Page 16 - Jan21T&T

or incidents, you’ll write a check for about $5k for your annual premium to ensure $750k worth of airplane. The same coverage in a Meridian will cost you north of $12k. There’ll be differences in premium with age, experience, flight time and other variables, but plan on insurance for the Meridian to be more expensive.
I think the Meridian is a vastly bet- ter icing platform. Wing deice boots beat weeping wings any day. The deice f luid is messy, detracts from useful load, and deice fluid can be consumed to a point of exhaustion in flight. The Meridian has a more robust icing platform along with the ability to climb to the higher flight levels, which is often too cold for air- frame icing to occur. Plus, the ad- ditional raw power of the Meridian provides a good escape mechanism. If I’m in icing in any airplane, I want an exit strategy and lots of additional thrust to give me options. Although the Cirrus is a FIKI airplane, the Me- ridian is far more robust.
Mission & Training
Even though the Meridian has two more seats, rarely will the Meridian operate with more than four people onboard. The useful load of the Merid- ian with full fuel is only about three to four people and bags (depending upon the size of the occupants), so it should be construed by a buyer to be an “easy four-place airplane” and an “occasional six-person airplane.”
The Cirrus SR22T-G6 will also carry the four people and bags, but like the Meridian, it will not carry that load with full fuel. But, with the low fuel burn provided by lean-of- peak (LOP) operations, a little bit of fuel goes a long way. A Cirrus SR22T will carry two mid-sized adults and bags and full fuel, but if you want to carry more people, you’ll swap fuel to keep the takeoff weight under con- trol. And, though the Meridian will burn more fuel, it goes much faster and jet fuel is cheaper to operate. Even so, the fuel costs in the Meridian
will be more, but it does more with that fuel burn. Speed is addictive, and the Meridian has lots more speed.
You might want to go for a Cirrus SR22T-G6 if 80 percent of your mis- sions are of shorter duration. It is no secret (but few owners seem to be able to grasp the fact) that speed translates into big differences on long trips but is inconsequential on the short trips. If you fly a 150 nm trip, the Cirrus will more than likely show up only a few minutes later than the Meridian. And, the Meridian will gobble the fuel on what will probably be a low altitude flight. I’ve got a Cirrus client in Texas who owns car dealerships around the state, most being within 200 nm of her home airport. She’s considered upgrading to a Meridian, but the Cirrus does such a good job on those short trips that it just doesn’t make sense to up- grade, even though she could afford the upgrade easily.
Concerning training, the Merid- ian will require more days and more
14 • TWIN & TURBINE / January 2021
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