Am I a weather wuss? (part 2)

On reflection I think I’ve distilled down what my fundamental problem with any kind of weather decision making is.

A lot of the decision process is instinctual, does it “feel right”?

Two issues with that. One I don’t have the experience to have developed good instincts yet and two, well two is a little more psychologically complex.

I’ve heard people say that you should always listen to that little voice in the back of your head and if it tells you that flying in these conditions isn’t a good idea then you should listen.

The problem is that little voice is ALWAYS telling me not to fly. I always have doubts in the back of my mind. I’m very conscious of the fact that I could be too cautious.

I’ve gotten better at looking at what the current conditions are and making a decision based on that. I believe that proper pilots refer to it as “establishing personal minimums.” It’s easy for me to decide not to go in a 20 knot crosswind or when the upper winds are a blowy 45+knots.

When it comes to predicting future conditions though. I’m still very unsure. On paper yesterday’s conditions looked fine for flying right up until that moment when I got on the ferry. A cloud base of 2000ft AGL is perfectly doable. Visibility of 5 SM is not ideal but certainly ok for circuits and a 30% chance of rain and low cloud is a 70% chance that it won’t happen.

How do you decide?

For the record despite the skies still looking Okish to the east, by the time my wheels up time got here it was monsoon rain and even the Porters were overshooting!

Still I was second guessing myself to the point where RTH told me to put down my phone and “stop stalking the weather”

Once the rain started (at exactly the time Bob had predicted, leading to a text form him at the instant the rain started pouring down saying “et Voila!”). I knew I’d made the right call but getting here wasn’t easy.

Flight services hadn’t been hugely helpful in that their prediction had been that I’d probably be ok for circuits. The flight school hadn’t been able to give me any more info than that because no one was up flying, so no PIREPS. Bob was probably still stuck in his office somewhere, possibly even in a different weather zone (stuff can be really localised here).

I just didn’t feel confident in my decision. And I’m not sure why. No one has ever pressured me to fly in dicey weather but I feel guilty every time I cancel those flights all the same.

If anyone out there has any "how to predict the weather tips", I'm all ears.