Category: PPL Training Page 3 of 6

According to FAA requirements, in order to obtain a Private Pilots License you need:

3 hours of night flight training in a single engine airplane, that includes at least:
a) 1 cross country flight of over 100 nm total distance; and
b) 10 T/O’s and 10 landings to a full stop with each involving a flight in the traffic pattern at an airport.

Today was a gorgeous day today and my next two flights are looking sketchy due to some incoming rain and maybe snow and ice.  So I texted my instructor to see if she had any openings in the afternoon after I got off of work.  She texted back, “Not unless you want to do some night flying”  I pondered this for a few minutes and get another text, “Do you have the night flying packet?”  I responded yes.  A few minutes later my phone buzzed, “What do you think?”  I thought about it for a minute or two and said  “I’m game, let’s do it!” A Night Flight, yay!

I think normally night flight is more organically scheduled.  Meaning, we are getting close to the end of training and we need to get it in.  I got the impression that this was kind of unexpected but why not.  From what I have read and heard from others, night flight is either cool or spooky.  There are some students who really don’t like flying at night and after their requirements are satisfied, never fly at night again.  Ever.  That had me a little concerned, excited…. maybe a little hungry.  It was dinner time after all.

When I get to the airfield, there is still plenty of light to pre-flight with ease.  I’m back in my favorite N4640B which I know all of the tendencies.  I go into the office and we discuss what is going to happen.  Sunset is at 5:25 and twilight ends at 5:55 which means that we can start logging night flight time. The goal was to complete two day takeoff and landings, and 4 night takeoff and full stop landings.  The overall plan is to do this sort of thing twice, which would get me to 8 takeoff and full stop landings.  Then we need to complete a night cross country which would give me the last 2 night takeoff and landings needed to satisfy the requirements for my check-ride.

We take off and there is a bit more wind then we would normally try to tackle during night flight training.  about 4-6 kts with about 3 of it crosswind.  We checked AWOS frequently and it kept saying calm but as soon as I lifted off the runway, I was in about a 20 degree crab to the right, so I don’t think the AWOS was giving a good representation.  The first two landings I performed a mediocre slip.  At least this time it was useful unlike last time.

The biggest skills we were working on was judgement and depth perception.  At night due to the way our eyes function, we are horrible at judging distances so we err on the side of too high when on our approach.  Better to use more runway than to hit something on approach because you’re too low.

I setup for the first night takeoff and it was pretty much like any other takeoff except I had pretty lights to track to make sure I stayed on runway heading.  The first landing was ok except for landing a little flat.  It is much harder to judge the flair at night.

The next three trips around the pattern were pretty serene and easy.  I even got a couple of “Nice Job” comments on my landings.  YAY!

Overall, I found night flying to be pretty serene and peaceful.  I will certainly fly at night after I get my license.  Usually, the air is pretty calm and not a whole lot of turbulence so I imagine it is really cool for a cross country trip.  I ended my flight with a new confidence in that I can tackle night flying but also I had some pretty decent slips that helped me out in that department. Can’t wait until my next flight.

Today, we had  a plan A of my 3rd solo which would sign me off to fly by myself.  However, since winds were higher than forecasted, we went with plan B, which was my first cross country solo to Richmond county airport (KRCZ).

The night before, I made a plan and filled out some way points and initial headings.  2 hours before the flight, I got the winds aloft and determined my wind correction and predicted ground speeds.  Having this, I also filled out the time for each leg of my trip and how much fuel that I would burn.

While I pre-flighted, my instructor went over my flight plan numbers.  Once completed, we went over the process for filing a flight plan.  I called up the briefer and filed for TTA-SDZ-RCZ-SDZ-TTA.

We head out to the airplane and go through the startup, runup, set radios.  Normally, I set the radios to CTAF and AWOS for TTA since I stay in the area.  Since we were going cross country, I changed the next frequency to flight services in order to open up my flight plan.

As we climbed to our altitude of 4500, I called flight service and opened up our flight plan.  After a few minutes of trying to get service to realize that it was 89433 not 69433, we were all squared.  Next I called up Fayetteville approach to request a flight following.  This went much better than last time as I have memorized the script.

The rest of the trip to RCZ was pretty boring.  I followed a power-line all the way to the SDZ VOR.  Kept speed and heading, while writing down times at each of my visual checkpoints. My landing at RCZ was pretty poor, and we floated a bit.  Sigh.

As we headed back to TTA, we were at an altitude with quite a bit more turbulence, 3500 ft msl.  Not a big deal but annoying trying to hold altitude.  The flight home was pretty uneventful but my landing at TTA was even worse than RCZ.  I did a half ass slip that did nothing for maintaining center line or glide-slope.  Sigh.  My instructor remarked to me, “After next solo I will sign you off and you can do landings to your hearts content.”

Next Flight, Plan A –  3rd Solo, Plan B – Hood work.  Hopefully the weather gets better than forecasted. Right now it sucks.

I promise I am going to add some more media to my posts.  I’m at a crazy point in training so it is hard to snap pictures in flight.  My instructor might throw my phone out of the window. 😀

“There is no sport equal to that which aviators enjoy while being carried through the air on great white wings.” – Wilbur Wright

As you guessed from the title or maybe not.  Today they let me take an airplane up by myself, again.  Second of three supervised solos!  Today was a little different from my first solo but I’ll get into that as we go through today’s adventure.

I arrived to cold temperatures and a pretty stiff 8 kt wind.  Luckily for me, it was straight down runway 3.  Today I was either going to go up for my second solo or we were going on a cross country trip to KRCZ.  The night before, I thoroughly planned for the cross country trip at the behest of my instructor.  Today, however, would not pose very good weather for travelling.  Ceilings were around 3500 ft and dropping.  Fantastic for pattern work though and with the wind right down the runway, there was minimal crosswind so 2nd solo it is!

We were nearly thwarted at the beginning of today’s flight by a cold airplane that did not really want to start.  Even though I had it on the engine heater before our attempts, it just didn’t want to start.  I asked one of the mechanics to come out and give us a hand and he was able to use a few tricks that got us up and running.

We take off and bounce around the pattern… literally, the wind made it pretty bumpy.  I make 3 pretty decent landings and then comes the question.  “Do you want to solo today or do something else?”  Do something else?  Something else?  Of course I want to solo!  Of course, I didn’t say that.  I indicated that I felt good to solo.  I understand why she asked, she didn’t want me to feel pressured into doing it.  So I dropped her off near Taxiway Alpha 1 and performed a run up.  Taxi’d to the hold short line for runway 3 and waited on two incoming aircraft… one on short final and another on base.

Once the runway was clear, I made the call  “Raleigh Exec, N89333 departing runway 3 left closed traffic, Raleigh Exec”  You have to read that in your inner pilot voice because I was totally using my pilot voice.

I lined up on the runway, heels to the floor and throttle in.  Green, green, green, airspeed alive and away we, err, I go.  Again like my first solo, this thing took off really fast and I was at 900 ft before the end of the runway.  The low density altitude caused by the cold air definitely helped but also less weight added up for a rocket of a ride.

First landing was pretty uneventful.  I did notice that the bumps around the pattern kept me on my toes.  No big deal though I did think to myself how during my first flight these kind of bumps did make me nervous.  Now, they are an annoyance.

Second time around the pattern was filled with more interesting events.  As I was climbing off the runway, I heard a garbled message about landing on runway 3.  I only saw the other plane that took off in front of me and was in the pattern.  I thought for a second it might have been them.  Either way, I went ahead and announced that I was on the departure leg of runway 3 staying in the pattern in case it was an unknown entity.  I turned crosswind and heard another call.  “Raleigh Exec, Cherokee is on a 6 mile final on the ILS for runway 3”.  Great, one in front of me, one probably coming in to cut him off and there may be a ghost somewhere in the pattern.  I make my radio call and turn downwind.  Then yet again, I hear “Raleigh Exec, Cessna 69012 is 3 miles for the 45 downwind for runway 3”  Welp, it is getting crowded real fast.  At this point I am being bumped around quite a bit and stabilizing on my downwind.  It was here that I thought to myself.  “Are you really doing this, you are alone with some chaos.  What do you do captain?”  It was then that I focused on what I needed to do.  Before landing checklist and constant scan.  By now the Cherokee declared missed and said would fly the missed approach.  The Cessna in front of me was turning final and then I notice to my right and about 300 ft low… that ghost Cessna.  Never did hear another radio call and put them out of my mind.  Sigh.  ” I made a radio call that I had the crossing Cessna and that I would extend my base.  At the same time I hear N69012 is now entered right behind me.  I extend my base and notice the Cessna in front of me is at a weird angle and way low for landing. They overshot center line on base leg and came back around to finally line up and land.  I turn base then final, going through my procedures.  I touch down nicely and it all turned out uneventful.  It did g

As I taxi’d back, my instructor asked if I wanted to go again or if I have had enough.  I make a quick assessment and it seems like the traffic is settling down so I said I want one more.

Third trip around the pattern was pretty uneventful.  I did notice that the windsock was blowing crosswind for a second so I did perform a crosswind takeoff.  By the time I turned final, the windsock was showing straight down the runway.

I taxi’d back for the last time with quite a feeling of accomplishment.  Later, I would comment to my instructor that this time felt more real because of the roughness of the air/wind and the crowded pattern.  It really felt like I was flying this time.  I was nervous for only a second as I thought how nervous I was on the first flight.  These feelings quickly vanished and I focused on what I needed to do.  After all, I got to fly and airplane today…. all by myself.  Again!

Got up nice and early and headed to the airfield.  Today would be the day that I will likely perform my supervised second solo.  I need 3 supervised solo’s in order to be released to fly to the practice area and practice in the pattern all by myself.

I arrived to some chilly weather.  It shouldn’t be shocking, it is January after all, but after the string of 60 to 70 degree days over the holidays it was a bit of a change.  I walked out to the aircraft and turned it around to face the sun.  There was quite a bit of frost on the wings and windshield so I needed to get that melted.

I did my normal preflight walk around with the only issue being the starboard green wing tip positioning light was out.  No big deal, not flying at night.  I make a mental note to squawk the issue once my flight is over with.

My instructor meets comes out to the airplane and I give her my weather brief and report on the airworthiness of our machine.

All strapped in, I go through the start checklist.

-Key in the mag switch, set to both

-Master Switch On

– Beacon light On

– Mixture Rich

– Throttle opened for start

– Prime as needed

– Key to start position

The dreaded sound of a weak battery instantly destroys our hopes and dreams of escaping the bonds of earth.  After a couple of more futile attempts, we could only hear the click of the starter without so much wiggle in the prop.

It was a busy Saturday, so no other aircraft was available which meant I would not be flying.  Have to look at the bright side, I got to sit in an airplane. 😀

Lots of rain and some holiday travel had me grounded for nearly two weeks.  It doesn’t take long for a student pilot to get some rust and it was quite evident today. It was nice to get back in the air for new years day.

We started out with a plan and a backup plan.  Plan A, I was going to solo for my second time.  I need 3 supervised solos before they will allow me to fly solo to the practice area.  Plan B was to do some hood work.

After two laps around the pattern we talked over how I felt and I felt pretty good for soloing but the winds had picked up and the crosswind was now at the upper limit that solo students are allowed to fly so we opted for plan B.  Except, my instructor left the foggles in her office so we came up with plan C… Round Robin KTTA – KSCR – KTTA.  This will be one of the first trips that I go on during my solo adventures so it would be a useful trip.  I would also get fuel for the first time since that will definitely be useful during my solo trips.

We took off and headed toward Siler City.  My first duh moment came when I needed to transition to cruise, I started to pull the throttle before pitching and accelerating.  I caught myself but not before my instructor busted me.  Then I carefully flew over the powerline track that I would follow and made my turn west late and started tracking the wrong road.  Ugh.  I know better than this.  After that, it was pretty smooth the rest of the way.  I made all of the right radio calls at the correct distances.  Entered the pattern and landed on Runway 4 at KSCR.

We taxied up to the 100LL fuel pumps and had an airport employee walk me through the details on filling up.  No real tricks here but since I have never done this before, it was a good lesson.

Back in the Cessna, I back taxi to runway 4, perform a run up and away we go.

The rest of the trip back was pretty uneventful. I followed the correct road and made my calls before entering the pattern.  A little excitement when I was on the 45 degree entry, there was a radio call over the airport from another plane entering the pattern at our altitude.  I quickly performed a left 360 until the other plane  obtained visual, said I was no factor.  Still good for spacing and good practice.

I entered the downwind as second for landing.  The landing was one of the crappiest that I have ever completed.  Landed a little sideways and on the wrong wheel for the wind condition.  This could have been a disaster if a wind gust picked up.  I wasn’t really that bad but I felt like crap.

We went around the pattern for one more.  This time I fought the wind and didn’t really slip correctly and I felt my instructor put us into a slip.  My confidence was in the toilet so we went ahead and called it a day.  It was 1.7 hours and I could really tell the rust was there.  I flew safely today but definitely not very elegant.

I’ll be back in the sky tomorrow, so we will see how I do.  Plan A, try for my second supervised solo.  If not, Plan B, hood work.

**Full disclosure, I completely ripped this off the source is unknown. I thought it was cool none the less**

Merry Christmas everyone!

Twas the night before Christmas, and out on the ramp,
Not an airplane was stirring, not even a Champ.
The aircraft were fastened to tiedowns with care,
In hopes that come morning, they all would be there.
The fuel trucks were nestled, all snug in their spots,
With gusts from two-forty at 39 knots.
I slumped at the fuel desk, now finally caught up,
And settled down comfortably, resting my butt.
When the radio lit up with noise and with chatter,
I turned up the scanner to see what was the matter.
A voice clearly heard over static and snow,
Called for clearance to land at the airport below.
He barked his transmission so lively and quick,
I’d have sworn that the call sign he used was “St. Nick”.
I ran to the panel to turn up the lights,
The better to welcome this magical flight.
He called his position, no room for denial,
“St. Nicholas One, turnin’ left onto final.”
And what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a Rutan-built sleigh, with eight Rotax Reindeer!
With vectors to final, down the glideslope he came,
As he passed all fixes, he called them by name:
“Now Ringo! Now Tolga! Now Trini and Bacun!
On Comet! On Cupid!” What pills was he takin’?
While controllers were sittin’, and scratchin’ their head,
They phoned to my office, and I heard it with dread,
The message they left was both urgent and dour:
“When Santa pulls in, have him please call the tower.”
He landed like silk, with the sled runners sparking,
Then I heard “Left at Charlie,” and “Taxi to parking.”
He slowed to a taxi, turned off of three-oh
And stopped on the ramp with a “Ho, ho-ho-ho…”
He stepped out of the sleigh, but before he could talk,
I ran out to meet him with my best set of chocks.
His red helmet and goggles were covered with frost
And his beard was all blackened from Reindeer exhaust.
His breath smelled like peppermint, gone slightly stale,
And he puffed on a pipe, but he didn’t inhale.
His cheeks were all rosy and jiggled like jelly,
His boots were as black as a cropduster’s belly.
He was chubby and plump, in his suit of bright red,
And he asked me to “fill it, with hundred low-lead.”
He came dashing in from the snow-covered pump,
I knew he was anxious for drainin’ the sump.
I spoke not a word, but went straight to my work,
And I filled up the sleigh, but I spilled like a jerk.
He came out of the restroom, and sighed in relief,
Then he picked up a phone for a Flight Service brief.
And I thought as he silently scribed in his log,
These reindeer could land in an eighth-mile fog.
He completed his pre-flight, from the front to the rear,
Then he put on his headset, and I heard him yell, “Clear!”
And laying a finger on his push-to-talk,
He called up the tower for clearance and squawk.
“Take taxiway Charlie, the southbound direction,
Turn right three-two-zero at pilot’s discretion”
He sped down the runway, the best of the best,
“Your traffic’s a Grumman, inbound from the west.”
Then I heard him proclaim, as he climbed through the night,
“Merry Christmas to all! I have traffic in sight.”

-Unknown

“Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air… .

Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.”

— John Gillespie Magee, Jr

Today was the day and it couldn’t have been better.  Calm winds and clear skies for the entire state.  I knew going in that if I performed well that I would be soloing today.  In the lead up I have watched many youtube videos and read countless accounts of others solo experience.  The accounts spanned the spectrum from terrified to casual.  I have to say that for me it was on the casual end of the spectrum.

Last night as I was falling asleep, my thoughts turned to what it would be like with no one in the right seat to save my from some unexpected brain fart.  It was then that I noticed that I don’t have the butterflies or nervousness that I was expecting.  Surely this was going to happen, the weather projections were calling for perfect weather.  I drifted into bliss and woke up refreshed and ready to go.

During the drive I revisited the idea of being alone but my thoughts wandered more to the procedures and radio calls.  I did have some butterflies but now more than usual.  These butterflies are normally reserved for the excitement of getting to fly a plane.

As I arrived, the airplane was attached to an engine block heater and wings tilted toward the sun.  It was just below freezing and we had some frost.  It seems my instructor wanted to take no chances and made sure that we had the best opportunity to fly today.

Everything was normal 0n run up.  We took off on runway 21 and started our journey around the pattern.  The first two trips, I came in too high and performed go arounds.  We discussed the different site picture in this particular airplane and I commented on the plane really wanting to fly today.  I adjusted my settings and site picture for the low density altitude, and made a nice landing.  The next time around the pattern, was the same and made a nice landing.  As we go up again we discuss certain things about what I am doing and then…. “You lost your engine”.  I go through my mnemonic for failed engine and get us safely to the runway.

“You think you’re ready?”  I replied, “Yeah, I do”

“Then drop me off at the next taxiway.”

She signs my logbook and instructs me to to full stop landings with a run up before each take off.  Each time I land she will ask me if I am good for another.  I am finally doing it!

As I taxi to runway 21, I still didn’t have butterflies.  I was excited but it really seemed routine.  I perform a run up and wait for landing traffic and traffic on Base.

Here we go!.  I make my radio call and lineup on Rwy 21, do my heading checks, heels to the floor, throttle in.  Green, green, green, airspeed alive… woah, I am off the ground.  I was at crosswind altitude before the end of the runway.  This thing climbs crazy fast when alone.  I go around the pattern making my radio calls and hitting my numbers.  First landing was decent… floated a little but I was expecting that.

I stop next to my instructor as I leave the runway.  “You want to go again?”  I replied, “Oh yeah, that was fun!”.  Off I go.

I take off again, noticing how fast I am climbing… like a rocket ship.  This time  as I approach crosswind turn, I hear a call, “Cessna 69012 is going to cross midfield for downwind runway 21, I have the departing traffic in site.”  hmm.

As I call my crosswind I let the traffic know that I do not have them in site.  At this point, I hear my instructor on the radio.  He is right over my head. I see the traffic and respond.  I really thought as I was taking off he would have followed me in on downwind.  I extended my down wind a bit for separation and made a good landing.  Though I was right on my airspeeds, I floated more this time. hmm.

As I pulled off, my instructor asked me if I wanted another, of course my response was yes!  The then voice her opinion on the radio about me being cut off in the pattern.  As I started my taxi, I got the AWOS and notice the wind had picked up in the other direction.  That is why I floated so much.  I called my instructor on the radio and told her the winds had shifted.  She had me do a 180 and come pick her up.  At this point we had a lot of traffic lining up and I decided that I was good and we headed back to the south ramp to start the ritual.

It feels good. Not nearly as scary as I imagined when I first started.  It was very serene. I think this is because of the excellent training that I have received and the confidence that I have gained over time.  I now have .5 hours of PIC in my log book and it feels great.  Not only did I get to fly a plane, but they let me fly it by myself!

So after many days of reschedule due to personal issues or weather, today I finally got airborne with the chief flight instructor for the pre-solo checkout.  Basically this is a ride to make sure that I have fundamentals down and am safe.  There were quite a few things about this ride. I would be quizzed on aircraft systems, club rules, aerodynamics… a wide range of things.  I was a bit nervous but once we got started everything went fine.

Adding to my trepidation was the fact that the aircraft that I would be flying was the only 152 in the fleet that I have not flown before.  Not a huge deal but definitely weighed on my mind.  I pre-flighted as normal and everything checked out.  Once finished, I headed in to grab our Chief.

As we walked out he said we would walk around the aircraft and go over a few things.  I knew that this meant the quiz.  I am pretty mechanically inclined and I geek out on these sort of things so I figured I would be fine but I studied none the less.  Sure enough, he asked me about parts of my pre-flight, more specifically the engine compartment.  “So, what is it that you are looking for?”  I go through each step, alternator belt, general inspection of the engine for rodent nests, check the flywheel, prop, spinner.  “What are you looking at the engine for?”  I explain that I generally look at the push rod covers, around the head gaskets looking for anything shiny that could be a leak.  He seemed pleased with the answers.  He then put me through the paces on the alternator.  “What would be the symptoms of an alternator failure and what would you do to try and remedy?”  I’m boring you aren’t I?  I’ll skip it and just say, my answers were satisfactory and we got in the plane to go fly.

I go through the startup process… this particular plane was hard to start but after 4 tries, I got it rolling.  Went through the motions… taxi’d to run-up, then to Runway 3.  “Go ahead and let’s do a couple of landings then we’ll head out to the practice area”.  Righto!  I make the pertinent radio call, position on the runway then showtime.

I had about a 6kt wind 30 degrees off to my right which translated into a slight crosswind.  Not a big deal but I fought the airplane on center line.  As I lifted off I had to do a bit of a crab, more so than I expected.  I think I had a strong wind than I anticipated.  Some bumps around the pattern made me nervous about my landing.  I focused on hitting my numbers around the pattern, talking all the way through it and the landing turned out fine.  I bit of a bump but not too bad.  “You can either full stop or touch and go… your choice.”  My choice was full stop since my normal instructor normally helps me clean up the plane for the touch and go and I have never done it myself. So I erred on the side of what I know.

As we taxi’d back, I asked for feedback and it was really good, no real constructive criticism.  “You did really well, let’s just head out to the practice area”.

I make the calls, lineup, throttle up and away we go.

“Once you get all settled, let’s do some steep turns”.  I get us to 3000 ft, enter cruise flight.  I perform a clearing turn to the right and line up on the best visual marker in the area, the Sharon Harris Nuclear power plant.  I get set stable, garbage in garbage out and then set out to tackle my nemesis maneuver.  I flight the right hand steep turn with very minimal loss of altitude.  I then setup for the left hand steep turn and perform it with about 20 ft of lost altitude.  Not bad, maybe I am getting them figured out.

“Go ahead and give me some slow flight”.  I inquire to clean or dirty and airspeed and he responds… your choice.  So I inform him that I am going to do 60kts clean.  He nods and I begin my setup.  Carb heat on, reduce power to slow down, pitch for 60 kts.  As I reach 60 kts I start to apply throttle to maintain speed and altitude.  I pretty much nailed it. YAY.

“Give me a turn in slow flight”.  I have the aircraft trimmed out nicely and begin a slow right hand turn 360 degrees.  “Nicely done”

“Ok, go ahead and give me slow flight dirty”.  I go ahead and add full flaps and prepare to push in the throttle to maintain altitude with all of the drag that I just added.  The Chief inquires as to why I gave it throttle and we talk through angle of attack and the relation of speed to pitch and throttle for altitude.  He seems pleased with my answers.

“Let’s do a power off stall”.  I inquire to configuration and again he responds that it is my choice.  Since I am already dirty, I tell him that I will do it dirty.  I pull the throttle back and slowly add back pressure and as my special stall instructor taught me, once close to the stall, I pull back to make it break.  As it breaks, I push in the throttle and recover.  “Nicely Done”  Yay!.

“Now give me a departure stall”.  I clean up the airplane and get us configured for takeoff speed of 65 kts and climbing.  I pull back to bleed off speed and again near the stall, pull back to the stop to get the break.  As before, I add throttle and recover.

“Let’s do a departure turning stall”  Same thing as before except I am in a shallow left turn.  I go through the same steps and recover.

At this point he is pleased with what he is seeing and we talk about spirals and secondary stalls.  He shows me some pretty gnarly secondary stalls and recovery techniques.  A lot of these my regular instructor tries to avoid.  It was good to go through the motions so I know what they feel like and how to recover.

“OK, let’s go ahead and head back to the airfield at around 4000 ft and we will do an engine out and we will be done” Spiral down engine out!!!! I like these.

I setup and when I got to downwind, he made the radio call and I pulled my own throttle…. that was weird but whatever.  I talked through the ABCDE for engine out and set out on my spiral down over runway 3.  Once I hit about 2000 ft.  I decided not to circle one last time fearing that I may get too low.  I sort of felt him out on the subject and he said “Do whatever you think”  I erred on the side of altitude and  started my down wind.  As I turned base I was high so I dropped full flaps and made my turn to final.  It was kind of beautiful, I was on a perfect glide ride down to the numbers, flared, floated and dropped down on the runway flat as a pancake.  “Crap, I didn’t have the nose nearly as high as I needed.”  He responded, “Yeah it was a little flat but you recognized your fault”

As we taxi’d back we talked over some of the maneuvers and I got a lot of positive feedback.  Not a whole lot of negative, he seemed quite pleased with my ability to handle the aircraft.  He even commented that if I was on my check ride today, My performance would have easily passed.  Double Yay!  I am not going to get a big head because I know I have a lot to learn but it was a real confidence boost today.  I also got to know someone with a ton of experience and hopefully started a friendship.

I saw my normal flight instructor in passing and she didn’t even ask how it went.  Just said “Make sure he signs your training card and your log book”  I responded, “What if I failed?”  “Oh please, get him to sign it.”  I am starting to think that she knew I would do well.  As she heads out to take a student for their first flight she says “I wouldn’t have sent you if I didn’t already know the outcome.  Stick with me kid, and I will take you places.”  I smiled and she bounded away with her new student.  I really do have a good flight instructor and so far, this has been a great experience.

I just got a text from her, it reads “Time to start wearing white shirts. :)”  I feel completely ready because of the great instructors that I have.  Can’t wait!

My flight was supposed to be with the Chief Flight Instructor for my pre-solo check but as life tends to happen, we had to postpone until early next week.

Since I had the plane anyway, my instructor and I moved up a planned short cross country from TTA to SOP.  It doesn’t qualify as a true cross country so I don’t get credit for it but it had all of the planning that goes into a real cross country.  Baby steps so to speak.  A lot of new things on this flight so as usual when new things are introduced… I am behind the airplane.

We started out by filling out a navigation logs starting with my abysmal attempt that I rushed together before the flight.  I had a few waypoints picked out and my instructor supplemented those with a few more obvious  checkpoints.  I tended to pick things that were not that easy to see from the air.  I am told it gets better with experience.

After calculating the wind drift, groundspeed, Magnetic variation, magnetic deviation and fuel burn we were ready.  As you may or may not be aware, magnetic north isn’t exactly located where true north is located.  So following a compass wont get you to the North Pole, that is why Santa must use other means just like we do to calculate it.  In our area it is around 8ºW.  Which means there is 8º between the true north direction and the magnetic north direction, this is called Magnetic Variation.  We account for this when we point our compass in a direction that we determine on a chart.  Okay, I am sure that you are bored… back to the flight.

We take off and climb to 2500 feet and I start following the checkpoints along with the SDZ VOR.  Then I make my first radio call ever to ATC.

“Fayetteville Approach, Cessna 4640 Bravo”

-Cessna Fayetteville, Go ahead

“Fayetteville Approach, 4640 Bravo is Cessna 152 Slant Uniform, off TTA en route to SOP Via SDZ VOR at 2500, request Flight Following”

-Cessna 4640 Bravo squawk 1270 and ident

“Squawking 1270 ident”

-Cessna 4640 Bravo is 8 miles southwest of TTA, report any altitude change

“Roger will report, 4640 Bravo”

I totally had a script that my instructor was holding up but I think I sounded pretty plausible.  I am learning to work my pilot voice.

While I was reading my script, I lost the power lines that I was tracking visually to the VOR.  And after wobbling back and forth trying to get the VOR lined up I realized that my directional gyro had precessed so I kept tracking the wrong heading… it made sense.  I made the comment to my instructor that ATC must know that I am a newb with me wobbling back and forth.  She replied, “You are holding your altitude well and that is what they care about”

The rest of the trip was pretty mundane, she quizzed me on landmarks and where we were on the chart.  I landed at SOP with a thud.  It has a much wider runway so I flared higher than I should have.  Not my most graceful by any stretch.  We perform a touch and go due to time and head back toward the SDZ VOR.  I contact Fayetteville approach again for a flight following back to TTA.  This time I followed the power lines all the way home and it tracked the VOR right down the middle.  Like magic.

We came in on the base leg for runway 3 at TTA and taxi’d back to a beautiful sunset over the clubhouse.  I felt like I was behind the airplane but I think I did ok considering my first time.  Like everything, practice makes perfect, I am sure it will soon become natural.

Next Flight with the Chief Flight Instructor.  I swear.

…. Probably

Today I got a text a couple of hours before my flight from my instructor that said “Plz 0lants round robin screen today”.  After a minute or two of puzzling at this, I got another “Oops.. please plan a round robin to Siler City today (stupid phone)”  This one made more sense.  I broke out my chart and drew a line from KTTA to KSCR and got a heading and calculated the magnetic heading.  I also picked out some nice visual waypoints to use in case we were going by strict pilotage.  There is a sweet power line that runs parallel to 64 west and I can basically sit right between the two all the way to KSCR.

I preflighted one of our aircraft that has more than average squawks and I added another one to the list but we will get to that one later. Squawk for the un-initiated is a term used to describe issues seen with an aircraft so that other pilots and the Mechanics to see.

After I finished the pre flight we sat down to discuss the flight.  My instructor said, “I see you have a nice line connecting Raleigh Exec to Siler City but we are going to use Pilotage today.”  Yes! I planned for that.  After showing her my pilotage plan, she nodded and we headed out to start off on our adventure.  She told me that today, I would navigate and make all of the radio calls.  Which is a good thing because the bird we are flying has a Squawk that the co pilot side push to talk is inoperable.  I figured this flight was more about seeing if I could make it to Siler City and back safely if I were solo.

I took off and made the radio calls to leave the pattern.  I also advised the other training flights in the area that I would be paralleling 64 west to Siler City at 2500.  It was pretty quiet along the way so I looked for landmarks on my chart and pulled up Siler City so I could get the AWOS and CTAF frequencies.  While messing around I noticed I lost about 250 ft of altitude… ugh… sloppy.  I re-trimmed  and kept an eye on it the rest of the flight.  Nothing too exciting other than conflicting radio calls to which runway was in use, I setup and other than being a little high… the landing was ok.  Just ok.  We taxied to the end and decided to take off in the other direction since it seemed the traffic has all left and that was the runway the wind favored.  I perform a before takeoff and position on the runway.

“Runway heading looks good, heels to the floor, throttle up.  Engine is green, green, green.  Airspeed is……… airspeed is…..  airspeed is not alive, aborting takeoff.”  I pulled back the throttle made sure I had control and slowed down to the end of the runway where we pulled off and pondered the issue.  In our club, we have pitot covers that cover the pitot tube but sit on a hinge.  There is a tab on the top that catches the airflow and flips the cover up exposing the pitot tube to the air.  We figured that for some reason, this thing didn’t come up.  We decided on one more takeoff attempt before shutting down to figure it out.

We line up and I go through the calls this time, airspeed is alive so we continue the take off.  I proceed to pilot us back to KTTA using the same landmarks as coming back.  This time the power lines to the right and 64 E on my left.  On the way back I was very cognizant of the altitude and kept us right at 2500 ft.  6 miles out I made a position call, 3 miles out my final position call before entering the pattern.  Entered the pattern, base, final and touchdown.  A little to the right of center, ugh.  Not my best landing day but serviceable.

As we taxi back my only feedback was blowing the altitude by 250 ft while fiddling with my stuff.  And also that in my 10 mile radio call I didn’t ask for traffic advisories.  Not a huge deal but good habit to get situational awareness.

Once we got back, I tied the airplane down and added a few things to the aircraft squawk book.  One about the airspeed inop instance and the other was that the flaps were very slow to move and made a loud humming sound.  It was the first time that I have entered a squawk.

Overall, I felt pretty good about the flight and felt comfortable with the whole process.  My next flight will be with the Chief Flight Instructor to perform my pre-solo check.  Fingers crossed!