Re: Things to remember in very hot weather

On Sun, 29 Jun 2008 16:17:47 -0500, Michael Ash <mike@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:

>In rec.aviation.student Mxsmanic <mxsmanic@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> muff528 writes:
>> 
>>> If that's as high as your airplane will go you probably should get
another 
>>> airplane. At least don't fly around out west where the hills are
higher than 
>>> that. Sometimes even the ground is higher than that! :-)
>> 
>> I try to avoid the mountains when flying a small plane.  There are some
>> extensive flat areas in the American west, but it is true that
sometimes to
>> get between two points it's hard to avoid the mountains, short of
crossing
>> half the continent to go around them.  Even if the aircraft has the
requisite
>> ceiling, carrying oxygen for everyone is awkward and will not inspire
>> confidence in passengers.
>
>You don't legally need oxygen for the passengers until 15,000ft, and even

>the "it's a good idea even though it's not required" range probably isn't

>until 10,000ft or so. If you start out at sea level, those will get you 
>into nice cool air.
>
>At the risk of turning this thread into something useful, does anyone
have 
>any recommendations as to when it's a good idea to give oxygen to 
>passengers? I'm not talking about the legal requirements, but just when 
>it's the smart thing to do. For example, as the pilot I like to start my 
>oxygen at about 10,000ft even though it's not required until quite a bit 
>higher. But then again, it doesn't really matter too much if my
passengers 
>have mildly impaired judgement during the flight, even though I'd really 
>want to avoid that myself.
>
>This is really an academic question since I don't plan to take anybody 
>that high to begin with, but I'm curious.

mike it depends entirely on your level of blood oxygenation.
go and buy yourself a little device that clips over your finger called
a 'Pulse Oximeter'. you can get little battery powered ones.
they ****ne two lasers of different frequencies through your tissue and
infer the oxygenation from the ratio of the attenuation. they are
quite accurate.
if your blood oxygenation drops below 95% you can start up the oygen.

the commercial aviation standard of 8,000ft is based on the onset of
difficulty that an obese person will have.
obesity means increased tissue to perfuse, compared to a normal weight
person, with just the same lung surface area. obesity brings on
hypoxia earlier.

Stealth Pilot