SkyHog
Touchdown! Greaser!
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2005
- Messages
- 18,431
- Location
- Castle Rock, CO
- Display Name
Display name:
Everything Offends Me
First the story - lotta fun!
I decided to take my plane down to Las Cruces today, but after the extra hour of work last night, I didn't feel safe until I slept until about 3:30pm. Because I had to go to work tonight, I didn't want to push it and make a stupid decision about flying to get back to work.
So instead, I flew to Socorro - just long enough to be cross country. I planned it so that I would get half of it day time and half of it night time. It was a great flight - a bit turbulent, but man this day made me really enjoy ownership!
Coming back was pitch black and everything was great. I love flying at night! Its so peaceful and fun (and IMHO, as I've stated before, slightly safer). Got flight following and was crisp and clear with my communications. ATC was friendly. God, what a gorgeous night.
I then landed and did a few stop and goes to get night current (in case I ever need to use it). After taxiing back to the hangar, I decided to try out the p-lead test that we posted about last night and this morning. Finished up the checklist (or so I thought) and pushed the plane back into the hangar.
I was really careful of a possible live prop (as I always am, but today I was much more so than normal). As I was finishing everything up, I couldn't find my airplane keys.
I looked inside the cockpit to see if I left them in there and my heart sunk. They were in the ignition and they were set to "both."
I can already see what went wrong. I deviated from my checklist (memory and written) to do the P-Lead ground test, and must have skipped that step because I had already touched the keys.
At least I still have a head and all of my limbs.
Now that is a lesson learned.
I decided to take my plane down to Las Cruces today, but after the extra hour of work last night, I didn't feel safe until I slept until about 3:30pm. Because I had to go to work tonight, I didn't want to push it and make a stupid decision about flying to get back to work.
So instead, I flew to Socorro - just long enough to be cross country. I planned it so that I would get half of it day time and half of it night time. It was a great flight - a bit turbulent, but man this day made me really enjoy ownership!
Coming back was pitch black and everything was great. I love flying at night! Its so peaceful and fun (and IMHO, as I've stated before, slightly safer). Got flight following and was crisp and clear with my communications. ATC was friendly. God, what a gorgeous night.
I then landed and did a few stop and goes to get night current (in case I ever need to use it). After taxiing back to the hangar, I decided to try out the p-lead test that we posted about last night and this morning. Finished up the checklist (or so I thought) and pushed the plane back into the hangar.
I was really careful of a possible live prop (as I always am, but today I was much more so than normal). As I was finishing everything up, I couldn't find my airplane keys.
I looked inside the cockpit to see if I left them in there and my heart sunk. They were in the ignition and they were set to "both."
I can already see what went wrong. I deviated from my checklist (memory and written) to do the P-Lead ground test, and must have skipped that step because I had already touched the keys.
At least I still have a head and all of my limbs.
Now that is a lesson learned.