A student pilot diary from Sydney, Australia.
Sunday 3rd October 2004 - 1.1H TT41H - Second area solo - Practice Forced Landings - Arrived at Bankstown and took the picked up the keys to Hotel Charlie Echo, which is a lovely little 152 with a new paint job. Gnats were swarming all over the thing when I got there - for some reason they seemed to favour the nose of the aircraft - don't ask me why. Normal pre-flight and the aircraft was in great nick. Uneventful taxi and run up. Took off into slightly bumpy conditions but perfect visibility. Scooted out to the training area for some practice forced landings.
It was difficult to pick the wind, which is a key part of practicing forced landings. It seemed to be coming from the south, just judging by my drift but without smoke I couldn't be sure. Tried four forced landings and each time I muffed up the wind direction, alternately attempting an approach with the wind at my back or side, which is not the correct idea. I should be landing into a HEADWIND - my memory items of the procedures to follow were pretty well spot on, but my entry direction was consistently wrong. More practice required on the balcony at work, walking through the sequences.
I was tuned to Sydney Radar and I had a little bit of fun listening to the Sydney Controller struggle with a VFR pilot who's accent was pretty strong. After advising him he'd been encroaching controlled airspace for about ten miles, the guy just acknowledged then had the audacity to ask to lodge a flight plan in the air. This requires a bit of work for the controllers and I honestly expected them to say no, they were too busy. If this bloke was too lazy or ignorant to keep out of controlled airspace or lodge a flight plan before take off, why should they help his arse out? To their credit they did everything possible to help this bloke, lodged a flight plan for him into their system, issued a squawk code and off he went. I was very impressed at how helpful they were.
Headed back to Bankstown, a bloke in a Piper called that he was at 2RN just after I called that I was at Prospect, both inbound. This meant we would both the joining the Bankstown circuit at about the same time. I put my eyes out on stalks and constantly scanned the direction he would be coming from. Spotted him and it was clear he was going to pass behind me, I was nicely lined up on downwind and about to report that to the tower.
"Ahh, Bankstown tower, that Cessna is a long way off to our left, could I track direct for base?"
The bugger had cut me off! He was going to slip right up the inside to land in front of me! That's cool with me though as his aircraft was a good 10-20 knots faster than me, better he overtake now than be stuck on my tail all the way around. They gave me instructions to track direct for base. Seeing as how I was on downwind this pretty much meant to keep heading straight ahead. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to but for forms sake I reported I was established on base. Slightly high approach, dropped it back to idle, dead stick most of the way in, added power at the bottom when I was back on the glide slope and plonked it down for a firm landing, rate it 7/10.
I was supposed to go straight out afterwards with Steve Cowell for crosswind landings but in typical fashion, when you want bad weather, the skies clear magically, and vice versa.
Thursday 7th October 2004 - 0.8H TT41.8H - A nice strong 20KT crosswind had magically appeared for me to practise crosswind circuits with Matt Bryan. Took HCE out again taxied out, ran the engine up, held short of 11 centre and requested clearance. Took off for the first time, as far as I can remember, from the centre runway and started fighting the crosswind to stay in the circuit. Soon decided that the crosswind was too strong to fight and started using it to my advantage instead.
Today must have been a red letter day because Matt cracked at least two (2) jokes! Got a little bit low on a flapless approach and as we passed over the tennis courts Matt remarked,
"We're a little bit low here. I'm supposed to be playing tennis this arvo but I don't want to get there this early." Zing!
A bit later I made a landing with a bit of a hop. It wasn't a bad bounce, I think just a little hop combined with a gust that picked us up and moved us sideways. Touched down again but this time it was a bit harder and a little sideways.
"I liked your first landing better," Matt said. Pow! Thank you, I'll be here all week. Try the veal!
Did some very nice crosswind landings and a couple of ordinary ones and brought it back home. Of course my last landing was not the best, but again I think we had a small balloon combined with a gust that picked us up. Saved it for an OK landing.
Matt signed me off to do crosswind circuits solo at the next opportunity and said he thought I went well. I was pretty pleased with the results and hence have no anxieties about crosswinds, something which notoriously plagues student pilots.
Sunday 10th October 2004 - Crosswind solo - 0.8H TT42.6H - a nice steady crosswind was blowing so it was good to get this compulsory part of the syllabus out of the way with such ideal conditions. I kept dropping a wing or going through a bounce occasionally, but as the conditions were so smooth I think I was actually flying through someone else's propwash.
Something that has puzzled me at Bankstown is the use of the phrase 'northern side,' meaning runways 11 left/29 right. I can't find anywhere in the AIP that advocates or prohibits the phrase, but when I asked for traffic information, the tower told me the traffic I was querying was for the northern side. I later requested a clearance to land 11 left and wasn't corrected, so clearly either phrase is acceptable. This month. Just wait until some dopey Cessna driver gets confused, does the wrong thing and then complains to CASA about the use of incorrect phraseology in a vain attempt to avoid being fined for screwing up. Then it's back to the old style, out of the book, say the right thing or die, geht in ordnung schiesse. No jokes over the radio, no g'days - all to get rid of a local nuance.
A lot of novice pilots have a fear of crosswinds - I think they're fun. You basically do everything wrong - you hold the ailerons all the way over until you rotate, let the aircraft weathercock after takeoff, point the nose in a diagonal in the circuit, turn too early (or too late) onto final, point the nose away from the runway to keep it lined up, then get the aircraft sideways in the flare, slipping into the wind, cross-controlling the rudders and holding the ailerons back into the wind when you roll out. Top stuff. Quite challenging to get right consistently.
I think I did pretty well, held a tight circuit, made a couple of landings that were below average, a couple more that were OK and a brilliant landing that made me cheer out over the empty intercom.
Of course - the one brilliant landing I made? I stuffed it all up by forgetting to put the carburettor heat off before touching down.
Thursday 14th October 2004 - Short field operations check flight - 0.7H TT43.3H - The days leading up had been the hottest October days on record. When I dragged my sweaty carcass out of bed and checked the ATIS, it was reported as 37 degrees at Bankstown, with a 10 knot crosswind. Just what I need to practice short field landings.
Matt sent me out to check out the aircraft and I expected to sweat my body weight over the next hour. As soon as I walked through the security gate, a lovely cool breeze picked up and the temperature dropped by 10 degrees. The wind had shifted through 180 degrees while clouds thickened and darkened while they scudding across the sky looking like streams of dark smoke. I was half expecting Matt to come out and knock the lesson on the head, but thankfully he didn't.
Made some good progress, the wind was pretty strong and I nailed the easy part of taking off, but the landing part needs a bit of work. Matt gave me some good advice and it seemed to be paying off.
While I was in the circuit a guy reported that while over Hornsby he had just encountered the most severe turbulence he had ever seen in 40 years of flying. He repeated it three times just so everyone knew about it. Matt and I commented that it really wasn't that bad at Bankstown - light turbulence at most and at least the wind was a steady speed. Later that night my mate Jacque emailed me to say that he had been trying to navigate through it and said it was "like driving a 4x4 down a washed out dirt track down a mountain."
Sunday 24th October 2004 - Short field ops solo - 0.9H TT44.2H - How quickly the weather can change in Sydney. Immediately after the hottest October days on record came the heaviest October rain on record. My flight on Thursday was cancelled due to poor weather but on Sunday the rain stopped just long enough for me to risk heading out to Bankstown.
The power was off at Basair and the lights switched back on soon after I got there. Jacques was there for a nav flight at the same time, which didn't look too promising given the 8/8ths cloud cover. The ceiling was only 1900 feet. We chatted for a while, then Matt signed me out to practice short field take offs and landings. As I taxied out a brief shower passed. Rain spattered onto the windscreen, thrown back by the propellor and slipstream. I looked around the field to see what everyone else from the school was doing. No one turned around, so I was buggered if I would let a little water scare me. In fact, I re-doubled my efforts to get out to the runway before any other bugger did.
Matt advised me to build up in stages, so I started off with a normal circuit to get into the swing of things, then gradually decreased the speed down to 55 knots on final. The circuit was busy so I had to keep a tight circuit and keep close to the guy in front, otherwise my decreased approach speeds would baulk everyone else. I didn't cause anyone behind me to go around, so I guess that was a successful policy. The tower controller was flat out and doing a really good job at keeping the traffic moving around.
I even managed to sneak in a stop and go. I was feeling pretty good at how things were going and requested a stop and go and was told it was permitted as long as there was no delay. Right-io, then. I lined up on final and brought the speed back to 55 knots, checked the wind sock, which looked about 20-30 degrees off the centreline and maybe 10-20 knots. Looking over at the right side of the runway I could see a line of about half a dozen aircraft holding short of my runway, some waiting to line up and some waiting to cross, a couple of Cessnas, Tobagos, a Duchess and a Metroliner, of all things. I could tell they would all be looking and critiquing my approach and landing, because in their position I would be doing the same thing. My approach was perfect, landed right on the numbers, left main first, gentle landing, on the brakes to stop at the second taxi way and off for a short field take off to hear the guy behind me cleared to land. Nice, textbook and I didn't disgrace myself in front of all those other pilots.
Now I was feeling cocky and just about ready to come in, so around again and request the northern side. Northern side granted and told to exit runway without delay as the guy behind me was pretty close.
"Cleared runway left and make it snappy," I replied. Make it snappy? It was the first thing that popped into my head.
First mistake - overshot the turn so had to hustle to get back into position, which meant I had hardly any time at all to get back onto the glidepath and slow down for the short field landing. Cool under pressure, I am. Speed up to 70 knots, got back into position, slid onto the glidepath then at the last moment, dropped full flap, slowed down to 55 knots, plonked onto the runway for a firm, but not hard landing, held the yoke back hard, stood on the brakes and exited at the first taxiway and got a thank you from the tower for doing a good job.
It doesn't get much better than that.
Thursday 28th October 2004 - Pre-GFPT check flight - 1.5H TT45.7H - And then it again, some times it gets as bad as this. At least that's the way it feels right now.
Headed out to Bankstown for a check to see what I need to work on before my GFPT next Sunday. I would be taking instructor Joe Kelly along for a ride. Joe has always admired my Irish Rugby Jumper, being from Ireland himself. My Weight and Balance calculations didn't work out too well, so I'll need to work on that. Strange because I hadn't had any problems with that previously. I worked out afterwards where I had been going wrong, adding the arms together instead of the moment arms. Question session went OK before we flew. Pre-flight went OK as well. Taxied out without incident, took off and headed for the training area.
For some reason I was behind. Didn't switch the transponder on until abeam Prospect, didn't climb after leaving the Bankstown GAAP until late, switched frequencies to Sydney Radar late. Acknowledged to Joe that I was late with all of these and he was OK with that as I had recognised my errors and addressed them.
Now. Stalls. Stalls went pretty well, still need some practice, which is only natural at this stage but coming along acceptably. The aircraft I took, TLQ didn't stall dramatically, just mushed down and started falling out of the sky. It was also quite low on power and took ages to climb. I even bitched about it but Joe had no sympathy for me at all.
Instrument flying - good.
Overall aircraft handling - OK
Steep turns - acceptable.
Practice forced landing - too slow.
Precautionary search and landing - unacceptable.
Off to Hoxton Park, which I have only visited once before. The wind was making it a bitch to land on as there are a line of trees beside the runway which roils and disturbs the wind. Long float with a flapless approach. Short fielder upset by sudden gust of crosswind and gave up. Glide approach stuffed up completely and overshot runway.
Back to Bankstown and no problems there. The only bright moment was making the final approach nice and low and seeing my tormentor, err, tester hover his hands over the yoke and throttle. I felt like asking Joe if my flying was making him nervous.
When I got back to the school I felt like pale, sweaty, luke-warm crap. Karen, another instructor commented that I looked like I had been through the wringer. Rod gave me a quick pep talk which helped a bit and I had a chat with Justin from my PPL theory course, which helped as well.
Nearly collected a white van when driving home as my mind was still going over where I went wrong. Yes, I know I should be dwelling on what I got right but that is more easily said than done.
Wednesday 3rd November 2004 - Prec search and landing revision 1.1H TT46.8H - Joe Kelly took me out again to run through precautionary search and landings. Couldn't have asked for better conditions, perfect visibility, only a few clouds way up high.
Made an entry to an emergency field which was basically a strip of dusty farm road with grass on either side. After a false start, I executed a half decent prec search and landing. When I was on the base leg Joe expressed a concern that we were too high. I didn't think we were and after I turned onto final it became clear why he thought that - we were looking at different fields. Joe thought I was aiming for a field in front of the one I was aiming for. I can't imagine why he thought that - there were huge high-tension power lines strung across it. Buggered if I wanted to end up hanging off them.
Off to Camden next, did a couple of touch and goes when Joe asked me, casual like, what I thought my circuit spacing was like.
"Hmmm...a little far out, maybe."
Joe immediately pulls the power off.
"You've just had an engine failure."
I knew he was going to say that, so best glide speed, carb heat, mixture, fuel and start heading straight back to the runway.
I wasn't sure I was going to make it to the runway and said so. Joe pointed out that this was why you should keep a tight circuit. I saw there was a nice big grassy field just this side of the runway and aimed for it. Sure enough, a lovely big thermal was waiting there for me and gave me just enough float to make it back to the strip. Isn't it great when nature helps out like that?
Thursday 4th November 2004 - Solo stalling - 0.8H TT47.6H - Lovely conditions again for flying. Headed out to the training area to do some solo stalling. On the way out the fresh air vent popped out, landed in my lap and scared the hell out of me. I thought it was a bird joining me inside.
I zoomed around for a while and enjoyed the view, tried a few stalls then a practice forced landing and decided to head back to Bankstown. I thought to myself how unusually busy the area frequency was, then realised I had never changed the frequency from Bankstown Circuit. Feeling somewhat chagrined, I checked the ATIS for Bankstown and landed uneventfully.
Saturday 6th November 2004 - General Flying Progress Test - 1.8H TT49.4H - Arrived at Basair early to run through the weight and balance and performance charts for the 152. Darrin Ward, the owner of Basair was to test me. The GFPT is basically the first formal practical step before a Private Pilots Licence and an important hurdle.
We had a chat before the flight, the P charts and W&B sheet I had completed were fine, but when Darrin asked me about a different surface for landing I stuffed it up. No biggie. Out we went for the practical part of the test.
Taxied out fine, HCE mucking up with fouled plugs, sorted them out and headed for the training area. Stalling went fine, ditto steep turns and instrument flight. Practice forced landings didn't go well at all. I still haven't got the hang of these f%#$ing things. Even after a demonstration and given a second go I didn't get it right. Fortunately we didn't even have a go at precautionary search and landing.
Into Hoxton Park for some circuits, short fielders and glide approach. About this time I was getting pretty fed up with myself for not getting the hang of forced landings, and to be honest I was getting pretty jack of the testing officer as well. Things I normally do well I started stuffing up, old habits reappeared and the things I thought I did ok weren't good enough either.
Back to Bankstown again and a couple of circuits to finish up the test. I'd never joined the circuit from outside the control zone so I wasn't quite sure about how I should go about it. I had half an idea, but afraid of looking stupid in front of the testing officer, I didn't clarify with the tower when I was permitted to descend to circuit height. I was just about to turn onto downwind when Darrin asked me if I was going to turn onto downwind any time today.
Now. Testing officers have a habit of, well, testing you. It's what they do. If you are doing well, they turn up the pressure or throw a spanner in the works to see how you cope. This trait meant that Darrin had firmly been removed from my Christmas Card list.
It was at about this time in the flight, at the 90 minute mark, that I stopped taking any interest in any of his input into the conduct of the flight. I didn't give up, I didn't stop flying and I didn't stop carrying out instructions, I merely started concentrating on flying the plane and not worrying about what the testing officer thought. I couldn't give a stuff at that point whether I passed or failed, I just started playing my own game. I didn't immediately start flying brilliantly, I was too rattled to make an instant recovery. A few circuits, including a go-around (I can't remember the last time I had to go-around because I messed up an approach) and back on the ground to tie down and debrief.
Back into the office and was asked how I thought I went. I thought I went pretty crap, but I passed - with the firm reservation that I needed to sort out forced landings as soon as possible, which I heartily agreed with and which concern I had expressed myself earlier.
But, yeah, I passed. It just doesn't quite feel like it.