Landing Mooney at Every NYC Airport: JFK, LGA, EWR, +7

[201er]

Since we're not using the airplane to actually go anywhere lately, I decided to catch up on some local flying. I took my wife and her father to see every single airport underlying the NYC Class Bravo airspace in my Mooney M20J 201.

It's a flight I've always wanted to do but would keep putting it off cause it seemed so close and attainable. Well, now I went and actually did it. And I have the video to show it.

Wednesday January 13, we departed Linden airport with the primary goal of landing at the 3 major airports and a secondary goal of landing at all the rest. I had one of the longest weather briefings with information for 10 different airports. I have done Poker runs with 5 airports before, but I think this was the largest number of airports and landings I've done in a single day.

Unlike my spontaneous landings at JFK, EWR, and LGA, this time things were planned. I planned the order of the airports, I checked all the airport information in advance, and I prepared a cheat sheet with all the essential info I would need. This was going to be a very fast paced flight with some airports as close as 6nm apart and the longest being only 24nm. This was particularly a communications challenge. A lot of focus would have to be made on getting all the right info in a very short span of time. I made out a single paper with all of the airports, runways, atis, tower, and ground frequencies in the order I was planning to visit them.

If the Trifecta would not work out, for example if one airport was just not allowing me to land, I would scrap the rest of the flight and just call it a sightseeing excursion. If everything went to plan with the big 3, then I would go on and try all the secondary airports. This is why I planned the flight with the airports in this order:

KLDJ Linden

KEWR Newark

KLGA LaGuardia

KJFK Kennedy

KFRG Farmingdale

KHPN Westchester

KTEB Teterboro

KCDW Caldwell

KMMU Morristown

KLDJ Linden

N07 Lincoln Park

KLDJ Linden

 

I had to copy the Newark ATIS while on the ground at Linden. A 6nm flight would not grant enough time to listen to the recording! Right after takeoff, I called Newark tower and requested a touch and go on 22L. Permission was granted and tower inquired where I was going next? "LaGuardia."

After landing on the numbers on 22L at Newark, I reset the flaps, cowl flaps, and trim and advanced the throttle to take off again. A left turn out took me direct to the Statue of Liberty and then up the East River. After a hand off to LaGuardia Tower, LaGuardia let me choose between 22 or 31. Although I had already landed on 31 last time and would have been thrilled to try a different runway, I knew the views would be better on 31 so I relived my prior flight.

Touch and Go at LaGuardia and I was back in the air making a left turn out to head direct to Kennedy. Just 10nm and time to land again. Kennedy tower had me climb to 2000ft to overfly their 31R arrivals and then establish on a left downwind for 31L. Unlike the first two airports, they refused to let me do anything but a full stop landing. However, they revised the original instruction for a full-stop taxi-back to a stop on the runway and then continue with an intersection take off from there. At 14,500ft, 31L is the longest runway on the East Coast. I could have done 3 touch and gos on this runway to get recurrent.

After Kennedy, the Trifecta was complete. A big grin and a sigh of relief, I had little doubt I'd be able to get clearance at the remaining airports. These first 3 airports flew by in the span of half an hour. There was no time to chat or think about anything but the next landing coming immediately. I was constantly turning radio knobs, talking, and making landings. But, following Long Island's south short to Republic, I had a few moments to collect my thoughts and offer some remarks to the camera.

Farmingdale/Republic KFRG airport turned out to be the busiest airport for the day. Way busier than JFK, LGA, and EWR combined! There was a line of about 6 planes waiting to depart and I heard someone after me told they were number 8 for landing! I had to extend downwind so far, I thought I was going to end up leaving Long Island. But, eventually tower had me turn in and I made a touch and go on 14.

A turn out to the north, and I had a 24nm leg to Westchester, the longest of the flight. However, the relaxing period was short lived. Visibility in those northern parts was not good and I could not even see across Long Island Sound. I had to dial in the ILS to find the long straight in final I was flying to 34 in Westchester KHPN. Winds were choppy and tower had to issue a go around with a Cirrus landing on the converging runway 29. I saw him fly right over as I was rolling across the intersection. But, I did not stop. I advanced the power and took off onward.

Passing the Tappan Zee bridge, I turned south to Teterboro KTEB. I requested the option for 19 but all tower would give me is 24. Flying pretty heavy, I preferred the longer runway. With traffic inbound to 19, Teterboro tower said they'll see. Getting in closer, they cleared me to switch to 19 at the last moment and make the touch and go.

At every airport, I made a big focus to make sure the gear was down. With so much up and down, fatigue, and unusually large runways, it was easy to get out of the normal flow. Other than camerawork, the single other task I engaged my wife with was rechecking that gear was down for every single approach.

Teterboro to Caldwell KCDW was quick. Traffic at Caldwell was pretty heavy, but they got me in for a full stop landing on 22. This was the only towered airport that I did not request a touch and go (or option) at. 4500ft of runway just was not comfortable with all the weight. I should probably mention that I don't really know how you're supposed to do a touch and go. I was never actually instructed on how it's supposed to go because I always trained from short airports where it was not possible. I think I've heard that some people do it with partial flaps or no flaps. Or with the trim in Takeoff. I don't know any of that. I don't really know if it's a landing and then a takeoff or more like bounce the wheels on and do a go around. I genuinely don't know. I just did normal, proper, trimmed, full flap, gear down landings every time. Then while rolling with the throttle idle, I would raise the flaps to takeoff position, retrim, open the cowl flaps, and then advance the power for a normal takeoff. I opted for these land and take off from the same runway touch and goes at most of the airports to save time on long taxi backs and in many cases traffic delays because I had so many airports to get to. And most of them had runways double the length I am used to or more. So why not land and then takeoff from the same runway when it's already like 2 runways joined together? I'm still not convinced in touch and goes as a training exercise for novice students, particularly in a Mooney though.

On the ground in Caldwell, I experienced my first break. A lot of landing traffic and then a bunch of departing traffic made us spend close to ten minutes on the ground. I had no problem to keep going, but since I was forced to wait, I took a breather. Caldwell to Morristown was another super short flight. In fact, I picked up the Morristown ATIS while still in the air enroute to Caldwell before landing. Despite it being such a short distance, it was not as short of a flight. Morristown tower had several planes inbound and had me to a sharp 250 degree turn to join their downwind. Then a 360 turn for spacing. If that wasn't enough, they extended my downwind until I was practically back over Caldwell before calling my base. They refused to give me a touch and go and issued a clearance for full-stop taxi-back. I'm not really sure how this would save them any time. It would cause me to occupy their runway twice instead of once and be on my way. However, I obeyed and got another short break on the ground.

This flight was definitely a work out and a challenge. Before I had my Mooney and even when I did have my Mooney for a few years, I definitely do not think I was up for the task. It took a combination of years of flying experience, experience landing at bigger and bigger airports over time, and the fact that I had already visited every airport on the flight at least once before that made doing it all in one shot possible. Although it was a challenging flight, I don't think I would say it was the hardest flight I've done. Genuinely, some hard IFR or even an IPC with 6 approaches is still more grueling. This flight was mainly a challenge in staying organized, focused, and doing a lot of very rapid yet very accurate communications. It was also just a lot of landings in one day. And unlike doing 10 practice landings at the home field, here each one was at a different place with a different runway and different wind conditions. Every landing was unique and required its own analysis. I'm really happy I captured all the video footage so that I could sit back and watch my flight. While it was happening, I was genuinely so busy doing it that I had virtually no time to get to watch it as it happened.

At this point, I had landed at every single towered airport underlying the NY Bravo Airspace. The 3 major Bravos and the 5 Deltas. I had 2 uncontrolled airports remaining. Linden KLDJ was one of them, but it is my home base so inevitably I would end there. The other was Lincoln Park N07. However, Lincoln Park has a particularly short and narrow bumpy runway. With trees in one direction and a mountain in the other, it's not a very friendly approach or departure. With a lot of fuel still remaining on board, I opted to drop my father in-law off to wait at Linden while we would wrap up that last segment. Although the book says the airplane could do it and I am pretty sure it could be done, I just did not want to take any chances of a good day ending badly by cutting things close to the edge. I'd been to Lincoln Park before a bunch of times and I know I always do it light because of the way the airport is. With just my wife and I, the landing and takeoff on 19 at Lincoln Park went smoothly with room to spare. Ended up talking to Caldwell and Newark tower again on the ways to and from Lincoln Park. We ended the flight at Linden victorious. We flew to every single airport underlying the NY Class Bravo airspace in one day in just under 3 hours of flying time. It was incredible. And now, I'm sharing it with you here in my video of the whole adventure:

 

 

[201er]

If that wasn't enough adventure for one day, we came home and introduced our baby to our parrots for the first time. Steven is 2.5 months old and had not yet encountered our 3 pet birds. We decided to give it some time. But, in the last few days he started showing an interest in toys and objects and we decided it would be a good time.

However, parrots are wild animals and can potentially be aggressive or even just scared of new people. We were not 100% sure how they would react so out of an abundance of precaution and best practices, we made the introductions slowly and used training to ensure the birds were learning to be calm and non-confrontational around the child. This was also a huge success.

 

 

[WaynePierce]

Do you have any idea if there will be landing fee's? I can't imagine how grueling that flight must have been...

 

Good job with the Parrots and kid!

[squeaky.stow]

201er, I had to respond because your post really cheered me up after a week of lousy news. I really enjoyed your story and your video. 
2 comments. First, congratulations on making lemonade out of lemons. COVID has kicked the crap out of society in general and aviation in particular. Instead of getting depressed about it, you figured out a way to have an adventure that you will never be able to do again once the airline traffic comes back. Secondly, kudos on the professional job you did in preparation and execution. There have been some tragic news stories recently with GA pilots that make us all look bad. Most of them involve poor preparation and planning and accepting unnecessary risks. You had a well prepared plan to mitigate risks and that allowed a very busy flight to go smoothly and safely. Proof of that was that your wife was obviously enjoying herself. Well done! Hopefully your video will be a good example to others. 

And congratulations on that beautiful little baby!

[MooneyMitch]

WWWWOOOWWWW!!!!!    

[flyboy0681]

Well, that's not something we are going to see on BeechTalk, the Cessna Owners Group or Cirrus Owners Association.

As always, I'm living vicariously through your flights, be it the Caribbean, Transcon or the New York Class Bravo. Growing up in Sheepshead Bay and watching planes arrive via Canarsie approach, I've always dreamed of flying into JFK. And your landing at Caldwell brought back memories as that's where I did my primary, although it didn't look quite like that back in 1980.

Great work Mike, you are a credit to Mooney owners worldwide.

 

 

[gsxrpilot]

I love the video. The adventures of 201er are well known and legendary. I don't think I can say it better than @flyboy0681 just did. 100% agree!

[StevenL757]

Agree.  Loved the video, and especially Steven’s face when he’s looking at the bird while you’re scratching his belly.  Priceless.  :-)

[takair]

Mike....first Congratulations to you and your wife!  Didn’t pick up that you were expecting and had a new baby before this post!  Great family photo!  
 

Impressive flight!  I admit, I haven’t watched the video yet, but I’m curious about the handoffs between airport airspace within the class B.  Did they just hand you off between towers?  I would be nervous that they wouldn’t accept the handoff...and leave me stranded in the class B or would they switch you to approach control?

[carusoam]

Well executed Mikey/201er/StinkyPants/ParrotWizzard ! 

Just another ordinary day of Mooney Flying...   

+1 plan the flight, fly the plan...

+1 Fantastic Cockpit Resource management... (CRM)

+1 Awesome radio work... including the discussion about runway length remaining at intersection Lima... 

Was the back seater your Dad?

Family and Mooneys... Perfect together..!

No better way to get around NYC... than a Mooney!

See if @Jonny @Davidv is still busy today... watching this video will make a great break in an ordinary busy day...

So many Mooney landings, @donkaye may even find it interesting...  always on the centerline, energy well controlled...

 

Looking forward to Stephen’s First Flight!

Go MS!

Go 2021!

Best regards,

-a-

[201er]

13 hours ago, takair said:

I admit, I haven’t watched the video yet, but I’m curious about the handoffs between airport airspace within the class B.  Did they just hand you off between towers?  I would be nervous that they wouldn’t accept the handoff...and leave me stranded in the class B or would they switch you to approach control?

It was entirely between towers for the Trifecta. There was a short time I was squawking 1200 between Kennedy and Farmingdale. And a short time talking to approach between Farmingdale and Westchester. Teterboro, Caldwell, Morristown all have adjacent deltas so hand offs from tower to tower. When you're on a Bravo clearance it's like being IFR. They have to take the handoff I'm pretty sure. I never worried about it.

Now here's a question, when you take off from a Bravo airport VFR, do you need clearance into Bravo!? I don't think they say it. Does a takeoff clearance from that airport imply clearance into Bravo? Or, is the Bravo to the ground and since you're already in Bravo you don't need it? Just need Bravo clearance when "entering" Class B airspace?

[donkaye, MCFI]

15 hours ago, carusoam said:

Well executed Mikey/201er/StinkyPants/ParrotWizzard ! 

Just another ordinary day of Mooney Flying...   

+1 plan the flight, fly the plan...

+1 Fantastic Cockpit Resource management... (CRM)

+1 Awesome radio work... including the discussion about runway length remaining at intersection Lima... 

Was the back seater your Dad?

Family and Mooneys... Perfect together..!

No better way to get around NYC... than a Mooney!

See if @Jonny @Davidv is still busy today... watching this video will make a great break in an ordinary busy day...

So many Mooney landings, @donkaye may even find it interesting...  always on the centerline, energy well controlled...

 

Looking forward to Stephen’s First Flight!

Go MS!

Go 2021!

Best regards,

-a-

Nice job.  Unfortunately, although a smaller area, the same thing couldn't be done reasonably in the San Francisco Bay Area because you are required to full stop and go to Signature at SFO for a price of around $300.  No problem with the rest of the airports around the Bay Area.  To this day, after all my years of years of flying to airports all over the Country and airports in Canada and Australia, the only Bay Area airport I have never landed at myself is KSFO.  There was a slight window of opportunity at the beginning of the Pandemic where a friend of mine was able to land there, but Signature immediately complained and the Tower stopped allowing it.

 

[flyboy0681]

2 minutes ago, donkaye said:

There was a slight window of opportunity at the beginning of the Pandemic where a friend of mine was able to land there, but Signature immediate created a problem and the Tower stopped allowing it.

 

Killjoys

[takair]

3 hours ago, 201er said:

It was entirely between towers for the Trifecta. There was a short time I was squawking 1200 between Kennedy and Farmingdale. And a short time talking to approach between Farmingdale and Westchester. Teterboro, Caldwell, Morristown all have adjacent deltas so hand offs from tower to tower. When you're on a Bravo clearance it's like being IFR. They have to take the handoff I'm pretty sure. I never worried about it.

Now here's a question, when you take off from a Bravo airport VFR, do you need clearance into Bravo!? I don't think they say it. Does a takeoff clearance from that airport imply clearance into Bravo? Or, is the Bravo to the ground and since you're already in Bravo you don't need it? Just need Bravo clearance when "entering" Class B airspace?

Thanks Mike.  That makes a lot of sense now, but I can certainly appreciate the workload you had.   Regarding your second question, I think you would call clearance first, get a code and receive adequate departure instructions and thus it is your clearance into the B.  Once talking to tower, you are essentially talking to the controlling agency, with a discrete code. 

[201er]

1 minute ago, takair said:

Regarding your second question, I think you would call clearance first, get a code and receive adequate departure instructions and thus it is your clearance into the B.  Once talking to tower, you are essentially talking to the controlling agency, with a discrete code. 

I know. I’m just saying I don’t remember explicitly getting a Bravo clearance once inside. Just when penetrating the perimeter to enter. That’s why if there is a delay in hand off between Bravo towers, it’s mostly their problem and not yours. Behave like you are IFR and continue on your planned route. Every tower in the Bravo gave explicit instructions on how to proceed after takeoff such as “left turn out, direct Kennedy.” In the event of a temporary coms issue or delay in hearing back, I would just continue doing what they instructed and expect.

[Davidv]

On 1/17/2021 at 4:45 AM, 201er said:

I know. I’m just saying I don’t remember explicitly getting a Bravo clearance once inside. Just when penetrating the perimeter to enter. That’s why if there is a delay in hand off between Bravo towers, it’s mostly their problem and not yours. Behave like you are IFR and continue on your planned route. Every tower in the Bravo gave explicit instructions on how to proceed after takeoff such as “left turn out, direct Kennedy.” In the event of a temporary coms issue or delay in hearing back, I would just continue doing what they instructed and expect.

Great video @201er, I was able to get in a low pass at MIA but that was about it for me!

In my experience, when departing an airport VFR under a bravo shelf, they usually explicitly say something like "This is not a Bravo clearance, fly runway heading at or below X thousand feet."  I don't recall them saying anything to me when departing an actual Bravo airport.  I suppose since you're inside the inner ring the fact that they are letting you takeoff is an implied clearance (e.g. they couldn't fault you for busting the inner ring as a result of you lifting off the runway).  

[KB4]

On 1/16/2021 at 10:37 AM, 201er said:

Or, is the Bravo to the ground and since you're already in Bravo you don't need it?

That’s how I see it. You are already IN.  
 

Different scenario—You hear cleared to Kennedy VOR 4500 but no mention of “cleared into the Bravo” can you enter?

 Since you cannot get to JFK VOR without entering Bravo, you have been cleared without ever hearing that magic word.  I have entered NY B with just “cleared to Kennedy 4500”

[Andy95W]

Similarly, it’s like when you’re IFR- you don’t need to hear “cleared to enter the Class B” because your IFR clearance is the clearance to enter the B airspace.

[cwaters]

@201er I've been a fan for a while now and this trip was one of the most fun to watch. Landing at the Ny 3 is on my bucket list but I might expand that to all under the Bravo shelf after seeing this one.

[RobertGary1]

Sounds like you spent more money on landing fees than an annual.

 

-Robert 

[flyboy0681]

13 minutes ago, RobertGary1 said:

Sounds like you spent more money on landing fees than an annual.

 

-Robert 

Some things you just can't put a price on.

[Ibra]

41 minutes ago, flyboy0681 said:

Some things you just can't put a price on

Some A&P/IA engineers say that 

[cwaters]

3 hours ago, Ibra said:

Some A&P/IA engineers say that 

They say that as they hand you the bill though

[thinwing]

I wonder if someone could do this in LA

[Skates97]

18 minutes ago, thinwing said:

I wonder if someone could do this in LA

Inspired by Mike, it is in the planning stages...