Going down to Boca today with everyone’s favorite single-engine turboprop! While I do a decent amount of flying from Nashville, very little of it is with general aviation aircraft, owing to a lack of variety and comparatively fee popular GA airports being in 3D until recently. While Boca Raton has been in 3D for some time now, I haven’t flown into there in almost two years, so I reckon I’m overdue for a visit. Hope y’all enjoy this as much as I did!
Server: Solo
Operator: Private
Aircraft: Daher TBM 930
Origin: Nashville International Airport, Nashville, Tennessee (BNA)
Destination: Boca Raton Airport, Boca Raton, Florida (BCT)
Callsign: N930TS
Route: KBNA-KBCT
Seat: N/A
Time En Route: 2 Hours 45 Minutes
Walking to our aircraft on the Signature Aviation ramp in Nashville. Our TBM is painted in an attractive, three-tone pearlescent silver-black-sea blue scheme that gives it a ramp presence far in excess of its physical size. Looking forward to a nice flight down to Florida today.
Taxiing to Runway 20C for takeoff. Due to Runways 02L/20R and 13/31 having construction done on them, only 02/20C and 02R/20L are in use. Tower currently has us third in line for departure behind a pair of Southwest Airlines 737 MAX 8s.
Bye-bye, BNA! Even with a relatively heavy load for our aircraft, the combination of our 850-horsepower Pratt and Whitney Canada PT6A-66D engine and 5-bladed Hartzell propeller gets us airborne relatively quickly. Of course, pushing the power lever up to full doesn’t hurt, either.
We’re cleared direct to 23,000 feet as we climb near Murfreesboro, south of Nashville. If there’s one thing the TBM family is good at, it’s climbing. Even with our calculated load of 93 percent of our maximum takeoff weight, we’re easily able to maintain a 2,000 feet per minute climb rate.
After heading east towards the Cumberland Plateau, we’re turning south towards the Georgia line over Crossville. The TBM is a rare breed, a hot performer that’s easy to fly and does so economically, partially owing to its Roy LoPresti-designed ancestor, the Mooney 301. Intended to be built in conjunction between the Kerrville-based general aviation manufacturer long renowned for building fast airplanes (Al Mooney is alleged to have claimed that he could get 1 mile per hour per horsepower oit of an airplane, and the company did that with the Mooney M20J) and Tarbes-based SOCATA. As a matter of fact, the letters “TBM” are often said to stand for “Tarbes-Built Mooney”. However, the 301 was a victim of both the 1980s general aviation downturn and the fact that it was rubbing against the practical limits for a 360-horsepower Lycoming TIO-540 while being 200 pounds too heavy. Faced with financial troubles, Mooney pulled out, leaving SOCATA to proceed with a larger, turboprop-powered version of the 301 that the two companies had developed, the TBM 700. Fast-forward to today and over 1,000 TBMs of various models have been built, with the current version being the TBM 960. All in all, it’s about the fastest single-engine private aircraft on the market this side of a Cirrus SF50, and it’s a whole lot less expensive to own and operate, too.
Humming along comfortably at FL230 under the clouds a couple thousand feet or so above us over South Georgia. As we near the Valdosta area, we’re getting to listen to a pair of A-10C Thunderbolt IIs of the 74th Fighter Squadron doing pattern work at nearby Moody Air Force Base. Center just told us that if we were down here about half an hour ago, we would have gotten to see a couple of Navy Super Hornets from Oceana going home after a SHOOTEX down in Key West. They flew into Valdosta Regional Airport, gassed up at the FBO, and got cleared for a low transition and unrestricted climb to 35,000 feet.
On our final approach into Boca Raton. Given how short BCT’s runway is, we’re having to be absolutely spot-on with our approach speed and we had better not be above the glideslope. We can only imagine what it’s like for guys driving large-cabin business jets into here.
Ah, the sound of a PT6A going into beta pitch! We’re arriving at BCT after a little under three hours of flying. Touchdown was good, but we had a bit of a hard time staying on the centerline due to (a) the runway being wet from a passing rainstorm a couple hours ago, and (b) the wake from a Dreamline Aviation Falcon 900 registered as N192RS and operating as DLX192 arriving from Scottsdale, Arizona closing back in. In any case, 192 Romeo Sierra has a sick-looking tangerine orange-royal blue/purple-white paintjob, and we let its crew know that. They were kind enough to thank us.
Taxiing along beside the runway with the lights of another Falcon 900 on final, N562BC, arriving from Kansas City Downtown Airport, in the distance. Is this “National Get Out and Fly Your Falcon 900 Day”? Not that we’re complaining. Always good to see one of these French trijets out and about.
Looking back at our aircraft on the Signature Aviation ramp through the fenceline. Feels good to be back in the left seat. The TBM is a fun little aircraft to fly and we’ll be trying to get more flights with this little rocket of an airplane in in the future.