Between the time I received my license and I earned my instrument rating, I made several nighttime runs from Tuscaloosa to Sylacauga, AL. SCD is about 60 nautical miles due east of TCL with no real traffic in between, so it was great for earning that cross-country time.
One autumn night in 1994, I loaded up with a couple of friends in 20823, a Cessna 172 which is painted a "Kermit-the-Frog" green (duly named "Kermit" by many of us). It was already full dark by the time we took off. A typical smooth flight was expected for the trip to SCD and back.
Roughly 30 minutes into the trip, the Loran readout began acting up. It reported we were over 200 miles from TCL at this point. Although I thought this a bit odd, I didn't really worry about it a whole lot on this severe clear night. We touched down at SCD a few minutes later, taxied off the runway, and returned to the hold-short line. Then the fun started.
"Sylacauga traffic, Cessna 20823 taxiing onto runway 9 for west depature, Sylacauga," I said. But the transmit light on the radio never came on. I pressed the button again, but no dice. So I reached over to the copilot's yoke, found the button there to allow transmission, and repeated the announcement. I suddenly realized what was going on: my battery power was getting low. There wasn't a soul at Sylacauga's airfield that time of night, so I elected to try and get home.
After we were airborne and headed back to the west, I heard this odd pulsing sound through the headphones. "Do you hear that?" I asked. My passengers told me they could also hear the sound. As we leveled off at 4500 feet, I noticed the Loran was acting even stranger so I turned it off. The radios were pulsing louder and louder, however.
It became obvious to me that one of two things was about to happen: either I could kill the master switch and attempt to turn it back on as we neared TCL, or everything would switch off soon anyway due to lack of juice. I explained to my passengers what I was about to do, that it wouldn't affect our engine so don't worry, and so forth. It was suggested maybe I should call Birmingham for assistance or try to land there, but I was stubborn and a little embarrassed.
I killed the master, and all was silent except for the whirring of the engine. We flew this way for about 5 minutes before I couldn't stand it anymore and tried to fire it back up. Fortunately, turning the master back on apparently did the trick. The panel cheerfully lit up, the pulsing sound from the radios was gone, and we were once again visible to radar as well as the naked eye.
I knew the FBO normally shut down at 10 pm, at it was already nearing 9:45 when I was 40 miles out, so I called TCL UNICOM (the tower closes at 8pm daily) and informed the person who answered of my situation. He advised to let him know when I was 10 miles out if possible. When that time came, he went outside and waited to catch sight of us. Upon spotting us, he informed me to kill my lights, turn everything but the radios off, and let him call my turns. At this point, I would have agreed to anything.
I lined up for a standard approach to runway 22, listening to him announce my legs. The landing was without incident, I thanked the lineman profusely, and vowed to never be as unbelievably stupid as I had been again.