On Easter Day, my parents and I flew out to St. Louis. We left Indianapolis Metro (KUMP) at about 0715 Eastern. The skies were clear and the winds aloft were about 25 kts on the nose. We were in the Cessna 182, so our ground speed was still around 120 kts. The first hour and 30 minutes were not very exciting, climbing up to 8500' using the KAP 140. We used the GPS and followed it in to St. Louis via the STL VOR. During the decent we passed right in front of the active runways at KSTL. We got to see a regional jet taking off and then continuing over the top of us. Neat to see from that perspective.
Easter was great. We had Ribs and Chicken Marsala and other delicious foods. I got to see my cousin Ryan, my step cousin Megan, my Aunt Sara, my Step-Uncle Grant and my Grandparents. it was a neat little Easter. I can't remember the last time I've seen the Aunt and Step-Uncle. They all wanted to go up and fly with me, but it was really really windy on the ground. In fact, the winds at take-off were 18 kts gusting to 23. They were about 50 degrees off runway heading which, for those of you playing along at home equates to a 13.7 knot crosswind. The Max demonstrated in a 182 is 15 kts.
dAnyway, we took off and headed south around KSTL. We went about 2 miles north of the St. Louis arch and engaged the KAP 140 to take us back to 7500'. We got a hefty tailwind and our ground speed was nearing 175 kts. On the decent into Indianapolis, we hit 178 kts, which is quite impressive for a Skylane. But, ground speed isn't a good measure when you aren't actually attached to the ground. I made a pretty good landing at KUMP given the 15+kt winds on the ground and made the realization that I had officially been the pilot of an airplane going over 200 mph. But only ground speed, with a 30 kt tail wind. Whatever, I'll take it. Bring it on Mooney Acclaim.
Showing posts with label SUS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SUS. Show all posts
Monday, April 19, 2010
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
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.
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.
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