28.02.2021: Lommis airfield was finally reopened yesterday. I already had other plans for Saturday, but today I took the chance to get back in the air again. As my last landings were more than 90 days ago I had to do three solo landing first, before taking my wife with me, but that wasn’t possible in Lommis as there is currently a “one landing per pilot per day” restriction in place due to the soft runway. So I flew to St. Gallen Airport to do two landings, which is a good spring training anyway, as it is a controlled airport in Class D airspace.
Flying there is easy, I just have to fly northeast until I hit Lake of Constance, and then turn right and follow the coastline to the east. Passing Romanshorn one reaches reporting point Victor, from there it is usually direct into the downwind for Runway 28. Below what that looks like on SkyDemon:
Victor is easy to identify, as it is next to Romanshorn, from where the ferry crosses the lake to Friedrichshafen. From Victor one can usually already see the airport, as on the picture below, but when there is haze one sometimes has to fly out over the lake for quite some distacne before one can spot it.
Landing in St. Gallen was a bit more challenging than I had expected, due to several business jets arriving in short sequence using the ILS on Runway 10. There is no ILS on Runway 28, so when the tail wind on Runway 10 is too strong they have to break off when on final, and then to a circling approach under VFR. Today the wind was from the west, but only 5-6 kts, so they all landed straight in on Runway 10.
My approach would have interfered with theirs, so I was first asked by the controlller to hold over Victor, and after some circles to fly to entry point Zulu instead, which is southwest of the airport. There I had to hold for another few circles, and then again for a few out over the lake on the downwind to Runway 28. On top I was informed that to do a second landing I have to be at least 20 minutes airborne, as no circuits are permitted on Sundays, but leaving and re-entering the CTR over different departure / entry points added to the training effect. On the positive side they have reduced landing fees during some winter months for small aircraft, to encourage pilots to fly there for training.
After my first landing I departed again via Zulu and flew towards the moutains, “kiling” 15 minutes with a bit of sightseeing. While it was all blue sky in Lommis and St.Gallen airport, there was a thick layer of clouds over the area arount the Säntis.
I then returned to St. Gallen via reporting point Sierra, from where one can fly more or less straight in to Runway. So despite these obstacles I made it there, and also did my two landings, which together with the one in Lommis on my return will give me the three ones I need. Below the perfect weather conditions at St. Gallen airport can be seen.
The flight to St. Gallen should have taken around 20 minutes, but it finally took me more than an hour. That didn’t keep me from doing a detour on my way back to Lommis, passing the Säntis as can be seen on the pictures below. The closed layer of clouds can be seen again, but Lommis was a few kilomeres north of that layer, under blue sky.
