First and Final Flights

Well, things are changing a little bit.  I'm going to be leaving the flying club I am in as soon as I can find someone to sell my share.  As a parting gift to myself, I took the C172 out to check out the fall colors.  It was a day before the big storms that came through and knocked off the rest of the leaves.  I snapped a few photos, but other than that, it was uneventful.

 

However, I have found the replacement for Sky-Vu.  It is a C152 out at Greenwood.  A lot fewer people (only 2-3 instead of 60).  I don't really need the nice airplanes and can save some money by flying something like this:

Tomorrow I'm going to be making a Pilot-n-Paws flight up to Wisconsin, near Green Bay.  More on that later.

Where's Summer B?

Hello eFriends!  I’ve been pretty quiet one here recently because I have been absent from the skies.  I’ve missed it, but during the summer time I play a lot of ultimate Frisbee and do a fair share of sailing.  I played when I was in college for Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.  In fact, I can be seen here in red shorts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxVXmJ9qZiM.  This tournament was about 3 years ago, but good enough for an example here. This year I’ve been captaining a mixed team from Indianapolis called “Liquid Hustle”.  This is the first year for the team and we have learned and have to learn a lot.  It’s been fun though.  Like I mentioned, I also sail.  I recently purchased a new boat, an MC Scow built by Johnson Boat Works in 1990.  I’m not going to bore you all with photos, but if you see sailboats on Eagle Creek Reservoir while flying or driving by, wave at me!

Anyway, to the flying:  Last night I went out for a night flight to get my currency back.  I started at about 9:20 from KEYE.  I did two trips through the pattern then flew northwest toward Zionsville/Lebanon.  I went north about 10 miles, just checking out the sights and headed back to KEYE for my third landing.  It was a beautiful night and I couldn’t have asked for more.  Wind was basically calm at the ground and was maybe 5 knots out of the northwest at 2000’.  Indianapolis looked magical from 1200’AGL.  I was listening in on the Indianapolis approach and I keep wondering if the woman controller I am hearing is Katie from http://bubo-scandiacus.blogspot.com.  Maybe someday I’ll request a touch and go over there and find out.  Seemed like a lot was going on yesterday though…

Time: 0.7 hrs

Landings: 3 night

Total: 118.4 hrs

P.S.  Bonus points for anyone who knew the title of the post was a Ben Folds Five song.

I love dogs, duh... (Rescue Flight #3)

Alright, you all probably know this, but I love dogs.  Dogs of all kinds.  Labs, Bassets, Weiners, Basenji's, etc.  In fact, aside from my Shar Pei/Lab mix Bo, the Basenji and Shiba Inu are my two new favorites.   BUT, that is not what I am writing about.  I'm writing to tell you about my most recent flight in support of PilotsNPaws, a non-profit organization that helps dog, cat Wand all animal rescue organizations connect with pilots to move these dogs to safety.  I've done three rescue flights, and this is about the third one.  I'll give a summary first, and if you have the same attention span I do, then you can skip the commentary later on.
Route: KEYE -> KJVY -> KEYE -> HAI -> KEYE
Passengers:
KEYE - KJVY - KEYE - Annie
KJVY - KEYE - KHAI - Mason, Honey (Collie Mixes) and Rufus (Australian Shepherd)
KEYE - KHAI - KEYE - Bobby and Ann (not Annie)
Weather - Clear and beautiful.  A little bumpy on the final legs.
Airplane: N146K a Cessna 172P

The Details:
I took off from KEYE with Annie.  We headed out to the Shelbyville VOR to try to get away from the KIND Class Charlie Airspace and to avoid the MOA and restricted airspace near Camp Atterbury.
The flight down was uneventful.  The FBO at JVY was nice and super friendly.  They let Annie and I hang out while we waiting for Barb to bring the pups up from further south in Kentucky.  She was unable to fly because of fog in the morning, but it cleared up by the time we departed.

We packed Honey and Mason in their own crates and put a harness on Rufus.  They were all super sweet and barely cried at all when we were flying.  We leveled off at 4500' after a 300 fpm climb.  Annie was enjoying herself, which was awesome because I was nervous about her flying.  Rufus was a sweet heart and just laid down in the back as soon as we leveled off.

We landed at KEYE uneventfully and let the dogs out to go to the bathroom.  Annie decided she was done and I took Ann and Bobby up for the rest of the flight.  We were about 100 lbs shy of the gross limit on the C172 with the 180HP engine, and I could tell it was a hot day.  We were climbing pretty slowly.

The flight to KHAI was pretty nice.  A little bumpy down at lower altitudes because the ground was heating up quite a bit.  It wasn't terrible, and no where near what can be felt in late July on a partly cloudy day.  We dropped off the pups with the rescue and wished them good bye.  They had been great, probably my quietest transport so far.  We made it back to KEYE without any issues monitoring KIND approach to hear who was coming in.  I don't always get flight following, but I almost always listen to approach to see who else is around.

I've attached a few photos above, but here are some more.  Those pups are darn cute.
Thanks to Barb, Ann, Bobby and Toni for the photos.

A Boring Monday

This past Monday was one of the most beautiful days I've seen around Indianapolis.  The forecast called for "abundant sunshine" and the meteorologists were correct.  I started my Rolls-Royce AE 3007 Line Maintenance course on Monday (I am the technical point of contact between Rolls-Royce and Cessna for the Cessna Citation X, which utilizes this engine).  This fact is only important because we get released from training at about 3:30 in the afternoon and that the customer training center is right next to KIND.  I got to see all of the Southwest B737s take off and land all day.  Of course there was a healthy representation from AA, UAL and DL.  And the inevitable Airtran...  Anyway, this inspired me to find somewhere to fly.  I texted my friend Beef, actually his name is Jeremy, but he got that nickname back in college at Rose-Hulman.  He said he would be waiting for me at the airport upon my arrival.  Beef lived in South Bend, so I got to fly to a new destination, KSNB.

The start of the flight was uneventful.  I flew up there via the OKK VOR and the GSH VOR.  The 172 doesn't have a GPS, but I did have a little handheld one I used for Hiking and Geo-Trecking back in the day.  I bring it along and program my route as a second source of information outside of my directional equipment.  It's a nice piece of equipment to have along.  I flew right by Grissom AFB and I got to see some of the neat planes they have on the ramp and at the museum from 7500'.  I called in to KSNB when I was about 23 miles out.  The vectored me in for a straight in to runway 36.  I made a great landing, and I remembered to enrich the mixture before my decent.

I stopped at Atlantic to find out that I didn't write down the unicom frequency and I had just pitched the Green Book in the back.  I idled out front for about 20 second and then decided to call the tower to ask.  Just as I did that the line guy hopped out from around the corner and parked me.  I had a nice experience at SBN, except that the "facility fee" was $40.  Ouch... Too bad it is the only FBO.

Beef picked me up and we went to the Heston Supper Club for dinner.  I saw something here I have never seen before.  There was a section of "combinations" that you could get for dinner.  The were the usual "surf and turf" type things.  But, under that item, it didn't list what the surf was.  Instead it was in the heading for the section.  It said "All combinations are served with choice of potato or vegetable, a soup or salad and an 8 ounce prime rib".  Now wait a second, are you telling me that this comes with a SIDE of Prime Rib?  I'm in.   I got the barnyard, which is a half slab of ribs, a 8 ounce prime rib and steak fries.  It was delicious, as you can see here:

Beef dropped me back at the airport and I preflighted, called Clearance Delivery and told them I was at the FBO, departing South Bend and heading toward Indianapolis via OKK.  I didn't bother going through GSH because it was only about 7 miles from KSBN. CD gave me a squawk code.  Just as I had they had finished the sentence, I was ready to roll, but remembered I hadn't removed the chalks.  I shut down the engine, hopped out, grabbed the chalks and then got back in and started her back up again.

I got my taxi clearance from tower and headed to runway 8R.  I took off without any issue but at about 500' agl, I looked at my transponder to make sure it was in ALT mode.  It was, but but it was also displaying 1200, which is NOT the squawk code assigned to me.  I called tower to ask what my code was again and then apologized for me being amateur.  He said something like "it happens to all of us".  I didn't really laugh because he just agreed I was being an idiot.

I flew on to OKK and watched  some large carrier type airplane to a couple of laps in the pattern at Grissom AFB.  It was really cool to see.  Granted, I could only see the lights and the call sign was non-descriptive.  But it was still neat to see.  When I was about 4 miles due east of KGUS, the carrier asked for a departure to Shelbyville, about 70 miles south.  I saw the carrier take off, turn north (presumably for the departure procedure) and then about 5 minutes later, I saw the same plane in front of me heading south.  I guess he was faster than my little C172.

I was soon passed off to Indianapolis Approach, and the following transfer took place:
Me - Indy Approach, Skyhawk 146K level at 6500'
ATC - November 146K, turn to heading 210, and uh... expect runway 14
(at this point in time, I became very confused but quickly realized what happened)
Me - Indy Approach,  my destination is Eagle Creek, I must not have been clear enough when talking to CD in South Bend
ATC - No problem, continue on current heading, altitude your discretion, maintain VFR
Me - blah blah blah.

This had not happened to me before, but it serves me right for not being clear to Clearance Delivery.  I was used to the controllers at Evansville (EVV) who just want to know what the direction of flight is because they don't offer flight following very far out.  It was a great trip, and I wish I had the funding to do that more often.  My next trip might be to fly down to the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs.  It will be me, Annie and Coby.  I'm excited.

The Next Step in My Training - Complete

I made a big step in my learning yesterday. I completed my checkout in the two Cessna 182's my flying club owns. The first is N182SV, A 2000 Cessna 182S. It has traditional steam gauges, but a GPS and KAP140 Autopilot. Autopilots and GPSs are new to be in the aircraft. The first planes I trained with at Mt. Comfort had them, but once I joined Sky-Vu, I only had the standard 6 pack gauges and then 2 VORs and an ADF. Luckily I had a handheld GPS as a back up. Pilotage is fun and all, but terribly inefficient.

The flight in Sierra Victor was about a month ago now, due to weather being terrible. Most of the required 5 hours of flight were done in our other C182, N721ZA. This is a 2004 Cessna 182T with G1000 avionics. Because of the avionics suite, I flew about 3.5 hours in this plane, and only around 2 in Sierra Victor.

So, here is what my 5 hours of required time looked like:
First flight was in SV. We departed from UMP and headed over to Mount Comfort (MQJ) and Shelbyville (GEZ). These are all on the east side of town, and the goal was just to get used to constant speed propeller operations as well as dealing with the different power settings and V speeds. I think I picked it up pretty quickly, and with direction from my instructor, all was well. I ballooned a little on a couple landings, and I bounced one pretty good, but we made it home safe. I ended up putting on 1.8 hours.

The next flight was a couple of weeks later in Zulu Alpha. We did mostly pattern work, but went from Eagle Creek over to Crawfordsville. I did a few turns on the pattern at Crawfordsville and then headed back to EYE. I had a 7 mile run that afternoon, so I didn't get as much time as I wanted to. We ended up with 1.3 on the Hobbs and decided we'd do it again to finish up the time.

Yesterday afternoon we completed that effort. I left work a little bit early and met my instructor at Eagle Creek around 3 pm. We did quite a round about flight and I landed at some airports I've never been to. First we headed off to Frankfurt (FKR) then Kokomo (OKK) then Wabash (IWH) and finally Huntington (HHG). They are all between 15 and 20 nautical miles apart, so we had some time to get settled in the air before entering the pattern at the next airport. I had some really good landings, and on the way back home we punched through a hole in the clouds and flew back at 6500' msl. Total on the Hobbs was 2.6 and after my instructor finished off the paper work, I had my checkout complete.

I think the next thing I going to try to work on is my check out in our C172RG and combine that with some instrument training. I'm not sure who I am going to have instruct, but I'm probably going to do my 10 hours of the RG and then go back and finish out in 146K...if we still have that plane. I wish my pockets were as deep as my dreams are grand...

Check Ride

Well, I’m a pilot. Hooray! I had my check ride on Saturday the 19th and I was successful. There almost two hours of oral exam questions and 1.1 hours of flying. It was pretty windy on Saturday, but I’m going to cover that stuff after the oral. Here is what went down:

I had to plan a flight to Spirit of St. Louis (KSUS) airport. Spirit is on the other side of St. Louis and I think he wanted to see how I would treat the Class Bravo airspace. I of course am fearless and chose to go right through it. Obviously this won me points becuase people shouldn't be afraid of controlled airspace, it is actually safer than uncontrolled airspace. The flight planning portion was fine, he pointed some things out on the sectional chart and asked about them. We talked a little bit about 2 way communications and when I was required to talk to someone and then asked if the plane had a GPS. It didn't, and he was surprised, but kind of pleased at the same time.

From there we covered aviation weather and airspace minimums. I almost did this flawlessly, but overall I did a good job.
After about 2 hours of oral questions we headed out to the plane. From there he asked a few system questions about the gages and the placement of counter weights on the controls surfaces. I knew these becuase Nate has prepared me well. We took off uneventfully, even with a stiff crosswind and headed toward the first check point on my cross country, Boone County Airport. Once I had it insight, he diverted me and we did some air manuvers.

Here is the order of things on the check ride:
Take off
First check point
Clearing turns
Steep turns (we only did 180s)
Turning power on/off stalls
Spin awareness (he set up the plane where we would have entered a spin)
Hood work
- constant airspeed ascents/descents
- turns to heading
- unusual attitudes
- lost procedure (using VORs while under the hood)
Right after I took off the hood, I confirmed where we were and then he pulled the power and opened the door and window
He closed the door a little bit later but left the window open to add some confusion.
We were just south of the Sheridan airport so we landed there by gliding in. I did the soft field landing and take-off, then a short field Take off and headed back to TYQ (Indy Executive).

At TYQ we did two landings, one was short field and one was accuracy.J.C. stressed that when you were in the pattern, you should always be able to land if power is pulled out, so that the pattern legs adjust accordingly when you have a heavy cross wind. And that slips may be necessary. Also, he said when he flys his 172 (which is a 1983) he does no power landings as a norm. So I think I’ll going to start practicing them on my own. A complete no power landing is kind of nuts to me, but I guess it isn't a big deal if I practice them.

Now, with all of that said, here are the things that I think I could have focused on more:
- Gliding (all the way to landing with no power), especially in pattern
- Radio communications – I think I do a good job of it, but I wish I would have had more experience with it. (Specifically controlled airspace)
- Turning stalls – power on/off
- SIGMETs – Tango, Sierra and Zulu (I hadn’t heard of these before, but I made some good guesses about them) A sigmet is a weather advisory for the air, Tango is for turbulence, Sierra is for Icing and Zulu is for Visibility.
Overall, it was a good experience, and I probably would have had a better post if I was able to write this just after the checkride. Oh well, 2 weeks later isn't so bad.

Solo XC - Evansville, IN (KEVV)

I completed my second cross country today.  Well, half of it.  I went to Evansville to visit my grandparents for the evening.  This whole flying thing is really great.  Anyway, There isn't a whole lot to talk about, so I'll do another photo post: