Random thoughts, organized and categorized for your consumption.
Flying
Flight Lessons 19, 20, and 21
Nov 25th
I must have really bad luck with equipment, or something. The 19th flight lesson was short because of the rapid onset of darkness (stupid wintertime!). The 20th was fogged out with visibility of less than 500 feet. The 21st was only 30 minutes long thanks to a weak engine. Needless to say, I won’t be flying that particular airplane for a while.
If there is a silver lining out of all of this, its that I’m really learning not to trust the engine in the aircraft I fly in, so I’m extra paranoid about finding an emergency landing spot each time More >
Flights 17 and 18
Nov 12th
I managed to go to a new airport and put a plane into the fix-it shop in this installment of flight training 101.
First up I got to go to San Carlos, just a quick hop up the peninsula from Palo Alto, and just close enough to completely throw off my check list for landing. Other than one completely hosed approach, things fared fairly well. Well, I think I did OK, anyhow.
This morning I headed out in the same plane as flight 17, and no one had flown it since I brought it in the night before. After doing all the More >
Flights 15 and 16
Nov 4th
The most recent flights were more of the same: flying the pattern, learning how to properly setup to land and then takeoff again. Should be getting easier, but I’m still finding ways to blow the base to final setup and then to be a bit early on roundouts at landing.
One exciting new event that happened was my near-night flying where I began losing spatial awareness, cutting my downwind leg short, and ending up a little closer to the runway than I’d like prior to landing. That was a bit rough, but nothing compared to the student ahead of me who More >
Flights 13 and 14
Oct 23rd
I can now say that a long break from flying does indeed dull the skills.
After my long business trip I had two back-to-back lessons and found that I’m not as sharp on my landings and pattern work as I once was. Even going out to do the normal maneuvers proved to be a bit sloppy for me. Lesson 13 was just about trying to remember what I had learned previously, and I did slip up a bit, but the landing went OK. Lesson 14 took me to Livermore, where I blew the whole approach, landing, and pattern, but did OK More >
Flights 10, 11 and 12
Oct 1st
I’m now in the phase where all my flights are about pattern work, radio work, and landings and take-offs. The short summary of the last three lessons goes like this:
Flight 10: engine runs rough, making the 3 touch and goes a little slow and climb out a bit challenging. On the 4th attempt at the runway I call it quits and decide that this engine just won’t work today. Just a half hour of flying this time around.
Flight 11: more touch and goes. Getting a bit better at judging where the runway is, when to start down, etc. Still not More >
Flights 7, 8, and 9
Sep 16th
At this stage in the game I’m learning to fly the pattern and pratice take-offs and landings. It’s pretty hard going, as the lessons come fast and the margin for error is very low. It also requires a lot of talking to the tower, watching for other planes, and generally going through a mental checklist very, very quickly.
The instructor says I’m doing well at the landing approach, and OK and landings, but I can’t help thinking that the issues I’m still having with take-offs and operating in the pattern are large ones. Hopefully things will improve with time, since I’m More >
Lessons 5 & 6: Crud and Partial Redemption
Aug 29th
Last week I did two flying lessons in the same week. The hope was that this would allow me to retain more of my know-how without sliding backward into regression. Well, it sort of worked.
On the 5th lesson I really blew the take-off roll and the landing was a mess. Too much rudder, then not enough, then a lot more than was needed: that was the take-off until the instructor stepped in and fixed things. On the landing I put the nose right in the middle of the runway, in a crosswind, and found myself on the far left side More >
Birthday Day Stress and Lesson 5
Aug 15th
The day started off a little rough, with an early awakening for a conference call, and didn’t really get much better from then on out. Yes, its my birthday, and my mother’s birthday, and now Steve and April’s newest born’s birthday. And sadly, it is also Ben Affleck’s birthday too. That was a real downer to learn about.
I did manage to sneak out of the office a little bit early and get in another flying lesson. This time it was all about not paying attention to the gauges and just “feeling” the plane. Good thing too, as the sky was More >
Lesson 4: Radio Work and Landings
Aug 13th
Today I had the fourth (I think) flying lesson in Palo Alto. It was a real doozy as it required me to talk to the airport tower as well as setup and land (or attempt to land) the plane.
As expected, it was a minor success bookended by a series of incremental failures. I don’t have any idea what I’m saying to the tower at this point, what the ATIS is saying to me, and I certainly had a lot of mess to deal with on the take-off roll and landing. Tail-dragger aircraft sure are tough to manage.
The instructor said I More >
Crappy Commercial Flights
Aug 13th
I had the great displeasure of flying from Oakland to Seattle this past Friday, just after the new “liquids ban” was put in place for all commercial aviation. This change seems to have completely fubar’d the airports, leaving an overworked air system even more in disarray.
All told, I spent 7 hours in two airports for 5 hours of meetings in a remote office. I would like to say that the face to face time was worth it, but I have to question how useful travel is when things are as painful as they now are at major airports. Kudos
Kudos TSA, More >