Float Plane Flying - Kenmore Air

Last week, when I was in Seattle for the week, I decided to take a lesson.  I did a little bit of online research and found Kenmore Air.  Kenmore, dubbed as "The Seaplane Airline", operates a fleet of de Havilland Beavers and Otters (DHC-2 and DHC-3) to locations all around the Puget Sound.  They also have a small flight instruction fleet with 2 PA18 Super Cubs, 2 Cessna 180s and at least one more Beaver.  I called the flight instruction desk about 2 months before I actually was planning on going out to Seattle.  One, because I wanted to make sure they had availability on this busy pre-4th of July week, and two, because I was super excited.  I got a lesson at 8:00 am on Wednesday the 30th.

My travel to Kenmore was an adventure because I didn't have a car and had to walk for 1.5 miles to the Ferry, then sit on the Ferry for 35 minutes, then take a bus to Kenmore.  I left the hotel at 6:10 and arrived at 8:10.  Oops, a little late! The sign was a beautiful site to see.

I walked into the main office and said I was there for a flight lesson.  The other customers in the office were probably a little confused because they were probably there for a flight to the San Juan islands.  My instructors name was Nile, not Niles, but Nile.  That took some getting used to.  He gave me a quick review of all of the A/C systems and where all the switches were that I would need.  This was the first aircraft that I have flown that had a stick instead of a yoke.  It was pretty neat, i think I like it better.  We casted off from the dock and headed out.  We did a run up and then followed the west shore of lake Washington until we could head out to the Puget Sound.  I've made a very very rough sketch of our flight below.

The orange circle is where we did some take off and landings.  We did quite a few of them, including confined space take offs, crosswind and normal landings.  Step taxiing was pretty fun.  I ended up logging 1.6 hours.  Here are some more photos of the day.

I highly recommend taking seaplane lessons.  It's great to do a different type of flying.  I'd like to get my rating some day, but I'll try to do it somewhere less expensive.... hehe

My Recent Flying Opportunities - Why I Network

I've recently been introduced to a fellow pilot who is very fortunate to fly for business and pleasure and be afluent enough to fly very often. The first time I flew with him was in December to go out to Pennsylvania to pick up his son. The best part was that we got to fly in his Piper Malibu Turbo prop. I had a great time on that trip, and told him if he had any other trips to let me know.

Last Wednesday evening, at about 8:00 pm, the pilot called me. He would be flying out to Seattle and wanted to know if I would like to join as a co-pilot. He also invited Annie’s Dad who had introduced us. We both agreed and we were going to stay with Annie’s Uncle on Bainbridge island. We met the pilot at the Shelbyville airport at the hanger with the CitationJet1 and departed for Torrington, WY at about 6:30. We landed in Torrington, re-fueled and headed to Boeing Field in Seattle. It was dark when we landed, and I couldn’t see the 787, but I was looking for it.

We ended up staying in the hotel on Thursday night instead of heading to Bainbridge island via ferry because it would have been at 2:00 am local time before we arrived at the place we were staying. On Friday morning I sent Lindsay a bunch of text messages about how awesome it was and asked about work. She still wants to punch me in the face. I had a Mocha Latte at the first Starbucks, shopped at the pike street market and saw the fish throwers. After that we headed to the space needle and had lunch at the rotating restaurant. We took the Bainbridge ferry to the island in the evening for dinner and I hung out with Annie’s Family. (note, she was not there).

We left the following morning after lunch with the pilot’s son, daughter and future son-in-law. We arrived back home in Shelbyville at around 7:30 pm after a non-stop flight back.
Here are some details about the actual flights:
GEZ -> TOR: 3 hours and 10 minutes. 844.5 nautical miles
Not much to talk about here. I sat up front with the pilot in the co-pilot seat. We chatted about the airplane, turbine engines and such. He is a very interested individual and asked about N1 vs. N2 and which was fan and which was compressor and how limits for the rotating parts are determined and why the N1 limit is 101.5, but the N2 limit is only 100%.

TOR -> BFI: 2 hours and 50 minutes. 836.9 nautical miles
I actually sat in the back for this flight and let Bob Alonso sit up front. I took a sweet nap and work up during the approach over Seattle. It was unusually clear and the city lights were very bright.

BFI -> GEZ: 5 hours and 30 minutes. 1641 Nautical Miles
This flight was awesome. It was day time for most of the fight and the pilot hopped in the back from time to time and let me montitor the flight. I didn’t have to do a lot, but I did help with: Optimizing the %N1 for best fuel burn and range; monitoring ITT, Oil Temp/Pressure and do an RVSM Log (see below); answering radio calls and talking with ATC at Minneapolis, Denver Chicago, and Salt Lake City; watching for traffic and looking at the rocky mountains. It was pretty amazing.

An RVSM log is something that pilots have to do when the go into the Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum airspace above 29,000 ft. The previous separation between aircraft was 2000ft, and now it is 1000ft. A number of things need to be logged every hour to make sure that the instruments are behaving properly and you are truly at the correct altitude. Because the air is so thin, a minor change in the pressure outside that accounts for maybe 20 ft on the ground could make hundreds of feet of difference. Here is what is required to be logged:
- Altimeter settings
- Airspeed (True, ground and indicated)
- Fuel on board, fuel burn per hour and reserve fuel at landing
- location (nearest airport and altitude)
- Temperature outside