Pilot Certificate

My permanent certificate arrived today! Actually it looks like a plastic credit card. But now I'm a card-carrying pilot, and I can exercise my privileges to act as pilot in command of an airplane, single engine land.

I'm a Pilot!

Random thoughts about the day...

Woke up at four AM, couldn't get back to sleep.

Left house early, got the airport early, took off for Easton with 7 miles of reported visibility and saw that the visibility was worse than expected. Returned to airport to wait for better visibility. Waited for 10 miles of visibility.

Tried again, visibility was better but not great, really glad I had GPS. I didn't even pick Easton up out of the haze until two miles out.

Landed, parked plane, tied down, examiner waiting at the door.

Long discussion about the way he does the exam. Forms to fill out, logbooks to inspect, etc.

Finally started, covered lots of stuff, map symbols, frequencies, LAHSO, aeromedical, scuba diving, static port blockage, equipment required for day or night or mountain flying, required inspections, required endorsements, scuba diving, VFR cruising altitudes, why I planned my cross country as I did, gotchas in the complex airspace near BWI, light gun signals, equipment and classes of airspace, sharing costs of flight, required documents aboard, weight and balance, short field takeoff performance, density altitude, and on.

Had lunch, more questions over lunch.

Finished oral portion, abbreviated preflight check of plane, taxied out.

Soft field takeoff, trip around pattern, slip, normal landing, touch and go, trip around pattern, short field landing, takeoff, depart for cross country.

Climb to 2500, checkpoints made on time, found KRJD, then started air work, slow flight, stalls, steep turns, hood on, unusual attitudes, lost procedures, tune and track to VOR, engine out descent to land at a private grass strip (with go around once landing was assured), return to Easton, soft field landing, taxi to parking.

I got a late start, it took a lot of time in the oral portion, and by the time he gave me my temporary certificate, it was getting toward sundown. So I filed for SFRA return, took off, and hustled back to Fort Meade, making it in as the sun was going down. I was again really glad for the GPS - I had a very hard time finding the field in the haze. By the time I got the plane tied down I couldn't even see the tach/hobbs meters - I wasn't planning for a night flight so I didn't have a flashlight. I wound up using the light from my cell phone to see the numbers.

But finally, I'm a pilot.

Solo 10

I realized last weekend that my landings were not pretty, poor in fact. It seems I worked so hard on cross country and other check ride preparation that I simply haven't made many landings lately. So today I went out on this amazingly warm November day and I did 10 trips around the pattern. By the time I did those last few, it was all much smoother and I'll be much more confident when I go for the check ride.

Practical Test Postponed

KBWI 111126Z 1112/1218 03009KT P6SM -RA OVC070 FM111300 04013G21KT 5SM -RA OVC025 FM112100 05015G25KT P6SM -RA OVC035 FM121000 03015G25KT 6SM -RA BKN025 OVC035

Lesson 30

There's a club rule that says that students must have flown with an instructor with the previous 30 days to fly solo. In order to be able to fly solo over to Easton for my check ride, I needed to fly with an instructor, so I decided to try something different today. I sent a message to the instructor (which he apparently didn't read) about going to Gaithersburg, 20 miles to the west. I had never flown west from Fort Meade, so it seemed like a good idea to use the lesson for familiarity with flight in that area. When he drove up today, he asked me what I wanted to do today. He said he'd never been to Gaithersburg/Montgomery County airpark before, but we can make that flight. I'm glad he also grabbed his GPS because we wound up needing it for the flight.

So we took off and headed straight out and he showed me the landmarks to look for to stay clear of BWI's class B and the FRZ. While the wind was calm at the ground, it was sure zipping along at altitude and it gave me trouble for the whole flight. We did a touch-and-go, and then saw just how much the airplane was struggling to gain speed because of the uphill slope on the runway, then it only slowly climbed out. Not fun.

We turned on course to go back to Fort Meade, and I came in way high on the landing. Then we had to do one more takeoff/landing so I did what was probably my best soft field takeoff ever, again climbed slowly, came around, and landed again.

Boy was I rusty and glad I wasn't trying that flight alone. Boy was I glad for a little practice before my check ride. I think I'll make a few trips around the pattern before I fly to Easton on Wednesday for my check ride. A few more landings wouldn't hurt.