The following story was submitted by a Garmin® 95XL owner. His letter is just one of many Garmin receives from customers who believe their lives have been saved by GPS technology. He also suggests procedures for other pilots to follow in the event they experience related problems with their aircraft.

I owe my life to your Garmin 95XL. In April of 1995, I was flying IMC in light rime icing conditions in my recently acquired Cessna Pressurized 210 at 16,000 msl on an IFR flight from Klamath Falls, Oregon to Bellingham, Washington. My P-210 is certified for flight in "known icing conditions."

The first indication of trouble came halfway into the flight when ATC indicated they were not getting my altitude readout from the encoding altimeter/transponder. I recycled it, turned it off and back on--all to no avail. Shortly thereafter, the ADF needle began to wander aimlessly, indicating it was not working.

Now my navigation instruments were also beginning to behave erratically. I kept ATC informed of each step of deterioration. The next thing I knew--the panel blinked a couple of times--loud static filled my earphones and eerie silence followed. Every electrically powered device in the airplane had shut down in the blink of an eye.

I flipped on the seven-amp standby generator--it too failed to bring back to life any of the avionics or panel instruments. What was I to do?

I had no way to talk to anyone. No way to get guidance or help. I felt the dread panic of the perishing for one fleeting moment. In the dark clouds, even the magnetic compass was practically unreadable--and with the light turbulence, it oscillated erratically plus or minus 15 or 20 degrees--which for all practical purposes made it of no value.

Thank God for the vacuum-driven artificial horizon. I had that and my yoke-mounted Garmin 95XL with its beautiful little moving map display running off the AA battery pack. That was it! Everything else I depended on for situational awareness and survival had been robbed from me in one dread moment of electrical system failure.

What should one do in such a moment? I was determined to fly the airplane--I could do that with the artificial horizon--but how would I ever descend 16,000 feet in IMC, find the airport, and land safely.

Here is how that little jewel replaced the $45,000 worth of avionics gear sitting dark in my cockpit--all of it reduced to the worth of a dead flashlight battery. Read carefully. This might save your life someday.

1. I had preloaded my trip so the course line was drawn on the moving map. By all means pilots, always do that.
   
   
2. I set the scale on the map to one mile resolution. I could detect deviations from heading within sec- onds by noticing the departure of the little airplane from course line. That became my compass. It worked as good as my now-inoperative HSI. A slight turn left or right would put me (pardon the expression) dead center--back on course. I later found that I could do as well at five-mile resolution and "see" further ahead.
   
   
3. I always plan my flights so the last 60 miles or more are on a Victor airway. That way I know (from my Jepp charts) the Minimum Descent Altitude that will guarantee clearance of all obstructions.
   
   
4. Within 60 miles of Bellingham, the MDA was 5,000 feet on the Victor airway. My 95XL told me how far I was from Bellingham, so I knew when I could safely descend to 5,000 feet for the approach.
   
   
5. I have an MDM (now Jeppesen®) simulator. I always fly the approach several times before a trip into an airport I do not use regularly. This is an enormous help in "programming" one's mind for the actual event and the sequence one needs to follow. This proved to be a great "stress-reliever" while descend- ing. On the way down, I was able to work out how I would fly the approach with only the moving map.
   
   

As it turned out, the angels were with me. As I leveled at 5,000 feet, I saw the Bellingham airport coming up on the GPS map. I instinctively looked out and down, and to my amazement--a large VFR hole opened up below me. I immediately turned on the master switch in the hope the battery had recovered enough to get my gear down. I cycled the gear and sure enough--down it came, accelerating my descent out of the clouds in a spiraling course to the runway.

Minutes later I was on the ground--trembling at the thought. "What if I had not made that investment in my Garmin GPS?" I knew the answer. There is little chance I would have lived to tell about it. With the high variable winds aloft blowing me sideways; with high mountains below me, with clouds, turbulence and uncertain ceilings and the panic one fights at such a time--there is little chance I could have navigated a couple hundred miles by dead reckoning to a place of safe descent and still been alive.

Thank you Garmin for the greatest invention since airplanes! I owe my life to your Garmin GPS 95XL with the moving map and battery backup. I wouldn't fly without it. Neither should any pilot who wants to stay alive.

(Author's name withheld by request)

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