Jaybird180
Final Approach
This weekend, I had my first flight as a new PP with a non-flying passenger. Soon after having my temporary certificate in-hand, I began planning a trip with my wife to Ocean City, MD KOXB and began watching the weather and reserved the plane.
The summer weather in Maryland has a lot of afternoon thunderstorms and we're right in the season, so this was a concern for timing. Up through departure day, I wasn't sure we were still going. In addition, we had to make decisions about time resources as there were other competing events that we wanted to attend. But the day prior, I resolved that the flight would be a late afternoon Friday departure and early Saturday morning return.
Lesson #1:
Don't try to plan the timing too tight- something will always happen to push the schedule back and WHEN it does, relax and keep in mind that your plan included extra cushion, use the cushion.
That Thursday, I thumbed through my logbook to find myself 1-night landing shy of 90-day night currency
. Although I know it's legal for me to fly at night to get recurrent, I didn't think it the wisest thing to do, so I called my CFI and discussed the possibility of delaying departure if I missed the timing window to arrive before dark. The delay would be to get me back into night currency (3 dual night circuits and then 3 solo night circuits to ensure that I had the sight picture firmly in mind and to minimize risk). This was a fallback plan that neither of us liked; he wasn't fond of driving 30 minutes to the airport on his Friday night off, and I wasn't fond of delaying the trip 2 hours while my wife waited if we missed the window- AND THEN we'd miss dinner for sure! Missing dinner probably would have been the trip scrubber (LOL). Fast food before a flight - YUCK!
Nevertheless, I got to the airport later than I wanted, the plane needed fuel (more time) and then I needed to SLOW DOWN to ensure I didn't forget anything important as my wife arrived seemingly without a care in the world.
After having my wife demonstrate emergency egress, we discussed the route and I asked her to hold my iPad and handwritten frequency list and to be in-charge of the transponder and air vent controls.
I'd flown dual before, BUT THIS WAS DIFFERENT! It felt like the ground roll, liftoff and climbout took FOREVER. No safety issues, but by my perception I would have appreciated more ponies under the cowl.
After a few attempts to verify my transponder was working, ATC cleared me into BRAVO at my requested altitude (never got that before- I couldn't -LOLOLOLOLOLOL), steered me to a heading then cleared me direct to my SFRA gate.
We got an 18kt push, I bumped the throttle setting 100 rpm above planned. My wristwatch and some mental math told me that we'd arrive around sunset. In retrospect, it probably would have helped if I grabbed another 2,000 feet for better tailwinds (?).
Soon enough, I see the destination airport in the distance.
A poorly planned decent and a downwind leg being too close put me too high for landing on runway 02 and we made a go-around. Nerves on the second attempt caused me to repeat the same mistake and another go-around. I decided to try landing on the longer runway 32.
On downwind for 32, it's now almost dark, visibility was reporting 10 miles (yeah right) and I'm staring out into open-ocean with a nose down 80kt pitch attitude. It was scary but totally doable...Right then and there, I began to think about getting instrument rated, for I'd just experienced total loss of outside visual reference (retrospectively, there were references in my left periphery). I instinctively went on instruments- I am NOT turning my head to look at the runway. My timing must have been a little off; I was motivated and made my base turn too early. Since I couldn't yet see runway in the high-wing Cessna I had FAITH that it would be there and I would see it upon completing the 90 degree turn to base…
…and then it was there. Another 90 and a forward slip and we were greeted with the sweetest sounding stall horn during the flare. I felt accomplished. I’m not sure my wife could appreciate the feat that had just been accomplished. I just played it cool and didn’t celebrate, but inside I was both prideful and relieved at the same time.
However....I hadn't studied the airport diagram as well as I needed to and there was NO ACTIVITY there, but my wife was able to point out the parking area at the unfamiliar, now dark airport, to her credit.
A night taxi to the parking area followed by a sloppy lineup job and I shut down the Hobbs at 1.1h. I'm now mentally planning the trip home, considering an IMC forecast that may delay our return trip by 2 hours and that we had other things we wanted to do Saturday morning (like the airshow at ADW).
While she's walking to the other end of the ramp in the darkness to find a bathroom, I'm pushing around, tying and unloading the plane. Of the 4 numbers listed in Foreflight for a taxicab, the first 2 were bad numbers (incrementally raising my stress level). Fortunately, she brought the checkbook as there was a $12 overnight tie-down fee that I didn’t know about (isn’t this supposed to be listed in the AF/D?).
The taxicab arrives to take us to our hotel, making this a “normal” vacation. I can now take off my pilot hat and put on the vacation hat.
Next morning we arrive at the airport fashionably late (I was tentative about the weather and preferred to wait in our hotel room instead of the airport- probably could have kept our schedule).
We followed a warbird (I think it was a YAK) to 02 and tookoff after them; I was glad to see them, as it looked like they knew where they were going and I was a little unsure.
We planned the westerly return at 4500ft but scattered clouds at 2100 gave me a moment of pause. I’d never experienced that before and decided to maneuver around a few when I decided it would be better to get up to planned to better see the cloud situation then make an informed altitude decision (didn’t want to encounter that ‘possible IMC’ on my first trip from this morning’s briefing). At 4500 I could see that the cloud situation would continue improving.
Like the trip outbound, our planned route would take us over 2 enroute airports, but because the home reports from Foreflight were 50/50 on weather I added another nearby airport as a ‘take a look before committing’ waypoint, but it turned out to be VMC all the way home.
A well executed approach and spot-on landing elicited passenger applause. Shut down and the total trip billed Hobbs time was 2.3hours.
Operational lesson: Ensure that everyone is on the same page about taking the plane overnight. The Senior CFI arrived extra early and was a bit shocked to see a missing airplane. The dispatcher didn’t annotate it properly. He was concerned about my safety when he couldn’t reach me on my cell (I was flying)
.
It was a good 1st trip. I’m already thinking about the 2nd.
The summer weather in Maryland has a lot of afternoon thunderstorms and we're right in the season, so this was a concern for timing. Up through departure day, I wasn't sure we were still going. In addition, we had to make decisions about time resources as there were other competing events that we wanted to attend. But the day prior, I resolved that the flight would be a late afternoon Friday departure and early Saturday morning return.
Lesson #1:
Don't try to plan the timing too tight- something will always happen to push the schedule back and WHEN it does, relax and keep in mind that your plan included extra cushion, use the cushion.That Thursday, I thumbed through my logbook to find myself 1-night landing shy of 90-day night currency
. Although I know it's legal for me to fly at night to get recurrent, I didn't think it the wisest thing to do, so I called my CFI and discussed the possibility of delaying departure if I missed the timing window to arrive before dark. The delay would be to get me back into night currency (3 dual night circuits and then 3 solo night circuits to ensure that I had the sight picture firmly in mind and to minimize risk). This was a fallback plan that neither of us liked; he wasn't fond of driving 30 minutes to the airport on his Friday night off, and I wasn't fond of delaying the trip 2 hours while my wife waited if we missed the window- AND THEN we'd miss dinner for sure! Missing dinner probably would have been the trip scrubber (LOL). Fast food before a flight - YUCK!Nevertheless, I got to the airport later than I wanted, the plane needed fuel (more time) and then I needed to SLOW DOWN to ensure I didn't forget anything important as my wife arrived seemingly without a care in the world.
After having my wife demonstrate emergency egress, we discussed the route and I asked her to hold my iPad and handwritten frequency list and to be in-charge of the transponder and air vent controls.
I'd flown dual before, BUT THIS WAS DIFFERENT! It felt like the ground roll, liftoff and climbout took FOREVER. No safety issues, but by my perception I would have appreciated more ponies under the cowl.
After a few attempts to verify my transponder was working, ATC cleared me into BRAVO at my requested altitude (never got that before- I couldn't -LOLOLOLOLOLOL), steered me to a heading then cleared me direct to my SFRA gate.
We got an 18kt push, I bumped the throttle setting 100 rpm above planned. My wristwatch and some mental math told me that we'd arrive around sunset. In retrospect, it probably would have helped if I grabbed another 2,000 feet for better tailwinds (?).
Soon enough, I see the destination airport in the distance.
A poorly planned decent and a downwind leg being too close put me too high for landing on runway 02 and we made a go-around. Nerves on the second attempt caused me to repeat the same mistake and another go-around. I decided to try landing on the longer runway 32.
On downwind for 32, it's now almost dark, visibility was reporting 10 miles (yeah right) and I'm staring out into open-ocean with a nose down 80kt pitch attitude. It was scary but totally doable...Right then and there, I began to think about getting instrument rated, for I'd just experienced total loss of outside visual reference (retrospectively, there were references in my left periphery). I instinctively went on instruments- I am NOT turning my head to look at the runway. My timing must have been a little off; I was motivated and made my base turn too early. Since I couldn't yet see runway in the high-wing Cessna I had FAITH that it would be there and I would see it upon completing the 90 degree turn to base…
…and then it was there. Another 90 and a forward slip and we were greeted with the sweetest sounding stall horn during the flare. I felt accomplished. I’m not sure my wife could appreciate the feat that had just been accomplished. I just played it cool and didn’t celebrate, but inside I was both prideful and relieved at the same time.
However....I hadn't studied the airport diagram as well as I needed to and there was NO ACTIVITY there, but my wife was able to point out the parking area at the unfamiliar, now dark airport, to her credit.
A night taxi to the parking area followed by a sloppy lineup job and I shut down the Hobbs at 1.1h. I'm now mentally planning the trip home, considering an IMC forecast that may delay our return trip by 2 hours and that we had other things we wanted to do Saturday morning (like the airshow at ADW).
While she's walking to the other end of the ramp in the darkness to find a bathroom, I'm pushing around, tying and unloading the plane. Of the 4 numbers listed in Foreflight for a taxicab, the first 2 were bad numbers (incrementally raising my stress level). Fortunately, she brought the checkbook as there was a $12 overnight tie-down fee that I didn’t know about (isn’t this supposed to be listed in the AF/D?).
The taxicab arrives to take us to our hotel, making this a “normal” vacation. I can now take off my pilot hat and put on the vacation hat.
Next morning we arrive at the airport fashionably late (I was tentative about the weather and preferred to wait in our hotel room instead of the airport- probably could have kept our schedule).
We followed a warbird (I think it was a YAK) to 02 and tookoff after them; I was glad to see them, as it looked like they knew where they were going and I was a little unsure.
We planned the westerly return at 4500ft but scattered clouds at 2100 gave me a moment of pause. I’d never experienced that before and decided to maneuver around a few when I decided it would be better to get up to planned to better see the cloud situation then make an informed altitude decision (didn’t want to encounter that ‘possible IMC’ on my first trip from this morning’s briefing). At 4500 I could see that the cloud situation would continue improving.
Like the trip outbound, our planned route would take us over 2 enroute airports, but because the home reports from Foreflight were 50/50 on weather I added another nearby airport as a ‘take a look before committing’ waypoint, but it turned out to be VMC all the way home.
A well executed approach and spot-on landing elicited passenger applause. Shut down and the total trip billed Hobbs time was 2.3hours.
Operational lesson: Ensure that everyone is on the same page about taking the plane overnight. The Senior CFI arrived extra early and was a bit shocked to see a missing airplane. The dispatcher didn’t annotate it properly. He was concerned about my safety when he couldn’t reach me on my cell (I was flying)
.It was a good 1st trip. I’m already thinking about the 2nd.
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