The IR is now in full swing and six lessons in the simulator have been completed out of a total of twenty.
They're coming along pretty well with little problems established so far. The ideology is something I'm really enjoying compared to visual flying where everything is so procedural and ordered that it almost makes navigating easy!
Over the past two lessons we've experienced an increase in the workload and an idea of what is to come. It is no easy task as a single pilot operating a commercial flight under instrument conditions and I think we're all starting to appreciate that.
Alongside the 'flying' in the simulator we seem to have a lot of downtime. It's very easy to say 'downtime' and associate very little with it but there is a significant amount of theory that we need to learn and in some cases seriously review before coming to the end of the training here with PTC.
Having said that the material is hardly something that gets the heart pumping and it has become quite difficult to just sit down and go through although slowly pieces are starting to come together.
This week the plan is to have another three simulator sessions before the weekend off and see what lies ahead next week. The first internal check ride tomorrow reviewing everything we have done so far including steep turns, stalls, unusual attitudes, NDB approaches and NDB/VOR holds.
I'll be sure to explain what all of that means in the coming weeks...
Wow! What an eventful past week or so! From losing 4,000ft in a couple of minutes to taking some of the family into the air for the first time it's been a period I'll most likely never forget!
Since the last update where I had been frustrated with weather conditions it was confirmed under the agreement with our sponsor airline that we would take part in the Upset Recovery Training outlined by a company called The Airplane Company based in Sanford, Florida.
The flight training group operate a number of different type of aircraft but the one that we would be most interested in (and be spending five hours in!) was the Extra 300 as mentioned in the previous post.
The course was to be conducted over three days consisting of three hours of ground school on Wednesday last week followed by a flight in the afternoon. The following two days consisted of two flights each.
I wouldn't like to comment on the performance of the Extra as we weren't briefed with such numbers nor do I have time to trawl the internet to find such figures! However, I will say this; it was far more powerful than what we have been used to!
The ability for the aircraft to get airbourne within only a few hundred feet was quite impressive as we rocketed up to 1,000ft before the end of the runway.
During the ground school introduction it was made clear that the main purpose of the whole three days was not to familiarise ourselves with the everyday flying of the aircraft but to understand more the principles of how certain situations in the air occur and how we deal with them.
"So wait a minute; we're going to be allowed to go up in these planes and you'll take care of everything? We just get to play with the yoke and throttle of a quarter of a million dollar piece of kit?"
"Pretty much."
"Well that suits me perfectly!"
The ground school consisted of briefings of each of our flights followed by case studies of situations where the actions taken by the pilots (based on poor knowledge and/or understanding of the basic principles of how an aircraft remains controllable) ended in significant fatalities.
In the afternoon the four of us headed to the airport to take part in our first lesson. This was mainly an introductory lesson where we got a feel of the aircraft, did some steep turns followed by a couple of barrel roles and one loop for good measure. Pulling significantly higher G's than normal (I reached over the three days +5.8 and -1 while a colleague nearly reached 7) made for a rather uncomfortable hour or so after landing. I'm not one for travel sickness but this was something else.
The next day we again headed to the airport for two more lessons. These started to look more at recovering from situations which could be experienced in commercial aircraft (as opposed to those built specifically for this type of operation). This was mainly focused around stalls and effective ways of recovering from them using the control surfaces we have available to us as pilots. In this case, the majority of authority is placed on the rudder, a control surface on the tail plane of the aircraft.
This led to two types of spins. Those where the nose was pointing down and those where the aircraft was completely flat on it's stomach heading towards the ground at an alarming rate.
Both were fantastic to do and again made for an uncomfortable hour on the ground post flight - not as bad as day one though!
On the third and final day we brought together everything we had gone through. Unusual attitudes, steep turns and stalls - all those scenarios that could be found in a commercial operation, although unlikely, could still be found. We also managed to fit in a few corkscrews and loops for good measure - it would be rude not to!
The experience was amazing. Being able to take the controls of such a fantastic piece of engineering was awe-inspiring at some points such as being half way through a loop approaching zero speed staring overhead directly towards the ground. Fantastic.
The highlight for me was definitely the following.
On Thursday afternoon we started our taxi to the active runway here in Melbourne. We were given 9L which is adjacent to 9R, the longest runway here in KMLB. As we taxied towards the threshold similarly the Delta Airlines 757 heading to Atlanta completed it's own taxi to the threshold of the runway, in it's case 9R.
"Delta 2213, cleared for take-off 9R."
"Extra, cleared for take-off 9L." This was a race...
The flight instructor opened the throttles on the Extra and as predicted we hurtled down the runway lifting the wheels off of the ground within seconds. This was ours. The plane was kept in ground effect (a few metres above the runway) for some time until the 757 began it's rotation. The instructor then conducted what he called a 'rocket departure' soaring into the air at a ridiculous speed. The Boeing had nothing on us. Or so we thought! As we left 800ft behind us the jet, now well into it's departure hurtled past us towards the heavens only a hundreds of metres away.
We certainly had the edge during the early stages but when that plane got warmed it we had nothing to come back with. Truly brilliant two minutes of fun!
At the same time as flying these flights over the three days we also got to see something that doesn't offer make an appearance in sunny Melbourne too often. A Russian cargo aircraft arrived to pick up two helicopters to take to Nevada for logging. Amazing machine to see and left quite a bit of smog over it's departure path as it left the runway!
On the day of commencing the Upset Recovery Training family members from the UK had arrived for a week. The weather had been unfortunately bad (to go flying) for the majority of their trip but finally, the day they were to depart back to Europe we got up in the air for just under an hour. Great weather made the flight very enjoyable!
Having had a good time with the upset training it was back into the classroom on Monday morning to begin the CPL ground school.
The Commercial Pilot's Course (CPL) is the next license we will be completing and to keep things simple it will be done in the twin-engined Piper Seminole. This is a similar aircraft to those that we have been flying now with a couple of major difference, the most obvious being lack of engine in front of the cabin and the addition of two on the wings! I'll be sure to explain more about the aircraft in the coming couple of weeks.
This course is designed to last around a month and will see the conclusion of our training here in the United States.
The plan at the moment is to return to Europe at the beginning of April after completing around twenty five hours in the plane.
First however, I have another seven flights to complete in the single-engine Warrior. Having flown this morning and two nights ago to West Palm international I am slowly working through. Hopefully they'll all be done within a weeks time!
Had a great week and hopefully those coming will be as enjoyable. The end of our training in Melbourne is finally coming in to view...
After a long long wait it's finally done - the FAA Private Pilot's License (PPL).
When we started flying, back in early June we had a number of goals to complete before concluding our single engine flying which we hope to do by mid-March this year. These included the following:
First solo flight
JAA check ride (PPL equivalent)
FAA PPL check ride
JAA CPL level Navigation progress test (the last flight before starting the multi-engine flying)
For those of you who have been following the blog for some time I completed the first two before starting the ATPL ground school stage back in August of 2011.
Since then, due to a number of different factors I have been unable to get the flight completed and have indeed continued the flight training beyond the check ride.
The check ride consists of two parts: an oral on the ground followed by a flight test.
The oral is conducted on the ground and is basically a one on one chat with the examiner. He'll initially checks the paperwork such as the flight plan and calculated performance figures before asking about the conditions along the route, the airspace (it's characteristics and minimas) along the flight path before moving on to more technical questions involving the aircraft (such as the make up of the engine and electrical systems) followed by questions focused around the human factors of flying (hypoxia etc.)
This usually lasts around 45 minutes to an hour.
Dependent on whether the questions are satisfactorily answered, the examiner will then let the student sit the flight test.
Departing from Melbourne airport on Runway 5 we headed on to the downwind to start the navigation flight at my starting point - above an old airfield just south west of the city. Before I reached this check point the examiner diverted me to Valkaria, an airport I have visited many times.
We entered the pattern to complete three landings. One soft field, a short field and finally a normal landing. Having done this we headed out into the practice area to do a number of different maneuvers.
Firstly he had me complete two steep turns - one left and one right. Then I was to fly a heading of 270 degrees and enter slow flight.
Slow flight is applying full flaps and reducing the speed to almost it's minimum before stalling.
Following this I conducted one stall with no power and one stall with full power (raising the nose to a much higher attitude than the former).
It was after this he cut my engine - simulated engine failure. As discussed last week I ran through the procedures and picked a spot to land. Shortly after running through what I would do he seemed satisfied and asked me to level off at 1,000ft to demonstrate a couple of ground reference maneuvers.
These basically involve solely flying with visual reference to the ground - usually a fixed spot (or a cow, as I've previously done) or a road. The idea is to keep equidistant from the point at all times, taking into account the winds to determine whether a steep, medium or shallow turn is needed.
Turns complete, it was time to head back up to a suitable altitude and go 'under the hood.'
Going 'under the hood' means putting on a pair of goggles which are designed to only allow the student to see the instruments within the cockpit with no visual reference from outside of the aircraft.
At this point he had control. He then put the plane into an unusual attitude which I had to recover from. Seeming satisfied he asked me to follow a heading and descend to 1,000ft. At this point I could hear him tuning into the radio the relevant frequency for Melbourne - we were going home.
"Maintain 030 and descend to 500ft."
Moments later: "Take your hood off."
I looked outside of the aircraft and in front, only a couple of miles ahead lay Runway 5, the same strip of tarmac we had taken off from only 54 minutes earlier.
Landing complete we returned to the stand where he duly congratulated me on passing the FAA exam and explained he would complete the relevant paperwork when we were back inside the building.
So, now I await the all important license through the post...the single engine stage of training moved ever closer to it's conclusion.
Saturday morning, 5.15am. Alarm goes off. Weary eyed I rise out of bed and get ready for my 8am solo flight.
I arrive at the Flightline around 6.15am and finish my flight planning. After checking the weather on the computers it looks like it's going to be a very good morning. The round robin flight would involve heading from Melbourne down to Stuart on the Atlantic coast before heading inland to Okeechobee and then back north to base.
The flight block time is scheduled as two hours and handy enough the actual flight should take a similar time including start up, taxi and shut down.
Paperwork complete, aircraft prepared I headed out to the run up area and completed the next couple of sections on my check list.
"Melbourne Tower; FIT 40 is holding short of Runway 23 at Echo, ready for departure."
"FIT 40 cleared for take-off Runway 23 at Echo."
Transponder set to ALT, flaps set, landing light on, mixture fully rich, throttle advance, temperatures and pressures in the green, airspeed is alive.
Into the morning sun the warrior climbs (at quite an impressive rate) as I direct her to the first way point en route to the first stop of the morning - Stuart.
I had yet to visit Stuart, a similar yet smaller airport to Melbourne but still controlled. There were no clouds at this time in the morning so the climb to 5,500 feet was smooth, uneventful and rather rapid. I was rather impressed with this particular airframe!
I've explained before the number of checks en route we are to conduct and this flight was not much different. I pride myself in trying to stay ahead of the aircraft and ten nautical miles north of Stuart I was ready to make my approach.
"Stuart Tower, good morning; 640FT is five miles north of the airfield, requesting touch and go and departure to the west with Bravo."
"640FT good morning; enter midfield for the left downwind for Runway 7. Report downwind."
Easy enough. Airport diagram out and time to plan the route towards the reporting point.
"Stuart Tower, 640FT is on left downwind for runway 7."
"640FT, cleared to land runway 7, fly runway heading after departure."
I've said this before and I'll say this again - landings always seem to come off better on solos! I'd like to think I'm quite critical of myself but I was extremely proud of my landing in Stuart and the one to follow in Okeechobee.
After touchdown, flaps were retracted and full power applied until the Piper Warrior was back where she had spent the last thirty five minutes.
"640FT, make left traffic runway 7, depart on course, free to change frequency above 2,500ft, good day."
The third and final airport of the day, Okeechobee is fast becoming an old favourite...well old at least. The airport is not towered meaning traffic has to be conducted by oneself and those flying and taxiing around the airfield.
A quick check of the weather and traffic frequency and I established Runway 5 was open. To enter the pattern it would involved overflying the airfield at 1,500 feet and then making a right tear drop approach to enter the left downwind for Runway 5 (see below).
A quick touch and go (again impressing myself!) and then back up to Melbourne.
By this time the clouds had started to move in and form. My planned altitude of 5,500 feet was scuppered the further I got towards Melbourne. 3,500 feet; 3,000 feet; 2,500 feet; 2,000 feet; 1,500 feet. Luckily by this time I was approaching the reporting point for Melbourne and I was able to descend to 1,000 feet and ask for a full stop landing.
"Melbourne Tower, FIT 40 is over Abandoned, 1,000 feet. Request full stop with Victor."
"FIT 40, fly straight in Runway 5. Cleared to land Runway 5."
A bit of a crosswind caught me out on final but other than that a safe landing and then taxi back to the ramp to park up. Overall a very enjoyable flight!
The progress test ride is fast approaching (hopefully early next week) and therefore I'm starting to get as much back seating in as possible. After the night flight last week (which I must admit was much more for enjoyment and inquisitiveness) I've not had much time in the back of the plane until today.
Back seating, as described before, is basically sitting in the back of the aircraft of another student's lesson. It takes away the stresses and distractions of A.N.C. - aviate, navigate and communicate and allows the back seater to concentrate on the areas he/she sees fit. This maybe listening to the radio calls, looking at how procedures are carried out or how manoeuvres are completed etc.
Today I was glad to get into the air for two back seat flights both covering similar lesson plans to mine over the next week or so. We're all pretty close to our progress check therefore getting in the back is as I said the other day, repetition. Seeing things happen more often certainly helps in cementing them in the brain and almost making them second nature. By being able to identify immediately the procedure and execution of any instruction is great and allows more time to be spent flying the aeroplane.
Anyway, up at 5.30am this morning and out of the door forty minutes later. Just after 7am we were airborne for the first fight of the day. I was due to fly again at 10am and then my own flight at 1pm.
As we move ever closer to the progress test we have been covering a lot of material that will have been forgotten since the start of the flying course. This includes everything from stalls to different types of landings.
Steep Turns
Steep turns are quite fun to do and are certainly key for any private pilot. Firstly the student pilot completed a thorough look out of the area for any traffic that may interrupt the manoeuvre. Once this is complete he enters a thirty degree bank to the left while maintaining his current altitude. Here (luckily for him this was the steep turn I recorded!) he executes this. Often an increase in power is needed to maintain the altitude.
His/her turn should continue for a full 360 degrees before arriving back at the original heading. Exactly the same is done to the right following this.
The idea of controlled steep turns is to allow the pilot to manoeuvre the aircraft more quickly and effectively and can be very good in sticky situations such as busy airspace.
Stalls
The primary learning point of a JAA stall is not how to actually stall the aircraft but more so how to recover from it.
Here my colleague enters his lookout turn before leveling off and slowing down while still maintaining his altitude. To maintain the altitude he must increase his angle of attack. Upon reaching the critical angle of attack the aircraft will buffer and then fall into a stall. You'll hear the aircraft stall warning horn go off as he approaches such an angle.
As the aircraft begins it's stall he must be able to recover by dropping the nose, adding full power and adding a touch of right rudder to compensate for the P-factor caused by the engine.
He must then return the aircraft to a controlled and steady climb the instructor tells him to do otherwise.
After a few touch and goes in Valkaria and Melbourne we landed and returned to the ramp for the debrief and for to then get ready for my second back seat of the day.
10am came around and again we taxied to the run up area, checks complete and we departed to the practice area south of Melbourne.
Along with those already covered above we also covered two other important components of any PPL holder or student pilot. Unusual attitudes and emergency landings.
Unusual Attitudes
Unusual attitude training is conducted at a safe altitude (above 3,000ft MSL) where the flight instructor will disorientate the student pilot (who has no visual reference) and then leave the aircraft in an unusual state. This is mostly in terms of the aircraft's pitch but also the roll (turn) of the aircraft.
The student pilot must return the aircraft to a straight and level flight.
Emergency Landing Procedures (in the pattern)
An emergency procedure landing at Valkaria airport in Florida. The instructor simulates an engine failure while the aircraft is on downwind to the intended runway. The student pilot must run through the procedure he has been trained to complete in order to land the plane safely.
Note, the engine is set to idle and can be used to it's maximum capacity at any time should the situation arise that it be needed.
This basically involves initially correcting the speed for the optimum gliding speed which in the case of the warrior is 73 knots then checking anything that could have caused the engine to stop such as an empty fuel tank or trying ways to restart said engine. In the event of this failing it is time to prepare the aircraft for landing. This means securing the engine for touchdown and preparing to exit the aircraft at the soonest yet safest opportunity.
Engine out procedures are carried out at all different altitudes and terrain areas but today was focused on the engine failing while in the airport pattern. Further posts in the future will certainly include different engine failure scenarios.
An almost identical flight complete and then to check the computers for the fore-coming weather over the following couple of hours. Not good reading. 'TSRA' - Thunderstorms with rain. Winds were over 20 knots and gusting into the 40s. I had seen the weather growing all morning and the radar confirmed my worst fears - the flight would be cancelled.
After an hour or so with my instructor with some quite helpful ground school it was time to return home. Although I'd not managed to actually get up myself it was good to get into the back of a couple of similar flights which will hopefully put me in good stead for my next flight tomorrow lunchtime - if the weather isn't similar to today!
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