NickG

Registering your aircraft in Florida will expose you to Florida taxes. However, the taxes you pay are calculated by "apportionment" and they will only tax you based on a percentage of value calculated by how long you are flying in Florida airspace as you EGRESS the state. I know, sounds crazy but that's how they do it.

I said Pioneeers in the “unreasonable” event fees. Mind you, all event fees are “unreasonable”

Yes, they publish NOTAMS along with requiring PPR

I completely agree with this. I have been doing a fair amount of X-C flying in the last month or so, including two round trips from Las Vegas to Houston. The max i can handle is about a 4.5 hour leg although I prefer to break the flight up into 2 x 3 hour legs. I fly an Ovation 3 so I'm flying between 11k and 16k so have cannula stuffed in nostrils. I couldn't imagine regularly flying the OP's mission - I think Turbine (although still a long flight) or commercial with a nice bird situated locally for use would be ideal.

Come and land in Las Vegas ( VGT, LAS, HND ) during a “special event”. Fees for light aircraft (up to 6k#) $750 up to $5000. They want to raise it to $10,000 for the top tier over the next 5 years.

I’m the AOPA AVN at KHND in Las Vegas. Unfortunately Las Vegas and the Clark County Dept of Airports have been the pioneers in the completely unreasonable “Special Event Fees”. AOPA is very active in fighting all of these attempts to squeeze GA.

I'm definitely going to make fire/smoke ID a part of my preflight planning, especially when flying in and out of California. The final leg of my flight will be Saturday when my friend will fly me down to KIFP to pick up the beloved O so I can fly it home to HND and a WASH (lol).

Yes. Agree. I didn't have the full picture of how large the fire was.

Yes, it is.

I have the paper filter.

Thanks - I consider myself a careful planner and quite conservative. This was my first foray into something this big. In retrospect, I also think I was suffering a small dose of get there itis combined with concern about the howling winds throughout Las Vegas on my arrival (which didn't happen due to the diversion). I've been told by another pilot that flew the area that the smoke tops were at 22k. and I would have had to make a multi hour detour to fly around it. I probably should have just kept the plane at Hawthorne and hopped on a Southwest to get home. Come back a couple days later and pick up the O. Luckily, nothing other than a dry throat and a dirty plane to serve as a reminder (although my buddy will fly me back to IFP on Saturday to pick up the plane). The outcome could definitely have been worse.

I spoke with my A&P today. He said that wildfire ash is generally not abrasive (a la volcanic ash). He said occasional flight through this will not cause any damage. However, he said I should blow out the induction air filter. Now I've got to figure out how to do that!

By the time I asked, the shortest route out was the one I was on. I had no idea the smoke area was that large or that high. I need to go back and see what I missed on the Leidos brief. As I mentioned, there had to be a better way to fly it than what I ended up doing. I may need to go back and re-examine how I look at weather briefs. I'm usually overly conservative, but this was a mistake. Luckily made it through ok. Plane will be ok (I'll need to clean out induction air filter).

Honestly, in retrospect, I should have diverted sooner. By the time I asked for a higher altitude, I would have been out of it before reaching the top. Probably not my finest example of ADM.

Up to 18 or so according to ATC