Isolated thunderstorms are easily visible ûwhen flying above a summer haze level. This ûanvil cloud was 30 miles away.

Against the soothing background clatter of the flight service briefer’s keyboard, one question you’d rather not hear: “Do you have weather radar aboard?” To use the metaphor of the hour, we don’t need to have the dots connected for us. What the question implies is, “You’re gonna need it.”

Yet very few pilots flying serious IFR have weather radar, especially in singles, where it doesn’t work especially well anyway. Even the radar found in light twins is of limited utility due to the narrow beam width of the small-diameter antennas piston twins typically have. …