t0r0nad0
Pattern Altitude
Well, on Friday my mentor Jeff invited me to join him on a flight to Natchitoches, LA (pronounced Nack-uh-dish, Looz-e-anna) to bring a friend of his up there so that he could join his family for Easter weekend. This was one of the first times in a small plane for his friend, so he got to ride right seat on the way up there, which was just a huge thrill for him. The whole way up there, he kept saying how awesome this was and that he's hooked. I was trying to work on him to start lessons for his Sport Pilot certificate 
. Anyway, since he was in the right seat, I got to sit in the back and take pictures!
We got our IFR clearance while taxiing at West Houston (IWS) and they told us to fly a heading of 180 after takeoff and to contact Houston Departure on 123.8 when leaving the pattern. We did, and departure had us turn to 270 deg. Here's a shot of IWS after we made that turn:
After a few westbound miles, Departure asked if we were an Industry (IDU) departure (westbound) or a Lufkin (LFK) departure (northbound). We informed him that we were a LFK departure, and they routed us north around Hooks (DWH) and over Conroe (CXO), then on course. We climbed to 7000' and had a great flight in smooth air the entire way up there.
We descended into KIER and canceled IFR once we had it in sight. We made a left crosswind entry to the pattern and I snapped a couple of pics:
And another on left base:
Then I took a video of Jeff turning base to final and landing. Sorry for the bouncy video - it was a bit bumpy in the pattern and I didn't have a tripod. Jeff actually made a greaser of a landing and taxied us in to the FBO.
We took a couple of pictures so that Jeff can claim KIER for the ConUS Challenge.
Jeff's friend was greeted at the FBO by his two children and his brother-in-law and bid us a fond farewell, thanking Jeff profusely. We used the "little pilot's room" and topped off the tanks for our return trip. I was in the right seat on this trip and Jeff handed over control immediately after takeoff. I called up Departure for our IFR clearance back to IWS and hand-flew the entire way. Here's the FlightAware track, and it looks like I did pretty good at keeping a straight line! (I'm not sure what the deal is with that "backtrack" thing - we never turned back.)
FA dropped us when we got to the local Houston radar control area, but we didn't cancel IFR until 5nm north of IWS when we had it in sight. I flew us on the 45 to the left downwind, but I turned us a bit early (still getting used to the speed of the Bo, which is much greater than the speed of the 172 I typically fly) and we wound up just joining the left base. Jeff took over while we were on a 1/2 mile final and made another good landing. We taxied in to the terminal, where we ran into my friend Blair (from the HoustonSpotters.net forum and a lurker here) who was taking pictures of N4GA, Phil Boyer's AOPA transport. I'll continue on this in another thread.
Thanks again to Jeff for taking me along and letting me log another 1.4 hours of time in the Bo! It was a lot of fun!
. Anyway, since he was in the right seat, I got to sit in the back and take pictures!We got our IFR clearance while taxiing at West Houston (IWS) and they told us to fly a heading of 180 after takeoff and to contact Houston Departure on 123.8 when leaving the pattern. We did, and departure had us turn to 270 deg. Here's a shot of IWS after we made that turn:
After a few westbound miles, Departure asked if we were an Industry (IDU) departure (westbound) or a Lufkin (LFK) departure (northbound). We informed him that we were a LFK departure, and they routed us north around Hooks (DWH) and over Conroe (CXO), then on course. We climbed to 7000' and had a great flight in smooth air the entire way up there.
We descended into KIER and canceled IFR once we had it in sight. We made a left crosswind entry to the pattern and I snapped a couple of pics:
And another on left base:
Then I took a video of Jeff turning base to final and landing. Sorry for the bouncy video - it was a bit bumpy in the pattern and I didn't have a tripod. Jeff actually made a greaser of a landing and taxied us in to the FBO.
We took a couple of pictures so that Jeff can claim KIER for the ConUS Challenge.
Jeff's friend was greeted at the FBO by his two children and his brother-in-law and bid us a fond farewell, thanking Jeff profusely. We used the "little pilot's room" and topped off the tanks for our return trip. I was in the right seat on this trip and Jeff handed over control immediately after takeoff. I called up Departure for our IFR clearance back to IWS and hand-flew the entire way. Here's the FlightAware track, and it looks like I did pretty good at keeping a straight line! (I'm not sure what the deal is with that "backtrack" thing - we never turned back.)
FA dropped us when we got to the local Houston radar control area, but we didn't cancel IFR until 5nm north of IWS when we had it in sight. I flew us on the 45 to the left downwind, but I turned us a bit early (still getting used to the speed of the Bo, which is much greater than the speed of the 172 I typically fly) and we wound up just joining the left base. Jeff took over while we were on a 1/2 mile final and made another good landing. We taxied in to the terminal, where we ran into my friend Blair (from the HoustonSpotters.net forum and a lurker here) who was taking pictures of N4GA, Phil Boyer's AOPA transport. I'll continue on this in another thread.
Thanks again to Jeff for taking me along and letting me log another 1.4 hours of time in the Bo! It was a lot of fun!
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