The whole week everyone was talking about how nice it was going to be on Saturday. I started getting worried the airport would be extremely busy and stressful. When I got to the airport, it was dead quiet. Odd, I thought. Then I realized that the airport is dead because no one is stuck there doing laps around the pattern. No one is forced to do touch-n-goes and are all out and about, doing Cross-country if they can.
I get there a little early as planned, so I start doing the paperwork and inspecting the plane as soon as I can get the documents (I wasn't sure if I could inspect without them, but next time I will). Walking around the craft I notice a missing screw on the engine cover, and a missing cover on the ELT antenna. I'm also not too sure about the gas level as this particular plane has long-range tanks. The level is up to the cuff like my instructor said it should be, but I still feel it's low.
My instructor comes up and I point out these things to him. I'm told the gas is actually a bit over the standard tank, the ELT cover isn't important and he'll notify maintenance about the screw when we get back. I know none of these things are deadly, and I trust my instructor, so we move on.
Today the wind was coming from a different direction then every other time I've flown, so this was my first time using runway 25. I asked for clearance, slowly taxied all the way down to the holding point, requested take off and waited. There are a couple planes on final and after they are down, tower will tell me to get into position. When I least expect it, I hear "Juliet Kilo Echo, Line up on the runway." Bah? What's that mean? Is that the same as- "JULIET KILO ECHO, LINE UP!" Gah! I call back: "In position! ... Juliet Kilo Echo..." Great time for them to change the terminology on me.
Taking off from runway 25 means we follow the King George departure that takes us along highway 99, to the north of the airport. There always seems to be a lot of birds just north of the airport, so I'm watching them closely. After my turn onto the downwind leg, a few eagles soar just in front of us to the right. As I get closer, all but one move aside. The stray comes slowly in front of us and glides just past the left wingtip. It's huge! I didn't know they were so big. I never want to hit one of those.
When we get into the practice area we go over slow flight again and then prepare for stalls. I go over my "HALT" check (Height, Aircraft, Location, Traffic) and I'm a little slow again. Now we're ready to stall.
For those who don't know, a "stall" in an airplane is not like when your car engine stalls. We call that the engine quiting. A stall in the airplane is when lift is no longer being generated. You are no longer an airplane; you are a rock.
Anywho, my instructor demonstrates by cutting the throttle, and constantly, increasingly pulling up to maintain altitude. Eventually the speed drops to about 45 knots, the stall warning goes off and a stall is immanent. My instructor drops the nose, adds power and we're back at straight and level with minimal altitude lost.
My turn. Throttle to idle. Nose up. Nose up. I'm dropping. My instructor tells me to pull up more, but the controls are getting heavy. I strain to pull. He grabs the yoke and yanks! The speed drops to below 40 knots and we completely stall. The nose drops down abruptly, but I'm not worried. I'm just staring at the ground thinking "do I nose down more, or put in full power first". My instructor is about to interrupt my deep contemplation so I do both at once.
We level off with me forgetting to use the rudder till the last moment and my instructor reminds me to nose down before adding power. Right. He also reminds me, as he adjusts the throttle, to bring back the power back to cruise as redlining the engine isn't a good idea.
All the slow flight and stalls have eaten up a lot of out time so we head back to the Boundary Bay without doing a touch-n-go at Abbotsford. Langley Airport keeps calling us telling us that our transponder is stuck on ident (constantly flashing on their radar screens). My instructor plays with it a bit saying that he needs to "tell maintenance about this too; this plane always does this". Great, another thing wrong with the plane.
At Boundary Bay runway 25 is still active so we're given a long, long, straight-in approach. Awesome. This should be easy. I've done this sort of thing hundreds of times in the simulator. We start descending, spotting the craft in front of us on final then taxi off. We're cleared to land. Little high... little low. I'm doing okay... We're near the threshold and I start leveling off. "Keep going down" I'm told. It's a common mistake to start leveling off too early. It's natural, really, to not want to dive into the ground, but I should know this. Damn instincts! I correct... I'm doing good... I hold off.. nose high... can't see... What's our altti- BAM! That was a hard landing. Wait! The left main is up again! SQUEEK! Now we're down.
I chuckle and say "Heh. That was a bit hard", but the smile drops of my face when I hear a churning, grinding noise off the right of the plane. "Do you hear that?" I ask. "Yeah, it's just the bearings. Lots of hard landings in this plane". I'm glad to hear I didn't break anything, but that's another thing wrong with the plane. These training craft really have "character".
We get back into the briefing room, I get drilled on the frequencies (which I know none of), pack up and I'm done. Another day at three-thousand feet over.
(Next time I must remember my camera!)
I get there a little early as planned, so I start doing the paperwork and inspecting the plane as soon as I can get the documents (I wasn't sure if I could inspect without them, but next time I will). Walking around the craft I notice a missing screw on the engine cover, and a missing cover on the ELT antenna. I'm also not too sure about the gas level as this particular plane has long-range tanks. The level is up to the cuff like my instructor said it should be, but I still feel it's low.
My instructor comes up and I point out these things to him. I'm told the gas is actually a bit over the standard tank, the ELT cover isn't important and he'll notify maintenance about the screw when we get back. I know none of these things are deadly, and I trust my instructor, so we move on.
Today the wind was coming from a different direction then every other time I've flown, so this was my first time using runway 25. I asked for clearance, slowly taxied all the way down to the holding point, requested take off and waited. There are a couple planes on final and after they are down, tower will tell me to get into position. When I least expect it, I hear "Juliet Kilo Echo, Line up on the runway." Bah? What's that mean? Is that the same as- "JULIET KILO ECHO, LINE UP!" Gah! I call back: "In position! ... Juliet Kilo Echo..." Great time for them to change the terminology on me.
Taking off from runway 25 means we follow the King George departure that takes us along highway 99, to the north of the airport. There always seems to be a lot of birds just north of the airport, so I'm watching them closely. After my turn onto the downwind leg, a few eagles soar just in front of us to the right. As I get closer, all but one move aside. The stray comes slowly in front of us and glides just past the left wingtip. It's huge! I didn't know they were so big. I never want to hit one of those.
When we get into the practice area we go over slow flight again and then prepare for stalls. I go over my "HALT" check (Height, Aircraft, Location, Traffic) and I'm a little slow again. Now we're ready to stall.
For those who don't know, a "stall" in an airplane is not like when your car engine stalls. We call that the engine quiting. A stall in the airplane is when lift is no longer being generated. You are no longer an airplane; you are a rock.
Anywho, my instructor demonstrates by cutting the throttle, and constantly, increasingly pulling up to maintain altitude. Eventually the speed drops to about 45 knots, the stall warning goes off and a stall is immanent. My instructor drops the nose, adds power and we're back at straight and level with minimal altitude lost.
My turn. Throttle to idle. Nose up. Nose up. I'm dropping. My instructor tells me to pull up more, but the controls are getting heavy. I strain to pull. He grabs the yoke and yanks! The speed drops to below 40 knots and we completely stall. The nose drops down abruptly, but I'm not worried. I'm just staring at the ground thinking "do I nose down more, or put in full power first". My instructor is about to interrupt my deep contemplation so I do both at once.
We level off with me forgetting to use the rudder till the last moment and my instructor reminds me to nose down before adding power. Right. He also reminds me, as he adjusts the throttle, to bring back the power back to cruise as redlining the engine isn't a good idea.
All the slow flight and stalls have eaten up a lot of out time so we head back to the Boundary Bay without doing a touch-n-go at Abbotsford. Langley Airport keeps calling us telling us that our transponder is stuck on ident (constantly flashing on their radar screens). My instructor plays with it a bit saying that he needs to "tell maintenance about this too; this plane always does this". Great, another thing wrong with the plane.
At Boundary Bay runway 25 is still active so we're given a long, long, straight-in approach. Awesome. This should be easy. I've done this sort of thing hundreds of times in the simulator. We start descending, spotting the craft in front of us on final then taxi off. We're cleared to land. Little high... little low. I'm doing okay... We're near the threshold and I start leveling off. "Keep going down" I'm told. It's a common mistake to start leveling off too early. It's natural, really, to not want to dive into the ground, but I should know this. Damn instincts! I correct... I'm doing good... I hold off.. nose high... can't see... What's our altti- BAM! That was a hard landing. Wait! The left main is up again! SQUEEK! Now we're down.
I chuckle and say "Heh. That was a bit hard", but the smile drops of my face when I hear a churning, grinding noise off the right of the plane. "Do you hear that?" I ask. "Yeah, it's just the bearings. Lots of hard landings in this plane". I'm glad to hear I didn't break anything, but that's another thing wrong with the plane. These training craft really have "character".
We get back into the briefing room, I get drilled on the frequencies (which I know none of), pack up and I'm done. Another day at three-thousand feet over.
(Next time I must remember my camera!)
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