Flight(s) April 28, 2005

CFI: Jason Hill
MapComments

I took the entire day off from work and got through Lesson 14 and the Lesson 15 Progress Check.

A funny day weather-wise, when I arrived at FSH, things appeared to be going from bad to worse. Rain was making the practice area invisible, although the winds weren't bad. Jason and I watched the weather for a little bit, and then surprisingly, there was a lull in the rain, and we headed up. A few power-on and power-off stalls in the practice area, and then to Kalaeloa for short-field and soft-field landings. Just when I was starting to feel better about my regular landings, it gets complicated. I must say, however, that there is much to be observed about landings by distorting them in certain ways. A month ago, the act of aiming for the ground was a little uncomfortable, but the short field landing with an imaginary obstacle at the threshold requires you to clear the obstacle and then swoop down, diving at the asphalt. It's not like a dive from altitude, since you're basically slow, and have the flaps down, and I notice that it's not really uncomfortable at all. Soft field landings are just regular landings with an emphasis on putting the main wheels down gently and then holding the nose off for as long as possible. I've seen and heard recommendations for those very things, several times in regular landings.

In the afternoon, Larry Mitchell and I went up for a progress check, which included VOR tracking, some simulated instrument work, and recovery from unusual attitudes. I found out that Larry is a ham when we were identifying the VORs by their morse code calls.