Weekend Flyer
| Category | Price | Seller | Device |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weather | Free | Thomas Court Software Development, LLC | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
THE PROBLEM -
Weather information for flight planning even a day in the future is sparse. Prog charts go out less than 24 hours into the future and lack detail. TAF’s are only available at select airports and only go 24-30 hours into the future. Predicting the flying weather further into the future or at non-TAF airports require you to become a meteorologist, interpreting fronts and pressure systems. Even then the local conditions will often mess with you.
THE SOLUTION -
NOAA does provides forecast data for more than 2½ days into the future and for nearly every airport with an automated weather station on it (more than 1500). But until now its never been presented to pilots as a clear picture of the flying weather. Other apps only let you view one airport at a time whereas Weekend Flyer draws a clear picture of your whole flight.
FEATURES -
- The base map is a high resolution scan of the VFR Wall Planner you often see at airports.
- The weather stations (more than 1500) are color coded for flight category VFR, MVFR, IFR, LIFR.
- Thunderstorms and high winds at the airports are also shown. No need to switch between several screens to get the information you need.
- Cloud coverage is also shown.
- Even precipitation is shown (but subtly to keep the map from becoming busy).
- Surface winds and winds aloft shown with wind barbs.
- Map shows all public use airports when zoomed in.
- Map optionally shows night and day.
- A unique ‘time slider’ allows you to quickly and easily show the weather for any time in the forecast range.
- The smooth interactive interface allows you to see the ‘flow’ of the weather.
- Tap on any station for detailed weather information.
- See the weather trend for a single station.
- Easily create and edit routes by long pressing on airports on the map.
- Send the route to ForeFlight (Weekend Flyer is not associated with the Foreflight app or company)
- Routes use winds aloft to determine estimated time en route. Just slide the altitude control up and down to quickly find the optimal cruise altitude.
- Simulate a flight at your expected departure time. Ideal for finding a route when you want to leave at a specific time.
- Or have the whole route’s weather shown based on your departure time and ground speed. Weather is shown for the time you’ll pass each weather station. Ideal for finding a departure time when you want to fly a specific route.
- Extensive help available in the app (press the ? on the toolbar).
LIMITATIONS -
- Contiguous United States (lower 48 states) only - Sorry Alaska and Hawaii.
- Not a replacement for an Electronic Flight Bag app nor for an FAA weather briefing. Some weather information like icing or turbulence just isn’t provided.
Reviews
Fantastic Aviator's Weather Planner
N3N Guy
I absolutely love this app! In just a few moments of time, I can get the "Big Picture" of how the weather looks for my planned route. Nothing like going to one place to see the most important part of your journey, the actual and forecast weather. Should I go for that $100.00 pancake breakfast or not? The decision is now easier. I also reference this app as a professional pilot for a quick look at my day ahead. Besides the overall view, the details of each point along the way are provided by just a touch on the map. This is well worth the price!
Awesome graphical map...gives great insight!
10-oh
I plan lots of cross-country flights all over the U.S. and one of the hardest things is being able to get a good picture as departure day arrives as to when will be the most opportune time to make the trip. If you're doing a weekend or a weeks vacation you want to ensure that you can get out of town (or get back home), in a reasonable timeframe. You can delay or move up your trip to beat or avoid the impending weather. While there are plenty of apps that give prognostic charts that will show fronts and areas of precipitation, it's much harder to get an extended range forecast of textual weather. METARs only tell you how it is now. TAFs give you a good textual (and in some apps, graphical) picture of how it will be soon, but it's look-ahead is not very far. That's why when they started using the MOS forecast it was such a good benefit. You get an approximately 3-day window of what the weather will be. The only problem is, if you are planning an x/c flight (maybe Wisconsin to Nevada for instance). You're going to have to view many many MOS forecasts to ensure that the whole route will have the weather you want. That can get very time consuming. But with this app, you can easily grab all of the MOS forecasts, and scroll a slider and literally watch the weather change for what is expected for the next 3 days. As an added benefit you can shade the screen for daytime and nighttime so you can easily see if you need to fly day or night to miss the weather. All in all its a fantastic app. It will not replace your other weather planning apps, but will give you one more really powerful tool in your arsenal that will help a lot in planning your weekend or trip. For weekenders, now you can leave in comfort on Friday knowing you will get home before you have to be back at work Monday morning. Great job on the app!
Kinda expensive, but ...
flitetym
.... that "time slider" ranks this app in the "cool" category. Just keep in mind several much cheaper GRIB apps are out there that will do the same, except the results won't be in METAR format. ... so, "caveat emptor!"
Clean and easy to use
BigDreamer85
Compared to complex aviation apps like Foreflight, this app is a breath of fresh air. And it's been getting better, really happy they added winds aloft.
Extremely useful and still getting better
IonSteve
Each update brings solid improvements to what was already a very useful app. The visual depiction of weather forecasts is super handy and a quick way to pay attention to route planning and takeoff times. The app provides a functionality that is almost like "future radar" found on some local TV weather forecasts. Using the time slider, you can easily see how weather is forecast to trend and what the implications are for your planned trip/route. Scanning METARs is something we're supposed to do, and should do, but this is an outstanding way to really SEE what those METARs are trying to tell us. The one time fee vs. subscription is welcome. I already have lots of subscription based apps, happy to pay for this once and be done.
Bad update
Piperperson
Well app no longer works on my ipad2. After last update march22 Crashes when trying to render the map.
Best app for quick visual VFR weather picture
N34FT RV-6A
All aspects are quick. Time slider gives unique and clear view of the day's flight conditions. New winds aloft altitude slider can't be beat for planing flight altitudes. Well thought out user interface and manual. Really quick way to get overview of upcoming weather for VFR flight.
Great App! Very powerful single & multi day planning tool
Jla629
Hi Tom, Finally had time to look at the program and it is very powerful! Wow, this will be useful as I am planning many cross country trips for this summer and in the future! Thanks so much. I will talk it up and show to all! Best Regards, Tom M.
