Lesson 57 - A Little Night Flying

 

After my previous lesson, my instructor texted me, "hey, how 'bout a night flight next? It's supposed to be warm." I looked at the long range forecast, and while Monday was indeed going to be warm, it was also going to be windy due to a system moving through. I suggested moving our Thursday lesson to the evening since I happened to have the day off from work that day. It wasn't going to be warm, but the winds looked reasonable. We scheduled for 5pm, with being the middle of December was well after sunset. 

It was a bit chilly, so my instructor and I tag-teamed the preflight inspection in order to get through things just a bit faster. Fortunately, the plane was parked right under the only light pole on this end of the field, so we could see what we were doing. We were quick, but thorough. I often read stories of folks rushing through their preflight inspections in the cold and at night, but we still made sure we didn't forget anything, except remembering that I had gloves in my pocket. 

We took off and headed south because I wanted to get away from the city lights for a bit. Flying at night is "easy" when flying over the city because the lights give you a good sense of a horizon. Flying in the middle of nowhere takes that visual cue away and I wanted to experience that. I got more than I bargained for. We picked up Parker Road, which is our typical route south to the practice areas. Not that we were going to be doing and ground reference stuff at night, but it was an easy landmark to follow into the darkness. Before too long, I noticed that my view forward had gotten very dark, indeed. That's to be expected, as there's not a whole lot out there. Still, I should have been able to see some lights somewhere. I glanced down at the ground beneath us. Recent snows still laid on the ground so I had a bit more definition on the ground than I may have had without it, but something still seemed a bit off. I glanced at my wingtips. The strobes were picking up moderate snow. Apparently there was a line of snow showers to the south of town, and I had just flown into them. We weren't in the clouds because I could still see below me, but we were enough into the thick of the snow where visibility was quite compromised.

My first thought was to do a coordinated "standard rate" 180 turn and head north. We were flying into IMC (instrument meteorological conditions), and that's what you're supposed to do in that situation if you're not IFR rated. I'm not. My instructor is, however, and he seized upon the opportunity. "Give me a steep 360 to the right." A what??? We're flying in IMC and you want me to do a steep turn? But--hey--he wants to walk away from this flight as much as I do, so he wouldn't have me do anything to put us at risk. Okay, I don't have reference outside the window, so look at the heading indicator, not which way I'm flying, rock the wings to 45 degrees, hold altitude, watch the heading indicator and attitude indicator, and make a 360. About halfway through the turn, I see hints of lights sweeping by out of the window, though not necessarily in the direction I thought they should be. I checked my instruments and I was where I should be. No sooner had I finished that turn, my instructor had me do another steep turn to the left. Same thing. Watch my heading and attitude indicators, don't lose altitude, and--again--about halfway through, I caught hints of city lights sweeping through the window. And--again--not in the direction I thought they should be. But my instruments were exactly where they needed to be for the maneuver. 

"So, what'd you think?" he asked me. It wasn't scary or unnerving. I've flown steep turns and I've flown without being able to see out the window, so it wasn't anything particularly unusual. However, the disconnect between what my instruments were showing and what I thought I saw out the window was quite sobering. It was a quick (and powerful) introduction to spatial disorientation at night. The lights play tricks on you. Trust your instruments. We flew around a bit more in the almost complete darkness looking down for hints of roads or cars on them, and then by GPS to get us headed back to the airport to do some landings. 

You would think an airport beacon would be easy to spot. After all, that's why airports have beacons--so planes can easily spot the airfield. By now we had flown far enough north to where we were out of the weather, so we had a good view of the city lights underneath and ahead of us. Could either of us find that stinking beacon? Nope. I found a dark area which I presumed to be Hess reservoir, then found the power lines that cross south of the field and then flew that direction because I knew I could find the runway from there, even without seeing the airport beacon. I called the tower, they cleared us to land. 

Prior to flying this flight, I had spent some time on my simulator doing night landings. I wanted to give myself a sense of what to expect. No, the sim isn't exactly like the real thing, but I figured it would point out things I'd want to pay attention to. The biggest issue I had on the simulator was keeping the centerline lined up. Also, a lack of peripheral vision as a reference for when to time my round-out and flare. I found in the real world, with depth perception to help out, keeping things lined up on centerline was easier than on the sim. Still not easy, because you only have lights on the edge of the runway to help, but easier than on the sim. Not having that peripheral vision to the side to time your round-out and flare, though, that got me every time. We did four landings at this point, and I flared too high on each and every one, causing me to lose airspeed and stall just a bit higher than I wanted to over the runway. "Smooth" was not part of the equation. After our forth landing, I decided I just wanted to fly and enjoy the lights of the city, so I asked the tower for a departure to the west, which they gave me. Once headed west, I handed the controls over to my instructor, pulled out my camera, and started taking pictures. It was a few days before Christmas, and all the neighborhoods were lit up. It was pretty cool. 

Completely unrelated to flying, it took me a bit to get the settings on my camera set to where I could get clean, well-exposed photos. I found that even with a good zoom lens, we were simply too high to get the neighborhood lights in any detail, so I just stuck to wide city shots. I also learned my iPhone takes much better night pictures than my old Canon DSLR. Go figure. 

After I took a handful of pictures, I took the controls and brought us back to the airport for one last landing. This time, I was going to hold just a little bit longer to try to time my round-out and flare just a bit better. I lined up, held things off until the last moment, rounded out, and THUD! I landed flat on all three wheels. Better than landing on the nose wheel first, but maybe I over-compensated just a bit. 

I've got one more required night flight, and it has to be 100 miles minimum. I also need 5 more night landings, so my instructor suggested an idea for our next night flight, a tour of a lot of local airports. I'm not sure when we'll get that scheduled, but I'm looking forward to it. 

Lesson 56 - Brush Up your Crosswind

 

After my previous lesson, I wanted to continue to work on my instrument flying, and also if practical, work on my crosswind landings. At this point, every lesson should check off more and more of the requirements for my final check ride. Get those out of the way, then just polish the skills that need polishing (like landings). Then I'll be ready for my final exam, so to speak. I checked the weather when I woke up, which had the winds at 7 knots out of the west. That was perfect for working on crosswind landings. By the time left for the airport, the winds had picked up a bit. By "a bit," I mean 14 gusting to 20, and still out of the west. If I were flying solo, that would be a hard "no go" at that point. The club rules dictate a maximum crosswind of 8 knots, and I'm more than fine with that. 

I sat down with my instructor, half expecting to come to the conclusion that the winds were crap and we wouldn't fly today. Nope. Today I was flying with my secondary instructor who likes his students to really know how to handle crosswinds. The 8-knot rule is for student solo, not for students flying with instructors, and he saw this as a perfect opportunity. Gusty crosswinds, but still within the minimums for the plane itself. I couldn't come up with a reason not to have a go, because it's definitely something that makes sense to learn with an instructor sitting next to you. We figured we'd do a little navigation work under the hood and then see if ATC would let us do some touch-and-goes before calling it a day.

We got in the plane and got the latest weather, which indicated the winds had calmed down just a bit, now down to 10 knots gusting to around 17. We decided to switch things around and see if we could do touch-and-goes first since 10 gusting to 17 was preferable to 14 gusting to 20. ATC obliged, and we were soon up in the pattern setting up for crosswind landings.

I've written about this in the past. I've drilled crosswind landings in the past. Today, they kicked my butt. I was fighting the wind today. Part of it stemmed from my instructor having me fly these without setting any flaps, so my approach speeds were faster than I had done in the past. The challenge there is that instead of using the flaps to create drag to slow down, you pitch the nose of the plane up a bit higher to slow down. When you do that, you become a bigger target for the wind. The gusts were also more unpredictable than just a stable crosswind, so my adjustments were not as good as I wanted. Add to that I had a tendency on round-out to want to level the wings, which is not what you want to do in a crosswind situation. Still, I pushed through four crosswind landings, in which I did manage to set the plane down on the runway more-or-less in line with it, but definitely not on center. It was, however, a significant crosswind, so while I won't say I did good, I won't say I did horrible, either. Definitely something I will work on again (and again) as conditions allow. My fifth attempt at landing resulted in a go-around because ATC had me do a short approach which left me too high. I slipped down to the proper altitude, but I was too fast and unstable for comfort so I waved off. We then departed to the east for some instrument work.

Today, I wanted to work on dialing in and tracking VOR navigation signals. I knew I could do better than my last time up, and wanted to prove to myself that I actually did know how to do it. I was back under the hood instead of using foggles because that's what the desk had available. I much prefer foggles. The hood kept sliding down, causing me to have to crane my neck up a bit to see the instruments. But that's neither here nor there. I felt I did better today with things, but I don't think I was quite as task-saturated, either. I still need to get better at dialing in VOR and GPS information in small spurts so not to take my attention away from keeping the plane on course. That comes with familiarization with the navigation electronics on the plane, which I'm just now starting to play with. 

I tracked the VOR signal out to a small private airfield, arriving about a mile south of it, which in the grand scheme of things is pretty good. I switched to GPS navigation and followed that back to the airport. Along the way, my instructor told me to close my eyes while he put the plane in what pilots call an "unusual attitude." This is where the instructor (or examiner) takes the controls, puts the plane in a steep climb, bank, dive, or otherwise not ideal situation and says "fix it." You've got to quickly assess the attitude of your plane and the steps needed to correct it. Nose down too much, you've got to raise it. Nose up to high, you've got to lower it. Watch your airspeed. Level the wings. Work your way back to your course and altitude. I will admit this was fun, and I corrected us with relative ease. 

When the GPS showed me about 10 miles out from the airport, I called the tower, took off the hood, and flew the approach visually. By now the winds had shifted direction so they were coming more or less out of the north. Yay! No more crosswind!!! I set us down on the runway with comparative ease to my earlier crosswind endeavors, to the point where my instructor later called that landing "pretty much perfect." Coming from him, that's high praise indeed. When he says that about my crosswind landings, I know I'll be ready for my check ride. 

Lesson 55 - Where Am I???

With the first solo out of the way, I'm actually coming down the home stretch. That's not to say I'm going to be finished tomorrow by any means, but now it's just a matter of planning the lessons so they start checking off the required components needed for my final check ride. Those include night flights, 10 hours of solo time, and "cross country" flights, both with an instructor and by myself. Also included in that requirement is that I fly at least 3 hours in simulated (or actual) instrument flying conditions. We decided today would be a good day to work on that.

I prepped the plane, we took off, and once I reached cruising altitude, my instructor pulled out the "foggles," and had me put them on. Foggles are essentially clear glasses with the top half of the lenses fogged over so you can't see anything but a blur of light through them. The bottom is clear so you can see your instruments. These are different from the hood I wore my first time, which is essentially an oversized golf visor. The foggles have the advantage of letting light through, which does a better job of simulating flying in the clouds where you're still surrounded by light, but you just can't see anything through it. 

I remembered from my first time flying by instruments that I was over-controlling the plane. I was turning too steep and climbing too fast, so I overshot everything. I worked the simulator a bit between then and now, and trained myself to make smaller adjustments. This paid off. My instructor had me climbing and descending, and also turning left and right. These I did with relative ease this time. Smaller control movements meant I didn't overshoot. 

Next, my instructor had me climb and turn at the same time. This is not quite "rub your belly and pat your head," but it still required a fair amount of concentration. I did okay with this early on in the process, but when my instructor had me making a series of turns and climbs in succession, I started to lose my bearings and began missing my targets. Now, some instructors would see this and maybe dial it back a bit to get me back in my comfort zone. Nope. Instead, he decided to layer VOR navigation into the mix, since when flying by instruments, this is one of the tools a pilot would be using to navigate. 

I have practiced VOR navigation on my simulator, and I tracked a VOR radial my last time under the hood, so this wasn't necessarily new to me. What was new was having it layered in with not being able to see anything but my instruments, and having to tune in the frequencies and radials while maintaining flight based solely on the instruments. This meant for a student pilot who is relatively inexperienced with this workflow, spending an inordinate amount of time looking at the radios and VOR gauge, drawing one's attention away from the other gauges, particularly the attitude indicator which is really the best visual reference you have to what the plane is doing. You can't see outside, so there's no horizon in your periphery that can guide you. Combine that with having to track this radial, then that radial, then turn and fly towards the VOR station and a whole lot of other more-or-less unfamiliar (and certainly unpracticed) maneuvers, and things went sideways fast. 

"You don't know where you are or what you're doing, do you?"

Yeah, that's a pretty fair assessment at this point. I had no concept of which way the plane was pointed. Yes, the heading indicator showed 90 degrees (east) but my mind simply couldn't picture which way that was. I was utterly confused. My altitude control was suffering mightily as well. At least I knew which way was up, but I was just having a hard time keeping level flight. 

You often hear about "spatial disorientation" when pilots fly in the clouds. Pilots get into those circumstances and simply don't believe their instruments. I experienced that today. It's not pleasant. It's easy to see how so many pilots crash their planes in cloudy/foggy conditions. I'm not gonna lie, it rattled me. Not to the point of being afraid or incapable of continuing, but because of how quickly task saturation set in and got me to that point. 

This was drinking from the firehose again. I've had a small handful of lessons like this; lessons where I'm pushed well past my comfort zone. We then dissect things and work on the various skills that come into play in that scenario. After I got thoroughly disoriented, my instructor had me take the foggles off. Since it was the addition of VOR navigation and me trying to wrap my head around that which seemed to be the tipping point, we worked on VOR navigation where I could see out the window. I'm not confused by it, but it's not yet second nature. That will come with time and practice, and when it becomes more second nature, it will be easier to incorporate it into the workflow when I can't see out the window. 

We returned back to the airport, where I flew a pretty decent approach, but we had a fairly significant crosswind which I struggled to keep up with. Not sure why, because I knew it was there. I just didn't do a good job at all of dealing with it. Something else to work on. 

The race is on...

Teaching students to fly is the most common way for pilots working their way to the airlines to build the requisite time required, which is 1,500 total hours. Well, my instructor hit that magic number and is headed to the airlines on March 10th. So, the race is on. Can I get through all my requirements and be ready for my check ride before he leaves? Time will tell. 

Lesson 54 - First Solo

 

A student pilot's first solo is arguably the most significant milestone in one's journey to becoming a pilot, or at least one that does not involve passing the FAA's check ride. It is the first time you're truly on your own. There's no safety net of an instructor sitting next to you. Either you know it, or you figure it out really quickly. The student's first solo is in most cases the student flying a few circles in the patten with the instructor who then hops out and sending the student back into the pattern for a few more landings on his/her own. While it's usually a big deal on the emotional front, from a practical standpoint, it's a very simple outing. You basically never leave the airport. With my stage check out of the way two weeks previous, I just needed a day with sunny skies and calm winds to do my first solo. Last week was too windy. I checked the airport forecast for Wednesday. It looked good. Alright, I'm going to knock this one out. 

Except, they closed the parallel runway at Centennial. Don't know why, but that means no pattern work, so no solo at Centennial. I arrived at the airport not knowing if there was a plan B, or if we were just going to have to do something else. My instructor said we'd instead head out to Spaceport instead, because the winds, while higher than at Centennial, were still within minimums. I prepped the plane and we took off to the east. Once in the air, I contacted Spaceport. Their pattern was full. What's more, the winds had kicked up beyond the club limits for student solos, so that wasn't an option. My instructor checked his phone and says the winds are calm down in Colorado Springs. We turned south. At this point, I still don't know if I'm actually going to solo, but I figured we's see where this went. We call Denver Departure for flight following down to the Springs, and set the VOR to navigate to the airport. 

We arrive in Colorado Springs and land on the east runway (17 left). The approach to this runway took me directly over my in-laws' houses, which was cool. This runway is 150' wide and 13,000 long, so it would have been next to impossible to miss it. Still, my instructor was (rightly so) being a stickler for hitting the centerline. Between the glare from the noontime sun and the skid marks from landing jets, the centerline was difficult to make out, but that's a poor excuse. Centerline tracking is important. At this point, I wasn't sure if I was blowing my chance at soloing or not. On my forth touch-and-go, my instructor called the tower to inquire about landing to let him off. They had us fly and land on the west runway (17 right) so I could drop him off. After the gratuitous "first solo" photo of the empty seat next to me and my instructor on the tarmac taking my picture, I throttled up and headed back out to the taxiway. This was it. 

The plan was to do three or four landings, then pick up my instructor and head back north. Colorado Springs' traffic control is a bit different than Centennial in that the ground controller does not hand you off to the tower. You follow the ground controller's instructions up to the hold-short line on the runway, then you switch over to tower frequency and let them know you're ready. Nothing I couldn't handle, but a reminder that I didn't have the "home field advantage." I took off, having to confirm with the tower that they wanted me in a right pattern because I knew I asked, but I wasn't sure I remembered the answer. Nerves. I told them I was a student solo, and they said no worries. 

My first landing was pretty smooth. Not perfect, but on center and on speed. I lifted off again. On my next approach, I was following another student pilot from one of the bigger schools. They were doing a full stop landing, and decided to take their own sweet time getting off the runway. They were still on the runway when I was approaching the threshold, so ATC told me to sidestep to the right and go around. Kinda figured that was going to happen. Had I realized they were full stop when I was on my downwind, I would have extended to give them a bit more time, but oh well. Go-arounds happen, and that's why we practice them. My third landing was my worst of the day. For some reason, I floated down the runway in ground effect for what seemed like forever. I was at 65 knots and not slowing down or going down. I jiggled the throttle thinking maybe it wasn't at full idle. Maybe that was it, but whatever it was, I lost that last bit of airspeed and bounced on the runway before I was ready. On the second bounce, I decided that was enough of that nonsense, stuffed the throttle back to full and started climbing back out. My fourth landing, butter. Absolute butter. I was almost bummed that I was solo on that one because it was definitely worthy of sharing with someone. 

We flew back to Centennial, where ironically my instructor handled the landing because there was a corporate jet landing right behind us so we needed to do a high-speed approach. I know the theory, and goodness knows I've accidentally arrived at the runway threshold at 95 knots at more than a few points in my training, but the resulting landings were abysmal. I was happy to be along for the ride on this one, studying the steps so I can practice them later without a jet riding my rear end. Once on the ground and back in the terminal, I had a very brief moment for the ceremonial shirt tail cutting and photo with my instructor, but we were at this point already an hour late for his next student, who--thankfully--was in the same plane, and very patient.

Take-aways of the day. First, I did it. Not that I was worried, but I did it. That by itself is an achievement. Second, things went wrong (as they will) and I handled them well. ATC said "go around," and I was able to calmly do that. I bounced a landing, recognized the danger, and recovered for the go-around. And I re-grouped after that and absolutely nailed my last landing. Lastly, though completely unplanned and rather impromptu, I think flying down to Colorado Springs added something to the day. It made it a bigger event than just flying three loops in the pattern at the home field. I soloed at an airport I had never been to before. I don't know how big a deal that really is, but to me, it showed that I can enter an unfamiliar airspace and handle it quite well even under a bit of pressure. 

There seems to be two schools of thought on when student pilots solo. Some believe a student should learn how to land right out of the gate, thus get to solo stage between 10 and 20 hours, under the theory that soloing will sharpen those skills as the student pilot sorts things out for themselves. The other (the one embraced by my school) is that students should have a fairly firm grasp of many aspects of flying, including unusual circumstances prior to being given the keys to the sky. I think the former style puts the student in a "sink or swim" environment. Certainly the instructor has faith the student will do well enough or they wouldn't have signed off on it. But does the student? Yet, perhaps a student who completes his or her solo facing a lot of personal apprehension finds an amplified sense of accomplishment having completed the solo despite that apprehension, an "I didn't think I could, but I did!" mindset. There is something particularly rewarding there. 

When looking at my experience through that lens, my solo may be seen as somewhat anticlimactic. There was no "I didn't think I could" aspect of things. I knew I could. And I found the experience every bit as much of an accomplishment. For me, the solo wasn't so much a test as it was a graduation of sorts. A milestone for certain, but mile 20, and a chance to realize the importance of miles 1 through 19. As an added bonus, the flight to and from Colorado Springs provided a cool preview of the next 20 miles. 

Lesson 53 - Pre-solo Stage Check

 

Once my instructor put me in for my stage check, I got paired with another instructor from the school to fly with me and sign off that I was indeed ready to be turned loose on my own. A "second opinion" of sorts which needs to be done by someone who does not fly regularly with the student. This instructor/examiner called me to schedule a time to go. I had a plane booked the following week which matched his availability, so we agreed to meet then. After getting off the phone, I looked at the long range weather forecast. Beautiful weather every day except the day we scheduled. But you can't do anything about the weather, and neither of our schedules allowed sliding things one way or another. We figured we'd take our chances and see what happens. 

That day came, and so did the snow. No flying today. However, we agreed to take care of the written and oral portions of the process since both of us were free. The "written" test is a sheet of 40 questions which ask about airport operations, frequencies used, basic questions about the plane, club rules for flying as a student, etc. I had filled this out early on in my training, so this was more review than anything else. Aside from a few questions whose wording was a bit ambiguous, these were questions that if you couldn't answer after your first 10 lessons, you weren't paying attention. 

The oral portion was more in-depth, a good, though basic warm-up for the oral part of the final check ride. I had previously sat down with my instructor to go through a mock oral where he noted things I needed to brush up on, and I had taken that to heart. I met my examiner, and we essentially had a casual conversation for a few hours about flying, covering all the basic acronyms for required equipment and procedures (ARROW, ATOMATOFLAMES, NWKRAFT) and the like. We talked through some "what if..." scenarios and looked at what would need to have with me when the weather cooperated and we got up in the air. I did well on the oral, though I definitely need to remember those acronyms better. (Even as I type this, I'm trying to remember some of the letters.) 

The practical day would have to wait a bit, as I was going to be on vacation the following week. I had a plane booked two days the week I was to be back from vacation, and it worked out that my examiner would be available the second of those two days. I figured that would give me a "warm-up" day prior to the practical. I liked that idea as it would have been three weeks since my last flight and I was nervous about being a bit rusty, especially when you combine that with general nerves of being tested on things. Well, that "practice" day with my instructor arrived on 30 knot wind gusts, so nope. No flying. I would go into the stage check cold. But--hey--if I "need" a warm-up day to get back in the groove, am I really ready to fly by myself? Probably not. I hit the simulator pretty hard all week to keep fresh on procedures and flows. 

Friday arrived on the heels of an overnight snowfall. I got to the field to find the sun had melted most of the snow off of the plane already, but the side that was in the shade was still icy. (Typical Colorado.) My examiner met me, we spun the plane 180 degrees so the sun could melt the ice off the other side while we talked about preflight stuff and what we wanted to do. (As an aside, one advantage to flying low-wing aircraft--much easier to de-ice the wings.) I could feel the nerves today, not so much about the practical flying, but all the little details I knew I was bound to forget. At this stage check, they're not looking for perfection, just proficiency and safety. It's a progress report. 

We hopped in, started the plane (after my examiner reminded me to push the primer pump handle all the way in. Nerves), and headed out. The winds were calm so we took off on runway 10, which got us headed southeast towards the practice area. I got us down there without any trouble though I gained 200' of altitude when I was supposed to stay at 7500'. Again--nerves. My practice area radio calls were shockingly smooth. I normally get tongue-tied with those though I can talk to ATC all day long. 

We started with slow flight and stalls. I forgot to do my initial clearing turns which I knew I was going to forget. That will be my third sticky-note for my final check ride. "Left," "Right," "Clearing Turns." Those went well, though I didn't realize on power-off stalls there was supposed to be a limit of how much altitude you lose at the start. I always just pulled power, pointed the nose down for about 75 knots, counted to three, then pulled up. I lost about 300' doing that while my examiner was looking for less than 100' loss. Not a dealbreaker, just a lesson to me to make sure I'm aware of what the parameters are of any maneuver I'm being tested on. 

We did some steep turns, which while not required for this stage are always fun. These weren't as smooth as I would have liked, not for lack of mastery of the skill, but because in both cases my nerves got to me and I forgot to note the heading I started at, instead just relying on what I saw out the window, which I noted after I had started the turn. Naturally I overshot on both. That, and apparently my definition of "steep" and my examiner's definition were not the same. I was flying around 45 degrees of bank, he was looking for 60 degrees. Something to work on. We cleaned up from that process and did a simulated emergency landing. Fortunately there was a convenient field off my left wing, and it was easy to set up an approach and landing. Once I got lined up to where landing would be assured, I did a (fairly textbook) go-around, then headed back to the field for some touch-and-go landings.

If I could have started the day with landings, my nerves may have been a bit calmer through this process. Landings were what held up this process to begin with, and while I was more-or-less confident in them, I still had that little bit of uncomfortable doubt. This was (literally) where the rubber meets the runway and if I botched the landings, it was back to the drawing board. I would have much preferred to get the "hard stuff" out of the way first so I knew if I passed that the rest would be easy. Instead, we saved them for last (which made the most sense from a practical standpoint), and I flew with this little nugget of apprehension hanging in the back of my mind much of the time.

Our first approach was a straight-in approach. For whatever reason, I prefer straight-in approaches. Maybe it's because I don't have to worry about turns in the process and have a better gauge to how high or low I am. Despite the straight-in approach, I still ended up just a touch high on short final, but I adjusted and managed to land pretty much where I intended. I uttered a celebratory "YES!" on touching down, but immediately wondered if my examiner interpreted that as "holy crap, I actually did it." I figured I had a few more chances to prove it wasn't an anomaly.

Once I hit that first landing, I knew that monkey was officially off my back and I could relax a bit. We did three more landings in the pattern. I tended to be high on all of them, but that's typical for me. It's rare that I fly a "normal" 3-degree glide slope. Being above the normal glide slope is particularly common when I'm landing on runway 35 where the terrain rises to the south of the field and I'm very hesitant to loose any altitude on the downwind. CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) tends to result in a hard "fail" on stage checks. On the plus side, I dropped us into a slip to get us back on glide slope on one approach, which the examiner noted with "ooh, nice slip." Overall, my landings were pretty solid. My airspeed control was where it needed to be, and a lack of any kind of crosswind (phew!) made landing on the centerline of the runway (within a few feet) pretty easy. 

Our fourth landing would be our final one. The stage check was over (save for tying the plane down). I did it. It wasn't perfect. Flying seldom is, even for seasoned veterans. It was good enough to show that I can fly and land safely by myself. The examiner praised certain aspects and pointed out areas where there is lots of room for improvement. But--most importantly--I passed. I'm officially cleared to fly a plane solo, and move onto the next phase of my training. From here on out, it's not about learning how to fly a plane, it's about learning how to fly a plane well and for a given purpose. I'm not going to say the hard part is done, but my confidence has definitely been given a nice boost. 

Now, I hope for VFR conditions with little wind on a day when I have the plane booked. That's proving to be hard to come by lately. 

Lessons 51 and 52 - Crosswind Control

I was still flying pretty high when I showed up at the field for this lesson. I had flown 6 takeoffs and landings without my primary instructor doing anything the previous day, and he put me in for my pre-solo stage check. I was pretty stoked. Today's lesson was with my secondary instructor. He tends to be a bit more picky than my primary instructor, and I was admittedly a bit worried that I'd totally botch things up. I told him my primary instructor had put me in for stage check, so he suggested we go out and brush up on maneuvers then do some touch-and-goes in preparation for that. Sounded reasonable to me. 

My maneuvers were fine, though I was definitely rusty on steep turns. I hadn't done maneuvers by themselves as an exercise in a while, but in reality I had been doing them every time I flew in the pattern. We just didn't specifically call them "ground reference maneuvers," and the biggest mental roadblock seemed to be getting into them from straight-and-level. We also did some power-on stalls, which I had not done in forever (and--thankfully--have not done during pattern work). The Grumman can get quite nose-high before it stalls, which for a mere 150hp engine surprised me. 

After a short bit of that, we headed back to Centennial for touch-and-goes. My landings today were not as smooth as the previous day. That last few feet kept throwing me sideways and I'd be trying to correct and lose sight of my airspeed. They weren't "bad" landings, but after the previous day, I was hoping they'd be smoother. Midway through, ATC changed the direction of flow on the runways. Ordinarily, they'll just have us extend and loop around. This time, they kicked everyone out of the airspace for 10 minutes while they made this change. We flew west and did some more ground reference maneuvers while waiting for them to change runways. We came back, flew a few more touch-and-goes, and--still--things weren't where I wanted them to be. Off just that little bit to be annoying.

It wasn't until after we tied down that it dawned on me as to why. Crosswinds. They didn't enter my mind. I wasn't compensating for them. They were definitely there as evidenced by ATC changing runway directions midway through our lesson because they were shifting. But for whatever reason, my mind just totally ignored the crosswind component of landings because the wind speed wasn't all that high. Dumb. Totally dumb. Totally correctable, but that would have to wait until the next lesson. The day previous, the wind was pretty much straight down the runway so I didn't have to think about it. Of course, that's not the right attitude either. I should always be thinking about it, just that my compensation for it needs to adjust based on how much of a crosswind there is. Again--lesson learned. Always figure a crosswind component. 

Crosswind Landings, take 2:

A week later, my secondary instructor and I were back at it again. After my previous lesson, my instructor and I decided that I should work on better crosswind control, and today's winds favored this well. We decided to fly down to Meadow Lake, which is a small field just north of Colorado Springs. This would be a narrower runway, only 60' wide, so I'd have a smaller target to hit. The winds were gusty and out of the northeast, so I'd have a fairly significant crosswind component to contend with, about 6 to 8 knots we figured. I was a little unsure about the narrower runway, but my instructor had faith in me. Given that after our first few lessons together I was worried he thought I was hopeless, his faith that I could hit a 60' wide runway with a fairly hefty crosswind definitely boosted my confidence. 

It's about a 25 minute flight from Centennial to Meadow Lake, so I decided not to waste that time just looking at the scenery. Rather, I suggested we do just the opposite--put me "under the hood" and have me fly down there based solely on the instruments. You need 3 hours simulated instrument flying to qualify for your private license, so I figured this was a good chance to get my feet wet. We took off, got to cruise altitude, and I put on the "hood" which is essentially an oversized golf visor which shields your eyes from what's outside the window. "This'll be duck soup!" I thought. Just dial in the VOR frequency and track it. How hard could that possibly be? 

Yeah, I ain't ever made duck soup, so I don't really know if it's easy or not. This was a whole lot harder than it looks on paper. My ability to hold altitude and heading based solely on instruments made my first time taxiing a plane using rudder pedals look straight-up sober. Here's the thing. Airplane instruments are slow to respond to what's going on. They tell you what the plane was doing a few seconds ago. Some, like the vertical speed indicator are particularly laggy. When you're flying solely by the instruments, you have to make very small, very slow changes so the gauges can keep up with what you're doing. I didn't do that. I was flying "normally." When I'd turn to a given heading, I'd stop when the heading indicator showed I was there, but really I was about 5 - 10 degrees past it because it was lagging behind just that much. So I'd turn back the other way and get 5 - 10 degrees off the opposite direction. Same for altitude. Somehow, in spite of myself, I managed to get us to where we wanted to be to set up a visual approach to Meadow Lake. I was reassured after our flight that this was perfectly normal for a student's first time flying by instruments. I'm looking forward (pardon the pun) to my next time under the hood. 

Anyway, we turned west towards Meadow Lake. This is an untowered airport, so there's no air traffic controller telling us where to fly. You basically announce your position and intentions at various stages in the process and hope other planes in the area are listening and staying the heck out of your way. It's similar to what we do in our practice areas, except in this case we're taking off and landing, not just flying in literal circles in the sky. 

The purpose of this exercise was to get me used to compensating for crosswinds in landings. I've written in the past, ailerons into the wind, a bit of opposite rudder to keep the nose aligned with the runway. I've done it to varying degrees and with varying degrees of success in the past, but this was the first time I was dedicating a lesson specifically to somewhat crosswind correction. I have set up crosswind scenarios on my simulator to help with this, so even in practice this isn't a foreign concept. It's just that I have to work on the mental memory to remember to take it into account. To be truthful, I surprised myself at how well I did. I asked my instructor how much he was assisting, he said "not much." Given my experience with him on previous lessons where I felt like I was fighting him on the controls, I rarely (ever?) felt any control input on his part when getting things lined up for the runway. I felt pretty good about that.

In retrospect, however, I realize there was still plenty of room for improvement. When looking back on the tracks of my patterns, one thing is obvious. I did a pretty decent job of compensating for the crosswind on the final approach to the runway. That final approach is one of four legs of a good traffic pattern. My crosswind compensation on the other three left a whole lot to be desired. On the downwind leg, I'd be letting myself get blown sideways closer to the runway. This would shorten my base leg and I'd either overshoot or be too high making that turn to final because I hadn't given myself enough time to descend on the base leg. Same thing on the upwind leg. Once off the ground after landing, I'd be blown sideways and struggle to stay lined up with runway centerline. 

The solution to all of this is to pick a point on the ground that you can use to reference your traffic pattern points and fly to them, compensating for the wind while in the air. This was my first time flying to this airport, so I'm not going to beat myself up too much for not being familiar with it, but it's definitely something you want to make mental checks to do. 

We did a half dozen or so touch-and-goes, then decided to call it a day and head back home. We did a simulated emergency engine out on the way, then decided that was enough teaching for one day. The air was smooth and the sun was shining. It was a good chance to just fly for the sake of flying--a reminder of why it is I'm doing this. It's good to have those moments in the air where you can just sit back, relax, take it all in, and realize how unique this experience is.

Lessons 44 through 50 - "You Think You Can Do This By Yourself?"

Okay, it's been a while since I've posted an update. To be honest, a lot of that has to do with not knowing what to write. It's not for lack of material, mind you. It's because these past 7 lessons have had some of the highest highs and lowest lows I've experienced in this journey. They're definitely worth talking about and I've been wanting to do it. Alas, it's human nature to dwell on the negative, and after leaving some of these lessons not thinking I was fit to fly a kite, the old adage "if you can't say nothin' nice, don't say anything at all" kept popping into my head. I didn't want this blog to become my vent, so I'd hold off until the next lesson when I could build upon the weaknesses exposed in the previous one. Sometimes that would be the next day or two, so it felt natural to want to group both together. But I'd not get to writing that post, then another frustrating day in the air, and the cycle repeats. 

I wrote in an earlier post about the importance of seeing weaknesses as challenges, not setbacks. As frustrated as I was leaving the field after some of these lessons--as much as I wanted to scream and vent to the universe--I stepped up my game the next time out. Incrementally, things improved. I felt more and more confident. Things were starting to come together. My landings started out over this period of time ranging from "well, nothing broke" to "could be better." By the 6th lesson, they were ranging between "marginally passable" to "hey, not bad!" Still not quite as consistent as I would like, but the trend was definitely moving in the right direction and both of my instructors seemed pleased with my progress.

When you talk to pilots who have "mastered" landings, many will tell you "one day, it just clicks." I don't know if I buy that. "It just clicks" implies that there's just something magical that happens; that all of a sudden a wand is waved and bingo, you can land. I wish. For me, it's been a long road of flying, analyzing, finding key weaknesses, correcting them, and just continuing to gradually fine-tune everything until the pieces more-or-less fall into place. Here are some of the things I really focused in on in the past few months.

First (and I've written about this in my previous post) airspeed. You have to maintain airspeed. A stable approach makes this much easier to accomplish and that's the standard you should shoot for whenever possible. Know what those speeds are, get there, and stay there. Having said that, you're not always going to have the luxury of a stable approach. There are times when you'll have to land short or come in hot. What you need to get good at is not so much maintaining your airspeed, but having absolute control over your airspeed through the entire process; being able to get it to exactly where you need it to be at critical moments (i.e., right at the threshold). You owe it to yourself to know how to correct being 90 knots on base and still make a solid landing. It's energy management. You're going to be correcting those mistakes in the process of learning how to land. Pay attention to how you're correcting those mistakes because knowing how to correct them teaches you how to control the plane.

Watch your instructor land. Pay attention to speed and attitude. They won't be perfect textbook landings, but your instructor will be ahead of the plane the whole way. They'll be fast and they'll pitch up to bleed off that excess airspeed such that you won't really notice they're doing it. They'll be high, but they'll go into a forward slip to drop airspeed and altitude. Learn the stable approach. Learn how to correct an unstable approach. Both are important. But most of all, do not get behind the plane. If you find yourself playing catch-up, just go around. 

Coordinated flight. I really didn't know how much this was impacting things until my secondary instructor pointed it out to me. "Keep the ball centered." That was a broken record our first few lessons together. Coordinated flight means the plane has much less drag through the air and can operate more efficiently. It's also much less dangerous in slow flight where you're teetering near stall speed. Part of that may have stemmed from the fact that I switched airframes about the same time I picked up my second instructor, so there were differences in how the Grumman reacted that I wasn't as quick at picking up. Whatever the reason, the broken record approach to beating this concept into my head worked. After a few lessons, my instructor quipped that he didn't have to keep reminding me because it had become part of my routine flying. 

The final five feet are critical, so don't lose focus. Fly the plane to the tie-down. Crosswinds will blow you side to side until your wheels are on the runway. At the same time, you can't let yourself get so concerned with maintaining centerline that you forget to watch your airspeed. If you're floating sideways when you reach stall speed, you're going to set down with something of a thud and put a side load on the landing gear. If you're a foot above the deck and not exactly on centerline, don't get too fussy. If there's runway beneath you and the nose is pointed to the opposite end, you'll probably be good. Let it settle and roll. 

Trust your gut. I have two instructors who have different perspectives and procedures on things. I had one lesson with my primary instructor where I was landing okay because I was trusting my instinct to keep the nose pointed down just a second longer than my brain wanted me to. He remained quiet for the most part, letting me work out things on my own. On my next lesson, my other instructor would be telling me "okay, begin your roundout" before I felt I needed to, but I listened to him and ended up rounding out just a bit high as a result. Later lessons went smoother because I took my instructor's words as what to do, not so much when or how to do it. By doing things when and how I thought they needed to be done, I got a better sense of control and my instructor felt more confident in my abilities as well. Know they'll step in when safety is at risk, but they'll try to give you as much slack as possible so you can learn to feel things yourself.

October 5th, 2022

This was lesson #50, a milestone in its own right. To this point I had logged about 80 hours--twice the minimum required for getting one's license. The smaller of the two parallel runways at Centennial had just re-opened after a month-long resurfacing. We could finally do pattern work at the home field without having to fly elsewhere. We get in, start up, take off, and immediately get to work. One landing. Not too bad. Second landing. Friggin' gorgeous. Actual applause from my instructor. Third, forth, fifth, all pretty solid. On my 6th landing, I was 10' off the deck when my instructor casually said "go around." There was no urgency. This was a drill. This was him throwing me a wrench because he felt comfortable doing it. Throttle full, reduce flaps partially, nose to horizon, gain airspeed, start climbing back out, retract flaps fully once sufficient airspeed and altitude. What I remembered early on being a series of steps I had to cautiously calculate flowed out of my hands as smoothly as I remember marveling at my instructor doing them in those early lessons. As I climbed out, I thought, "by George, I think I've got it!" 

My instructor suggested we call it a day. I agreed. I didn't think we'd gain anything by spending more time/money in the air today. We landed, taxied to the ramp, and my instructor took the controls so I could chill. He says "You think you can do this by yourself?" I said "yeah, I think so." He said he didn't do anything on any of those landings. They were all me. And then, I heard the word every student pilot wants to hear, "solo." He said he'd put in for my stage check once we tied down. It was then that I realized all the work I had been putting into getting my landings in check--working with two instructors with two vastly different styles, screaming, venting, beating myself up, picking myself back up--paid off. 

Lesson 43 - Airspeed, Airspeed, Airspeed

 

The day started out on an optimistic note. My instructor and I chatted about our most recent flight when I had three out of five solid, unassisted landings. Another day like that, and he'd get me set up for pre-solo stage check. That's what I wanted to hear. It's what I've been waiting to hear since I started this journey. And then we took off. And it became abundantly clear that this would not be "another day like that." 

I don't know which planets were out of alignment, but my airspeed control s-u-c-k-e-d. There's no other (polite) way to describe it. And no way to explain it, either. This is something that I've had under control in previous lessons, and for the first half of the lesson today, it seems to have gone completely out the window. I'd be on target, check something, and somehow have gained or lost 20 knots. Maybe I wasn't trimming properly. I felt like I was fighting the controls a bit more than I have been in previous flights. I can't even blame the plane. I was in the same plane I flew last lesson where I was in a good groove. Maybe the heat? Maybe a tailwind? It was a bit bumpy, but not unreasonably so. I honestly don't know or I would have been better at correcting it. Simply put, I was not in my groove today. 

We stayed at Centennial today because they had room in the pattern which allowed us a good number of landings since we didn't have to spend 20 - 30 minutes flying to and from other airports. More landings, more chances to prove "I got this" I thought. And after a while, I was able to find some consistency at the end, right before our "low fuel" warning light came on and we called it a day. (We were just over half when we took off, which was my minimum without asking for a refuel, and the warning light came on at 1/4.) We could have gotten one or two more in, but we were both hot and a bit tired and at the point of diminishing returns anyway. So here in no particular order are my take-aways.

First, and I wrote this before, and every instructor since Orville and Wilbur has said, "airspeed is key." If you aren't consistent on your airspeed, you're not on a stable approach, and your landing will suffer. Airspeed. Is. Everything. Fly the numbers. If the book says 65 knots over the threshold, be at 65 knots over the threshold. Pitch for airspeed, power for altitude. Use trim. Get this right and the rest will fall into place. 

Second, careful, small adjustments to the controls. Do not over-control, but do not under-control, either. I was just a bit fast on one approach, and was a bit timid in how much I pulled the nose back because I didn't want to balloon. I landed flat on all three wheels. A little more pulling back earlier would have bled off the speed and gotten the nose in the right attitude. In hindsight, this could have been due to a poorly-trimmed set-up. If I'm trimmed too far nose down, my speed will be fast and it will take more back-pressure to raise the nose. On another approach, my speed was on target but I was a bit low, so I added power to slow my descent, but I added too much power and we started to climb a bit without gaining airspeed. Add just a little bit of power (100rpm or so) and keep the pitch attitude. 

Third, if things aren't going right, take a break and regroup. My instructor can sense when I'm getting frustrated, and about halfway through flew a landing so I could watch and recalibrate myself. It helped. Maybe it was just a quick mental break, maybe it was just seeing it done well, I can't say for certain. But whatever, when I got back on the controls, I felt my landings were a bit better. Still not great, but more "all me" than the previous ones. 

Forth, F18s land ridiculously fast--ATC told us 270 knots approach speed. But it's friggin' COOL to see them landing and taking off on the parallel runway while you're doing your pattern work. Sadly, no pics, but damn that was awesome to see from the air. 

In looking back on this lesson, I felt like I was fighting the plane more than I have in previous lessons. That tells me I probably wasn't trimmed as I should have been. When I think back to my earlier landings when trim was an afterthought, these landings were very much on par with them in terms of consistency. When I look back on my last lesson where I was definitely much more consistent and comfortable, I wasn't fighting the plane. I wasn't pushing the nose down or pulling the nose up. Maybe upon reflection, that's the biggest takeaway. If you're fighting the plane, you're not flying the plane. So perhaps that become  my focus next time out. Make sure I'm flying the plane. When I do that, things work. 

Lesson 42 - It's About Bloomin' Time (and Coyote on the Runway)

 

I was ready for a shot at redemption. My frustrations with my previous lesson (two weeks prior due to yet another maintenance cancelation last week) were still festering in the back of my head and I was ready to shake those demons. I knew I was better than that last flight, and dammit, I needed to prove it today. 

I was with my primary instructor today, so when I got to the field, we talked about the last lesson and the frustrations I encountered. We talked about things I knew I was doing wrong, and about things I thought I was doing correctly, but perhaps not quick enough for my other instructor and the tensions that created. He offered his perspective on things (which helped), then we moved onto today's lesson. That was then, after all. Pilots, like professional athletes, need to develop a sense of on-demand short-term memory loss so we can put our last screw-up behind us and move on. We decided that we'd spend the day in the pattern again working on landings either here at Centennial if we could get it or fly out to Spaceport if not. We went out to the plane, noticed that it seemed everyone and their brother was already out prepping their planes and heading out, got ours ready and headed out ourselves. 

I called ground traffic control, who is usually very good about telling us if pattern work is going to be a possibility or not. If it's not, we're right there at the end of runway 10, and can easily jump on that and fly east to Spaceport. Today ground control did not seem to indicate there would be any issue with doing pattern work at Centennial, so I accepted runway 35R and headed down the taxiway--along with what seemed like every other plane on the field. I think I was something like 6th or 7th in line, and in the 30 minutes it took to get to the runway to take off, another 8 to 10 planes had come in line behind me. With that much traffic, pattern work at Centennial was not going to happen. 

We flew out to Spaceport, and with the exception of me picking the wrong line of trees to make my turn to the north, the flight up went very smoothly. Spaceport had room for us in the pattern, and told us to enter downwind for runway 17. I noticed on the weather report that the winds were out of the north at 6 knots or so. This meant a tailwind landing, but--hey--that's the runway they're using, so today's lesson would include tailwind landings, I guess. I flew the pattern well, maintained my speed fairly well, and sat us down without much difficulty at all. First landing, all me. My shot at redemption seemed to be taking shape. 

Second approach, ATC had us following another plane in the pattern. I don't know what happened, but I turned from my downwind leg in the wrong spot, I don't think I lost a foot of elevation on the base leg, and with the tailwind, I was still 300' above the ground near the threshold of the runway. Go around. My instructor teaches the "Three C's" in a Go-around. "Cram" (full throttle) "Climb" (reduce flaps, gain speed and altitude), and "Clean" (once gaining altitude and airspeed, take flaps all the way out). I pushed the throttle full, gave a little right rudder to counter the left-turning tendencies when you do that, and began to climb. I only had 20 degrees of flaps in when I called the go-around, so I didn't reduce flaps right away. I began to climb, and really felt like I had to pull back on the yoke to gain altitude. Speed was fine (75 knots, normal climb-out speed) but boy was I fighting the elevator. Oh, wait... "Clean." Crap. Okay, reduce flaps. That's better! Brief discussion ensued about what got us into that predicament while turning back to the downwind leg. That's the nice thing about the downwind leg. It gives you a chance to quickly regroup and chat about what just happened. 

Air traffic control decided to change the runway direction, since--after all--we had been dealing with a tailwind. When Centennial changes runway directions, the just have traffic hold to clear things out, then have everyone land the opposite direction. Spaceport? Nah. They decided to have everyone in the pattern fly east, line up for landing on runway 26 (crosswind), then once back up in the air fly south and line up for runway 35. Curious way of doing business, but I got a crosswind landing in. Not the cleanest, but nothing bent. 

We flew south to line up for 35. Base, final, touch down. Fairly smooth! By this point I'm feeling a whole lot more confident. Back up, and head south. ATC has us extend our downwind for additional traffic. They extended us nearly 5 miles south to the edge of the airspace. When we turned back north, I hear ATC clear another plane into land, apparently ahead of us. I'm not sure what was going on, but my instructor and I are watching this other plane cut in front of us to land. I slow down a bit by raising my nose, and I add a bit of power so not to loose too much altitude. We're still watching this plane in front of us that's just crossing the threshold. I'm still flying the approach to land, but my hand is on the throttle ready to slam it forward just in case. Just as my instructor and I were ready to declare a go-around ourselves because the plane was still on the runway ahead of us, ATC told us to go around. This time, I got all three Cs, and the go-around was smooth. Back around, extended 5 miles south again (why, this time, I don't know), and back for one last landing at Spaceport. My flare was a bit high on this one, but I corrected and sat us down just a bit further down the runway than anticipated. We departed to the south.

Coyote on the Runway

Approaching Centennial, I get the weather info. Winds 330 at 10 knots. They were landing on runway 35, so 10 knots pretty much straight down the pipe. I'm good with that. I'm still a ways out from the field, but I take a southwest heading that would put me on final for 35L or 35R, depending on which one ATC gave me. While en route, A plane waiting to depart 35R reports a coyote on the runway. This is not that unusual at Centennial, in fact one had met an untimely end just the previous day. As he's taxiing towards said coyote, he reports that the coyote is taking a dump on the runway. I mean, when ya gotta go, ya gotta go, I guess. Now, of course, we have "Foreign Object Debris" (FOD) on the runway, which even though it's likely soft and squishy, is not something ATC wants being kicked up into oncoming traffic. So ATC begins to divert traffic away from 35R while they figure out how much of a risk this steaming pile of fresh coyote droppings presents (to say nothing of the coyote).

I contact ATC to ask to land, and they offer me runway 28 since 35R is currently in, I have to say it, "shitty" condition. With the winds coming from 330, that would mean a crosswind landing. I asked for an updated wind check, they said 330 at 6 knots. I had dealt with a 6-knot crosswind at Spaceport, so I figured I could handle it here. It was either that or wait until they figured out what to do with the coyote droppings. I accepted 28, they cleared me to land, and I made my turn towards the airport. As luck would have it, I was set up about 5 miles out, pretty much straight in. A little right aileron into the wind, a little left rudder (okay a lot more left rudder than I thought I'd need) to keep the nose in line with the runway, flaps, airspeed, and touchdown. And for the first time in 42 lessons, my instructor applauded! He told me of the 5 landings I did, three were all me, and the other two required only very minor inputs on his part. I said after 60+ hours of flying, it's about friggin' time I finally got it together. 

And the coyote droppings were apparently safely blown off the runway by a taxiing plane.

Another day of landings like this, and it'll be time to start looking at stage check and solo. While my landings felt very consistent today, I'm still not 100% happy with my altitude control on my base leg. That second landing when I was 300' too high, I need to be better than that. I was off my game. I know why I was off my game, though. And my crosswind control felt natural. I wasn't fighting anything, I was just doing what I needed to do to keep the plane on centerline. (And I think I was closer to centerline than I have been in the past, but honestly don't remember.) But overall, easily my best day of landing practice yet. I was never rattled and I think that helped. 

Here, also, is the LiveATC recording of the troublesome coyote. (Edited for time)

And I've decided that Wile E. Coyote is now my unofficial mascot. I found a Lego Wile E. Coyote at Comic Con over the weekend. He will become a keychain and be attached to my flight bag. 

Lesson 41 - Highway from the Comfort Zone

 I'm writing this a few days after my last lesson, because quite frankly had I posted my thoughts immediately following, it would not be exactly "family-friendly" reading. It was not a good lesson. Not my worst, but certainly far from my best. I'm so close to my pre-solo stage check I can taste it, and this lesson was Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown. I was frustrated, even a bit disheartened. Mad at myself, mad at my instructor, just generally not in a good place. As we've all learned one way or another to never hit "send" on an e-mail written in anger, I decided not to publish my original thoughts and reflect on the lesson in order to cast it in a much more objective light.  

First off, I wasn't expecting to fly, having been bumped to the simulator due to my reserved plane (a Grumman) being down for maintenance. A last-minute cancelation freed up a Cessna in my time slot, so my instructor snagged it. Cool! It'd had been over two weeks since my last flight and more maintenance and scheduling cancellations have pushed my next flight to two weeks from now. I was happy not to have a 5-week gap (again!) in my training. Still, my mental prep was for doing VOR navigation and simulated IMC, not take-offs and landings. I've also been flying Grummans recently as I find them a bit more responsive than the Cessnas, in which I have to wait just a second or two to get a feel for whether the control input I just put in is having any effect on the plane. Third, I was flying with my secondary instructor, whose teaching style I'm still getting used to. This is not a criticism, mind you, just a difference and it led to some muttering and tongue-biting on my part during the lesson as I was working through my frustrations. 

We decided to fly out to Spaceport to do touch-and-goes since it looked like things were going to be pretty busy at Centennial. I don't mind the flight to Spaceport because it gives me 10 minutes to gather my thoughts on the way out and just mentally prepare myself. But right from the take-off, I was already a bit on the defensive. When taking off, you want to rotate off the ground at around 55 knots in the Cessnas, but you don't want to continue to climb just yet. You want to get off the ground, then lower the nose to build airspeed. This avoids a "power-on stall" where you try to climb with too little airspeed, stall, then unceremoniously fall back to the ground with (at that low altitude) rather disastrous results. I rotated, then lowered the nose just a bit, but my instructor apparently was looking for more of a nose-lowering than I gave him, so he chided me to lower the nose and proceeded to explain why it was important. "Yeah, I know," I muttered under my breath. I was doing that, just not as fast or pronounced as he was expecting. And that pretty much set the tone for the entire lesson.

We flew out to Spaceport, asked them for touch-and-goes, but they told us the pattern was full. Bummer, but we decided to fly east and kill 10 minutes doing ground-reference maneuvers, and then ask them again if they had room in the pattern for us. My ground reference maneuvers in this case were S turns around a road. It had been a while since I had done ground reference maneuvers, so it felt good to do them. My first attempt turned too soon, but the rest were pretty smooth and even. After a few minutes, we called Spaceport again, and this time they let us in. 

I've got over 100 landings under my belt at this point in my training. Procedurally, I know what to do. What I ran into today wasn't so much a matter of not knowing what to do, but not doing it soon enough or fast enough, and exposing lapses and things I need to not forget to pay attention to. When landing, I try to make small control inputs so not to over control the plane. That's especially problematic on landing, and it's been something I've really been consciously working on, as over controlling in the past had messed up my approaches. Because the Cessna isn't quite as responsive as the Grumman, and because of my known tendency to over control, I was being conservative on the control inputs. More than once I muttered under my breath "I'm $%&! working on it!!!" (and I know once or twice verbally) as my instructor told me to add this or that. I felt most of the time I was doing things right, just not fast enough, thus my instructor was on to the next thing while I was still finishing up the last. This led to a sense of fighting the controls as he's for instance telling me to get the nose down to increase airspeed, while pulling back on the controls because we were getting close to the runway and it was time to round out. Just enough lag to where he's saying one thing and doing something else, which then confused me and led to not-so-great landings. (Cessnas friggin' float down the runway.) Our last outing was much more relaxed and both my instructor and I felt good about my landings, so this felt like a bit of a setback. 

One thing that I did not do well today was my climb-out and turn from upwind to crosswind. I had my controls crossed, meaning I had right rudder and left aileron trying to make a right turn. This is not how you do that, as at low enough speeds, it leads to a stall, spin, and sudden impact with the ground. I think I've been pretty good in the past about adding sufficient right rudder, and my instructors have not mentioned this prior to today, so maybe it was a "just today" thing. Regardless, it really dug into my psyche today. Maybe it was because of the "I know this, how am I not doing this today?" aspect, and maybe that contributed to my interpreting my instructor's tone as wondering how I've gotten this far without knowing this. I kept wanting to say "yeah, I know, I get it," but then each time I took off again, I had to work to get in enough right rudder to stay coordinated through the turns. Hopefully that was just a "today" thing. I went home and hit the simulator pretty hard to work through that. Though completely different in feeling, it was more the mental procedural notes to "keep an eye on the ball" through the process. Correcting it is easy. Knowing to look to stay on top of it so you don't have to correct it in the first place is just another thing to add to the mental checklist. 

As frustrating as things were, let me cast things in a slightly different light a few days after the fact. First, I've noted that my primary instructor tends not to like to see me be too comfortable in the plane. He'll pile on another task for me to do if he sees me getting complacent. I've come to appreciate this, though I usually curse him at the time because it pushes me outside of my comfort zone. I think that's kind of where I'm at with my secondary instructor as well. He's flown with me enough to know I can land a plane. He wants me to get better and more consistent, so he's pushing me to think faster and react quicker. He's picking up on weaknesses in my thought processes and forcing me to fill in those mental gaps. Having to think about my weaknesses while keeping my strengths strong has similarly pushed me outside my comfort zone. In the end, I know I'll be a smarter, better pilot as a result. It's a teaching style that I think will take a bit more time to get used to, but it's already paid dividends. When I think back on the lessons which have left me leaving the field feeling the most frustrated, they're also the ones which pushed me the furthest outside my comfort zone and the ones which taught me the most. 

As they say in skiing, "if you ain't falling, you ain't learning." Every now and then you gotta get knocked back on your heels to push yourself to do better the next time. Yes there were times I wanted to holler "shut up and let me fly the plane!" Yes, I walked out feeling more frustrated than I had in a long time. Then I realize that a lot of that was me; things I wasn't doing well, things I had overlooked. I could fly the plane, but I can fly it much better. I know about being coordinated in turns, but as I tell my kids whenever they begrudgingly say "I know, dad," having knowledge and acting upon that knowledge are two different things. That's where this lesson came from. So, yeah. I left the field feeling frustrated and a bit mad. Now, I get to climb back into the plane, turn that frustration into action, and become a better pilot because of it.

Lesson 40 - "Miraculous?"

 

Nothing about flying is really "routine," but of late, the business at hand has been drilling down on my landings. Gaps in my mind have been filled in, and I'm feeling a lot more confident about my landings than I ever have. I was flying today with my secondary instructor, who has been working with me to get over my landing struggles. Today's lesson was designed to be "more of the same." Take off, hit the pattern, land. The pattern at Centennial was full, so we flew out to Rocky Mountain Metro in Boulder. I will confess that due to other things going on right now such as vacation and multiple things on the "honey-do" list, I'm writing this three weeks after this lesson, so my memory of details has gotten a bit foggy. 

The big takeaway from this lesson was the importance of maintaining a tight pattern--for the benefit of everyone in the pattern. You need to be in a predictable space (absent ATC instructions to the contrary) so when ATC advises planes in the pattern of others in the pattern, we know where to look and can find the planes (or they can find us). There were a few times in the pattern where either I was a bit far from the runway or the plane I was supposed to be following was outside the pattern and I could not find him. When ATC says "you're number 3 to land" and you only see one other plane in the pattern, is he number 1 or number 2 to land? If you think he's number 2 and you follow him, the plane who is really number 2 to land is converging on the same point you're flying towards, and, well, let's just say that's a situation that needs to be avoided. 

A tight pattern, mind you, is helped by landmarks on the ground that you can reference to know when to make your turns, so even on airports out in the middle of nowhere, you need to figure out points on the ground which you can quickly identify and line up with, or failing that, time your turns with a consistent count on the crosswind leg of the pattern. 

After a handful of not-too-bad landings, my instructor apparently felt comfortable enough in my abilities to introduce a new wrinkle--the no-flaps, forward slip approach. He had been working with me on side slips in previous lessons as a means to keep the nose lined up with the runway. A forward slip is similar in principle, but rather than keep the nose lined up with the runway and use the ailerons to move the plane side-to-side (hence "side slip"), with a forward slip you keep the plane's course moving forward, and let the nose point to the side opposite the aileron input. The goal with a forward slip is to introduce drag, slow the plane, and lose altitude quickly (in a controlled fashion). Given a choice, I'll use flaps, but it's a good skill to develop. 

We left Rocky Mountain Metro and returned to Centennial, flying south towards Chatfield Reservoir because my instructor prefers to fly routes over less-populated areas "just in case" something happens and clearings to land are easier to find. Makes sense, but my aerial photo of Coors Field will have to wait. 

We got back to the field and talked about how things went. My instructor called my progress since the first time we flew together a month or so ago "miraculous." Truthfully, I'm not sure how to take that. While I will definitely say my landings have improved greatly since, I didn't think they were quite that bad to begin with. Still, progress is progress, and I'm moving closer to my goal.