Taken earlier today, on the backhaul from Baltimore. Kitsch was on assignment in California today, so Pepper was drafted as Co-Captain for this particular run. In this particular niche of flying, most pilots are qualified as Captains - in fact I can only think of one person (out of the dozen or so I have flown with over the past 5 years) who is only qualified as a first officer, and that's more to do with internal politics (in the company he works for) rather than ability or qualifications.

Moving on: Thunderstorms can grow really fast, and this was a good day to observe said growth - we flew by this particular set of storms on the way into Baltimore around 1pm when it was basically a single cel, but by 3pm daytime heating had helped the line of thunderstorms grow into an unbroken line around 60 miles long, which is what is featured in the video. The tops were at 35,000' when we flew past them, but the tops have since climbed higher. As I'm typing these words, the small line has now grown and into a widespread system of thunderstorms that look kinda like this:



The good thing is that the line of thunderstorms has lots of gaps in it, which means that with some creative vectoring, most pilots won't have to get too close to them.

Yay for summer! I like the extended daylight hours, but I'm not a huge fan of the apocalyptic weather that accompanies them.



Random babble ensues:




It was a charter flight, so we had to dress up in full regalia. Seriously, wearing a tie around my neck is the worst part of this job. Having said that, I also recognize that I'm a huge whiner.