAMP, SET AT 6,700 FEET
ELEVATION FOR NICE, COOL SUMMERS.
The high-elevation strip is only 3,436
feet long, shorter than I remembered, and
is surrounded by tall pines. That raised
density-altitude concerns. Looking more
closely, however, I noted that narrow centerline taxiways at each end of the runway
effectively add another 2,600 feet for takeoff, well within Flying Carpet capabilities.

socks, then skimmed trees and houses to
land on Runway 21.
Half a dozen airplanes were already
parked on the sunny ramp when we
arrived, and another eight or 10 soon
followed. The seminar was to be held in a
private hangar facing the ﬂight line, and
as each arriving airplane was secured, its
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Flight Training - December 2014

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