Flying VFR at night can be exhilarating.  The view of the lights is magnificent. There is usually much less turbulence.  Sometimes the thunderstorms have died down.  

     There is less traffic at night.  Communication is usually more casual.  On one occasion, at about three AM, I recall the center controller and pilots enjoying a conversation about the partial eclipse of the moon we were watching.

     Other aircraft are much easier to see at night—unless you are over a large city such as New York, in which case aircraft navigation lights are almost impossible to distinguish from all the other lights.  And if you are actually in the clouds  it is sometimes possible to determine in what direction the lightning (and hence turbulence) is occurring and avoid it, although Stormscope and Doppler radar are the incomparably better way to do this.

     Takeoffs and landings at night are a little different than during daylight hours, but with a little practice with a CFI, they should not be a problem.  

     Even locating the airport usually is not much of a problem.  If there are a lot of lights around, it’s probably the area with fewer lights.  If there are very few lights around, it’s the area that has lights.  Just make sure you don’t try to land on lighted highway construction or a long factory roof that has a string of lights along the edge of the building—or anything else that could sucker you into landing on something you shouldn’t.  At night, lights along a road or even a factory building may look a lot like runway lights.  

     One time the tower controller at Detroit Willow Run airport casually glanced to see the progress of a passenger airliner that had been cleared to land.  The aircraft appeared just above the bottom of the tower window.  Because he lived in the area, he realized that the pilot had mistaken the row of lights at a freeway repair site for runway lights and was about to land on road construction.  He informed the pilot who afterward came directly to the tower to personally thank him.  To avoid this, use your navigation radios to double check that what you are about to land on is what you planned to land on.  

     An airline pilot(s) lost his job because he landed at Biggs Air Force Base instead of flying the nearby ILS runway 22 at El Paso International airport.  The runways are somewhat parallel.  Just the electronics he had available probably cost considerably more than my electronics and aircraft combined and he didn’t use them.  And this was in daylight VFR with over 15 mile visibility!

     All in all, VFR night flying is enjoyable if you have a means of assuring you will stay awake.  (Just as an aside, if you are flying ‘VFR’ under the hood with a safety pilot, occasionally verify that your safety pilot hasn’t fallen asleep.  Been there, done that—at below minimum enroute altitude (MEA) in mountainous terrain!)  

     However, there are very good reasons to have an instrument rating, or at the very least considerable instrument flying capability, for VFR night flying, especially if cross country flights.

     On several occasions I have flown a VFR flight plan at night when suddenly the whole world disappeared because I had flown into a cloud I couldn’t see.  This has occurred when the visibility was far in excess of 15 miles and there was a nearby city full of lights.  You have to be prepared for this.  You can be instantly IFR without a clue beforehand.

     Visual illusions also can render a pilot effectively on instruments.  On one occasion, I was flying, probably on an IFR flight plan but in excellent VFR conditions, with little moonlight in west Texas where there are few ground lights.  A light on the ground ahead in the foothills of the mountains seemed to me to be a star, meaning the aircraft was aimed at an extreme angle toward vertical.  This, of course, would be disastrous if continued for even a short time.  Yet when I looked over my left wing, I could see Van Horn, Texas more than 50 miles away.  This was somewhat disorienting.  I rechecked my instruments several times, yet it still seemed to be a star.  After cross checking the instruments I knew they were correct, so I just followed them until that confounding light was no longer visible.

     A night takeoff can present a problem you wouldn’t encounter during daylight.  A short time after acquiring our Piper Apache, I took off at night from Pecos, Texas.  There were no runway lights but this was not a problem because the landing light on the Apache was very adequate.  Visibility was probably greater than 50 miles.  The takeoff went fine, using a little higher airspeed than usual to assure that there would be no inadvertent descent after liftoff.  As I was climbing, I could see the reassuring glow of the powerful landing light in the atmosphere ahead of me.  There were no other lights in that direction.  The glow was the only thing visible.  

     Then I suddenly realized that the glow would look exactly the same whether I was right side up, upside down, or anywhere in between!  I immediately went on instruments, then turned off the landing light. Turning off the landing light made no difference.  I was still on instruments because it was a dark night.  There were no lights on the ground ahead; there was nothing to see!  I was in full IFR mode with 50+ miles of visibility!

     There are multiple situations in which you need to be immediately IFR capable when flying cross-country at night, even in excellent visibility, and this necessity may occur with no warning whatever.  If you wish to fly at night VFR, other than close to your airport with high ceilings and good visibility, instrument capability should be very high on your priority list.

When Night VFR Becomes IFR

Dr. Sherwood Kaip

El Paso, TX

<skaip799@gmail.com>;   cell: 1 (915) 309-6340

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