DutchessFlier
Line Up and Wait
Like so many times these past 6 months, I pulled 71D off the runway onto delta taxiway, stopped the plane and went through my after-landing checklist.
This afternoon, the guy next to me reached over, shook my hand, and said, "Congratulations, you are a Private Pilot"..I still can't believe it!
EDIT-UPDATE: Yeah I know its 2am...just can't sleep right now..still in the midst of disbelief!
Just to add some info on the checkride...Whatever you do if you are still a student, be very prepared for anything, but take the advice of everyone who says to just be relaxed. That helped alot! The whole process yesteday was about 4 hours. Two hours oral, which was a great learning experience, and a different one for the examiner since he often doesn't do PPL checkrides with applicants who own their own planes. For example, I did not know that the stall warning horn, while not on that famous MEL list of VFR instruments we all sorta memorized, is listed on some 172's as a required instrument, but in my POH, it is not listed at all. When he asked me about that item being inop, and could I still fly, I answered 'yes', which brought about the discussion, and we went into the POH. Lo and behold..not there. So for 71D, a stall warning horn is not a required item! I am not sure if the oral was more in depth than he usually does, but he was very much into how much I understood my responsibilities as an owner and the systems in the plane, currency, and MX issues. He was also very very precise about my XC planning, airspace, limitations, the special emphasis areas, and aeromedical factors.
The checkride was probably one of my best learning experiences in all my training. Yesterday WX, in a word: 310/veering 020 12kts G to 19 LLWS. We did the preflight, cockpit management, exchange of controls, and set up the GPS for an XC from POU to MHT, but obviously did not fly the XC. I was very careful about my XW taxi and takeoff procedures, and the moment we got up, the LLWS was pretty obvious. Flew out about 50 miles on course, then diverted to a short field uncontrolled airport, Kingston-Ulster, which is set up right next to a bridge across the Hudson River. Set up once for the landing pattern entry, and the winds were gusting and in the 45 into the pattern we were being pushed sideways along the downwind path, I broke it off, told him I was not comfortable with the set up, and that I was going to reset the entry a mile farther out with a more straight in approach less than 45 degrees to the pattern to compensate for the wind drift. I didn't even have to simulate a short field landing...sheesh it was a short field, gusting crosswind, work the plane all the way down through the taxi situation. He actually smiled as we taxied back to the runway. I did too!
Did the maneuvers next: Worked a while under the hood, all the turns, climbs, stalls, you can imagine how interesting the slow flight was yesterday in those conditions! Based on the landing process at Kingston, we did not have to do the ground ref work, and besides, the winds were enough to keep us above 800-1000 agl as a safety factor. But we did the engine out to just above my emergency field, and I managed a pretty good teardrop turn to final, just to compensate for the effect of the gusts on the plane, because I knew that this was gonna be a one time try in any conditions, but especially yesterday it had to be aligned well right off the bat. Back to POU, for some reason they switched to rwy 6 from using 33 all day! so here goes a XW landing with almost a 45 degree component...My examiner says, okay, lets do the after landing procedure if this was another short field (dump the flaps, back pressure, hold the braking firmly) just after the fence the LLWS hits us...I am set up on the centerline crabbed all the hell way over into the wind, I had just kicked in the rudder to align us and at that moment the gust takes us sideways. 2 seconds to decide..go around or land. We were low, and slow, the LLWS was there, and I said, we land, held the rudder, lowered the upwind wing a bit, and thankfully the gust subsided just as we were about 3 feet off so we drifted back to the centerline, and landed without too much side loading..but man I was not breathing for about 10 seconds there. We taxied back on delta....then the sweetest words of all!!!
Post flight debrief was another great learning experience..now I have a ticket to keep on learning.
This afternoon, the guy next to me reached over, shook my hand, and said, "Congratulations, you are a Private Pilot"..I still can't believe it!
EDIT-UPDATE: Yeah I know its 2am...just can't sleep right now..still in the midst of disbelief!
Just to add some info on the checkride...Whatever you do if you are still a student, be very prepared for anything, but take the advice of everyone who says to just be relaxed. That helped alot! The whole process yesteday was about 4 hours. Two hours oral, which was a great learning experience, and a different one for the examiner since he often doesn't do PPL checkrides with applicants who own their own planes. For example, I did not know that the stall warning horn, while not on that famous MEL list of VFR instruments we all sorta memorized, is listed on some 172's as a required instrument, but in my POH, it is not listed at all. When he asked me about that item being inop, and could I still fly, I answered 'yes', which brought about the discussion, and we went into the POH. Lo and behold..not there. So for 71D, a stall warning horn is not a required item! I am not sure if the oral was more in depth than he usually does, but he was very much into how much I understood my responsibilities as an owner and the systems in the plane, currency, and MX issues. He was also very very precise about my XC planning, airspace, limitations, the special emphasis areas, and aeromedical factors.
The checkride was probably one of my best learning experiences in all my training. Yesterday WX, in a word: 310/veering 020 12kts G to 19 LLWS. We did the preflight, cockpit management, exchange of controls, and set up the GPS for an XC from POU to MHT, but obviously did not fly the XC. I was very careful about my XW taxi and takeoff procedures, and the moment we got up, the LLWS was pretty obvious. Flew out about 50 miles on course, then diverted to a short field uncontrolled airport, Kingston-Ulster, which is set up right next to a bridge across the Hudson River. Set up once for the landing pattern entry, and the winds were gusting and in the 45 into the pattern we were being pushed sideways along the downwind path, I broke it off, told him I was not comfortable with the set up, and that I was going to reset the entry a mile farther out with a more straight in approach less than 45 degrees to the pattern to compensate for the wind drift. I didn't even have to simulate a short field landing...sheesh it was a short field, gusting crosswind, work the plane all the way down through the taxi situation. He actually smiled as we taxied back to the runway. I did too!
Did the maneuvers next: Worked a while under the hood, all the turns, climbs, stalls, you can imagine how interesting the slow flight was yesterday in those conditions! Based on the landing process at Kingston, we did not have to do the ground ref work, and besides, the winds were enough to keep us above 800-1000 agl as a safety factor. But we did the engine out to just above my emergency field, and I managed a pretty good teardrop turn to final, just to compensate for the effect of the gusts on the plane, because I knew that this was gonna be a one time try in any conditions, but especially yesterday it had to be aligned well right off the bat. Back to POU, for some reason they switched to rwy 6 from using 33 all day! so here goes a XW landing with almost a 45 degree component...My examiner says, okay, lets do the after landing procedure if this was another short field (dump the flaps, back pressure, hold the braking firmly) just after the fence the LLWS hits us...I am set up on the centerline crabbed all the hell way over into the wind, I had just kicked in the rudder to align us and at that moment the gust takes us sideways. 2 seconds to decide..go around or land. We were low, and slow, the LLWS was there, and I said, we land, held the rudder, lowered the upwind wing a bit, and thankfully the gust subsided just as we were about 3 feet off so we drifted back to the centerline, and landed without too much side loading..but man I was not breathing for about 10 seconds there. We taxied back on delta....then the sweetest words of all!!!
Post flight debrief was another great learning experience..now I have a ticket to keep on learning.
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Let me be the first (on the board) to offer you a hearty congratulations!