Michael’s Flight Training Diary

Flying time today: 1h 15m

Total flying time: 30h 20m

Yet another nav today, around the now-familiar northern Cotswolds. This would apparently be spiced-up by learning what to do when lost. Actually, the lesson turned out to have very little to do with that, but was a useful refresher in a most-important flying skill…

The checks and departure are now routine. I barely have to think before pressing the push-to-talk and opening my mouth. The rotation was a little abrupt and we lurched into the air - must remember to be gentle and progressive. But I remembered to dip the nose on climb-out to scan for traffic, and I remembered the transponder-fuelpump-landinglight check at 1000ft AGL too. Climbing steadily northwards towards my selected cruising altitude of 2500ft, I decided to put the calls in to switch to Oxford Approach and request Flight Information Service… which was fine, except that I started the whole thing on climbing through 2300ft, and failed to notice I’d gone through my target altitude! Note to self: don’t engage in one complicated procedure when I’m just about to have to start another one!

Departing northwards from runway 01, my chosen remote start for the navex was just to the west of Upper Heyford disused airfield. Everything was going smoothly, and the visibility was quite exceptional: as we approached Banbury from the south-east, the Malverns and the Forest of Dean were clearly visible above the patchy veil of low-lying mist covering much of the south-west Midlands. What a beautiful day.

Abeam Banbury, headed for the first turning point of Old Warden, the instructor introduced the Pan Pan distress call on the emergency frequency of 121.5 as a means of getting un-lost. It turned out to be a bit of a non-event, though. He decided to call them up to see if they were busy, so dialled up 121.5, listened briefly to establish there was no activity, then introduced himself by saying something like:

instructor: “London Centre, Golf Foxtrot India Alpha Tango request position”

And by the miracle of the Distress & Diversion VDF triangulation network, they instantly responded:

London Centre: “Golf Foxtrot India Alpha Tango altitude 2500ft position three miles east of Banbury”

instructor: “Roger, thank you, Golf Foxtrot India Alpha Tango”

And that was that. No Practice Pan call after all! But if I did, I’d say something like:

“Practice Pan, Practice Pan, Practice Pan. London Approach, Golf Foxtrot India Alpha Tango is lost, request position. Golf Foxtrot India Alpha Tango.”

Not quite by the book, but it’ll do. Anyway, happily assured of our position despite the 50-mile visibility and familiar ground, we proceeded to Old Warden airfield, made a neat turn, and set off for the next point. I hadn’t quite got the aircraft trimmed exactly, so my height control was a bit wayward. I must make a conscious effort at the start of the cruise to really get the trim exactly right, so I can fly it just with the rudder (though this was a bit disconcerting since the previous user of the aircraft had almost drained the left tank and not touched the right one, causing the aircraft to bank right as soon as yoke pressure was released… the only answer was to fly radically out-of-balance if my hands were occupied!)

My decision to have a point immediately north of the gliding zone at Shennington as a turning point wasn’t the wisest decision: it’s the shortest way of ensuring that my route avoided the gliding zone (as the direct route passed directly through it). But Shennington isn’t that easy to spot from the air and there are no obvious distinctive landmarks around it - so not a good waypoint! Anyway, I did identify the position correctly, and made the turn on time. Settled down onto the next leg to Gloucester, all was going smoothly… and the instructor closes the throttle. “Engine failure!”

I made a reasonable job of getting the speed down and the aircraft trimmed, then identified a field that was a bit too close for our height, then I pulled out the checklist and attempted to work my way through it. Error. I realised that we were too high for the ideal field, so I decided to go around in an arc to get to it. But I was losing height faster than expected, I’d have to put it down straight ahead only 2/3 of the way around the 360-degree turn to line up with my desired field, and I was rapidly running out of options. Go around…

Lesson one: don’t use the checklist, memorise the procedure and focus on flying the aeroplane. Lesson two: if too high, use flaps and maybe an S-bend, it’s amazing what sink rates can be achieved doing that. Don’t go round in a complete turn unless there’s lots of height available. At 2500ft above the Cotswolds - 1800ft above the ground - it’s not possible.

So for sake of memorisation, the procedure is:

• Get speed towards 75 knots, and trim to maintain it.
• Find a field, and plan the approach.
• Carb heat on
• Fuel pump on, check gauges, switch tank
• Mixture appropriate (i.e. fully rich at low-level in the UK)
• Primer locked
• Mags both on
• Throttle in a sensible position
• ATTEMPT TO RESTART - if it fails, we’re going down…
• Fuel pump off
• Mags off
• Harnesses tightened
• Door unlatched
• Brief passengers: “Brace for emergency landing, the instant the plane stops get out as fast as you can”
• Make a mayday call. If there’s time, switch to 121.5, otherwise use the current frequency: “Mayday Mayday Mayday Golf blah blah blah blah, PA28, engine failure, forced landing, near Blahsbury.”
• Master off

Having gone around and climbed back to cruising altitude, I figured out where we were and what we needed to do to get back onto course for Gloucester. A bit of good ground-to-map work followed, but thanks to the distinctive topography of the Cotswold escarpment, we were back on track in no time. A few minutes of following the heading later, I realised that things weren’t right as we were getting further away from the escarpment, not closer… ah, I hadn’t re-checked the DI after looping around for the PFL! It was nearly 20 degrees out. But once I’d realised this, the instructor closed the throttle again… here we go again!

Made a better job of it this time. Only 1000ft above the ground, I had to make decisions quickly, and all the fly-a-circuit procedures seemed a bit irrelevant. We got lined up for a field rather nicely, and we probably would have walked away, although the go-around was a bit hairy since we’d ended up flying up a dead-end valley! We did a couple more PFLs, and I was doing them much better now, finding a field close-by and using flap to dump height and get into them. Touchdown with full-flap is likely to be a somewhat less violent affair than flapless, too.

So we headed back for base, coming in for a left base join for 01. This was another novel approach for me, but it all came together nicely, the pre-landing checks done a good way out to keep attention focussed on the approach. Called left base moments before someone down at the runway entrance called “ready for departure” - and ATC kindly told them to hold and wait for me, which was rather nice for me but I didn’t envy their fuel bill keeping their twin turboprop at the hold for nearly five minutes while I approached, landed and trundled to the far end of the runway. Oh well, guess it goes to show that I’m not always the victim!

The approach was a bit high, and I wasn’t watching speed properly: I ended up doing the whole thing at 70 knots because I was focussed excessively on the approach trajectory. Should have given a bit more throttle and a touch less back-pressure. Flared slightly late, touched-down slightly skewed with a bit of a bump… 7/10.