Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Adventures in Aviation

I haven't been flying as often as I would like during the past few months, and the flying I have been doing has been mainly routine time-building exercises, so not much to broadcast about.

During a lesson a few weeks ago, there were several grass fires burning around our practice area just west of Tulsa. I got to experience some pretty powerful thermals for the first time. During one slow flight session we got into a column of quickly rising air that pushed us up almost 500 feet in a matter of seconds. The downside came a few minutes later. We were still doing slow flight, having compensated for the updraft, when we flew out of the thermal. The plane immediately stalled, the nose dropped, and I got to perform a stall recovery that I wasn't expecting. Which I guess is the entire point of training. If you know a stall is approaching you can get ready to recover ahead of time. When the plane tried to fall out of the sky with no advance warning, it was all muscle memory and routine, which was a great confidence booster.

On July 7th, I got my flight plans together and approved for my first Cross Country Solo. The only requirement on this solo is that it be at least 150 miles round trip, visiting 3 airports, including the home airport, and one leg has to be at least 75 miles. The Flight School has a standard first cross country route from Riverside (KRVS) in Tulsa, northwest to Stillwater (KSWO), then south to Shawnee (KSNL) before returning to Riverside. The information I had to supply was weather, routing, way-points, altitudes and time en route. Fortunately AOPA, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (aopa.org) has an amazing online flight planner that I was given permission to use.

So with paperwork in hand and the sign-off in my logbook, all I needed was some clear weather for a day, and an operational airplane. This magical combination didn't actually come up until August 20th. In Oklahoma, it can get windy, as an understatement, and now I had to have good flying conditions (winds less than 15 knots and no gusts reported) at three Oklahoma airports instead of just Riverside. Several weekends in a row I had an airplane booked only to have to cancel due to thunderstorms or high winds.

One beautiful weekend came up in the beginning of August, and I reported to the airport with all baggage in hand ready to go. Bob was returning from a previous lesson in 69212, the Cessna 152 I had booked to make my trip. As his student was getting the plane tied down, Bob walked over to me and informed me that something had gone wrong. The engine was running rough and smoking a bit, and the plane was grounded until maintenance could check it out. There is another aircraft rental company on the airport, Christiansen Aviation, we had rented one of their 152s the last time 69212 was down with steering linkage issues, so Bob sent me to see if they had one available at short notice.

They did have a 152 ready to go, so Bob and I went for a lesson instead of my solo Cross Country. I was fine to rent one of their planes with Bob as Pilot in Command from the co-pilots seat, but not to solo in one until my paperwork had been approved by the management, which wouldn't be until Monday.

Saturday August 20th finally rolled around bright and clear, winds had been reported as calm overnight, and by 10am when I arrived at Riverside Airport, were blowing smoothly at around 5 knots, weather stations in Stillwater and Shawnee were reporting similar conditions.


Cessna 152 N95005

I checked out my rental plane, N95005, and filed my flight plan with Lockheed Flight Services. With a flight plan filed, someone would know where I should be flying if anything unplanned happened and I had to land in some field somewhere.

But, despite the wonderful weather, Saturday's flight was also not to be. During the pre-flight inspection one of the things to check is the fuel strainer leading to the engine. You pull on a cable handle for the strainer, which is a filter / water separator, and it's supposed to stream some fuel onto the floor for you. I pulled the handle and the tube under the airplane gave me a few drips. Hmm, that's not right... I double checked the fuel selector valve was on and tried it again, still nothing. I called up the Christiansen FBO, and they sent one of their fuel guys over to take a look, as their mechanic was busy with another plane. He verified the problem, we tried playing with the mixture and primer, but nothing helped. So I cancelled my Saturday plans and rebooked the airplane for the following day.

Just as I was about to leave, my phone rang, my friend Mike and his cousin Chris had come out to the airport to watch me depart, so I visited with them for a while before heading home for the day.

Sunday Morning: I re-printed all my Nav Logs with the updated weather, which was still smooth at Riverside and Stillwater, but Shawnee was reporting winds of 6 knots gusting to 9, I talked it over with Bob, and we decided that I should fly the first leg to Stillwater, then recheck the weather. Worst case scenario, I could just turn straight around and fly home. 6 gusting to 9 is not worrying at all, but just because the report said "gusting" at all, I might not have been allowed to fly.

I arrived back at Riverside, checked out the plane, which passed all the pre-flight inspections this time, borrowed Bobs GPS, and was soon given take off clearance on runway 19 right.

I lined up on the runway listening to the fuel slosh in the brimming tanks, and pushed the throttle to the instrument panel. 26 gallons of fuel weighs in at 156 lbs, but with the co-pilots seat only holding my charts, notes, and some bottles of water and cookies packed for me by my wife Melodie, the plane leaped into the air when I reached the take off speed of 50 knots. I climbed toward my planned cruising altitude of 4,500. Riverside Tower's air traffic control passed me to Tulsa Departure, I got permission to switch frequencies to McAlester Flight Services radio and opened my flight plan, giving them the time I had taken off.

Keystone Lake
The air was a little bumpy at times, but mostly smooth, with clouds up at 10 and 12 thousand feet, so it was quite pleasant. As I pulled the throttle out to about 2250 RPM and adjusted the fuel mixture, Riverside Airport quickly disappeared in the haze behind me and I was flying over unknown territory. Having the GPS with me, as well as picking out lakes, rivers, roads and highways on my sectional map was a great comfort. I never felt lost at all. I left Tulsa's air traffic control area, and I was then talking to controllers at Kansas City air traffic control. I passed by Keystone lake, and could see some boats leaving a white wake behind them. As I got close to Stillwater, Kansas City had me contact Oklahoma City approach, who kept me until I had Stillwater Regional Airport in sight.

I called Stillwater and was told to turn to the north and watch for another Cessna that I was to land behind. I picked out the other plane about the same time he saw me, and we got lined up in the pattern to land. He landed just as I was turning onto the base leg, and came to a full stop on the runway, which was a bit worrying, I had almost decided to go-around when the other plane hit the power and took off again, I guess they had been doing short field landing practice. I performed one of my better landings, taxied to their parking area and got the plane shut down. I called Flight services, closed my first flight plan, and checked the weather for Shawnee. The winds had calmed down a bit, and were no longer gusting, but blowing about 10 knots right along the runway. I got my second flight plan filed, and got out of the plane to stretch my legs, I had been flying for about an hour at this point.
Stillwater Regional Airport - KSWO

I phoned Melodie and then my mom to let them know I had made it safe and sound, and sent text messages to Mike and Bob letting them know the same. It was really nice knowing that so many friends and family members were keeping me in their thoughts as I flew. I was 1/3rd of the way around my loop, and ready to get on with the flight.

I performed the pre-flight checks again, everything was still good to go on the airplane, so I fired it up, called Stillwater ground control and was given permission to taxi out to the runway. Stillwater Tower gave me the go ahead for a straight south departure to Shawnee, so I took off and climbed out to 3,500 feet. Shawnee doesn't have it's own Air Traffic control tower, so I stayed on the radio with Oklahoma City Approach until I had the runway in sight. I tuned the radio to Shawnee's CTAF or Common Traffic Advisory Frequency and announced "Shawnee Traffic, Cessna 95005 is 8 miles out on a straight in final for runway 17, Shawnee Traffic." If there's no airport control tower you are supposed to say who you are talking to at the start and end of radio transmissions so anyone who tunes in to the frequency halfway through can still figure out who you are talking to. There are only a handful of CTAF's and some airports within radio range of each other might be on the same frequency, so you just announce which airport you mean.

Shawnee Regional Airport - KSNL
My route from Stillwater was almost straight south, and the Shawnee Runway runs almost straight north and south (170 degrees, whereas south is 180) so I was able to fly straight in and land. I taxied to the parking area and shut down the plane, closed my flight plan, filed the new one for the home leg to Riverside and got out again to wander around for a while.
After checking in with everyone and having some cookies and water, I got back in the plane, took off into the wind to the south, and turned northeast toward home. Cruising at 3,500 feet I had a really nice tailwind, so although my airspeed indicator showed me flying at 85 knots, the air I was in was moving in the same direction I was headed. The GPS ground speed at one point showed I was doing 117 knots. Not bad for a C152!

Riverside Airport in sight ahead!
I sent Mike a text message when I was about 30 nautical miles out, so he and Melodie could meet me at Riverside when I landed. With the wind behind me, I still beat them to the airport, they arrived just as I was taxiing to the parking area.

Solo Cross Country Complete
I got the plane shut off for the last time, and tied down in it's allocated parking spot. Checking the timer, I had managed to log 2.9 of the 5 required solo cross country hours. I can choose the next destinations myself, Mike has some friends in Claremore who get together every weekend, so I might go out there, then up to Bartlesville and back to Riverside on my next voyage.

All I need now is another couple hours of simulated IFR lessons with Bob, and the Solo Cross Country time, and I will be ready to take the tests and get my license!
Hopefully with fall approaching, the weather will cooperate and let me finish this year!