EdFred
Taxi to Parking
Sure, until you have to do exactly that.
When I was in private training, my instructor had me do at least one night landing with no runway lights, one with no landing light, and one with neither of them. I was told that was stupid and should never be done. Well guess what happened last night?
I'm out with my student finishing up his night landing requirements last night, and we've done four of them with the landing and runway lights on, and the runway lights have already shut off once in the pattern and we turned them back on again. The surface wind was calm and I said "let's use the other runway after this takeoff." So, we depart 12 for the fifth time and head out. I told him let's fly out a little bit beyond and above the pattern, and just make a 180 and come straight in. You never know what the situation might be that you may need to do a straight in vs a full pattern. Our PAPIs our OTS until the FAA comes back out so it's old school approach path. We make the 180 and the winds at altitude were blowing pretty good, because we were way high, way close, and way north of a straight in. So we fly back to the SE a but further and get lined up again...runway lights are off.
Click, click, click, click, click. Nothing. Repeat. Nothing. Seven clicks, nothing. Three clicks. Nothing. Five again. Nothing. We tried probably ten attempts to get the lights on. I had told my student about my training with no runway or landing lights, and I said, "well, looks like we get to do this for real." OK, we see where the beacon is, we see where the hangars are, so the runway is offset from those to the south. Let's start getting lined up with where we think the runway is. We make out the runway, and oddly enough the trees that usually don't stand out at all when the runway lights were on, were visible with them off, and we both noted that.
His smoothest landing of the night, and he made the first taxiway.
When I was in private training, my instructor had me do at least one night landing with no runway lights, one with no landing light, and one with neither of them. I was told that was stupid and should never be done. Well guess what happened last night?
I'm out with my student finishing up his night landing requirements last night, and we've done four of them with the landing and runway lights on, and the runway lights have already shut off once in the pattern and we turned them back on again. The surface wind was calm and I said "let's use the other runway after this takeoff." So, we depart 12 for the fifth time and head out. I told him let's fly out a little bit beyond and above the pattern, and just make a 180 and come straight in. You never know what the situation might be that you may need to do a straight in vs a full pattern. Our PAPIs our OTS until the FAA comes back out so it's old school approach path. We make the 180 and the winds at altitude were blowing pretty good, because we were way high, way close, and way north of a straight in. So we fly back to the SE a but further and get lined up again...runway lights are off.
Click, click, click, click, click. Nothing. Repeat. Nothing. Seven clicks, nothing. Three clicks. Nothing. Five again. Nothing. We tried probably ten attempts to get the lights on. I had told my student about my training with no runway or landing lights, and I said, "well, looks like we get to do this for real." OK, we see where the beacon is, we see where the hangars are, so the runway is offset from those to the south. Let's start getting lined up with where we think the runway is. We make out the runway, and oddly enough the trees that usually don't stand out at all when the runway lights were on, were visible with them off, and we both noted that.
His smoothest landing of the night, and he made the first taxiway.