More actual!
Anytime an instrument student gets a chance to fly in IMC in southern California – he takes it. And that’s exactly what I did this morning. Weather was great for IFR training – ceilings high enough to be comfortable, but still plenty of actual. We flew out to Brackett (POC) for the VOR there. This […]
Approaches, Partial Panel, and some IMC
Today the plan was going to be to do some steep turns under the hood, some more unusual attitude recovery, and a bit more airwork, but the weather didn’t cooperate. The visibility was really bad, so we decided to get Tower Enroute to Oxnard (OXR). Tower Enroute is like a mini-clearance, with published routes to […]
Far and away
This was the most fun I’ve had since the training started. Just like with the private pilot license, getting to solo is the most frustrating part – and the cross countries make it all worth it. Tonight we did a short cross country from Van Nuys (VNY) to Lancaster – Fox Field (WJF). Even though […]
It’s all about the workload
Today was lesson in more ways than one. I’ve been frustrated in the past because I felt like things weren’t moving fast enough. Today I learned that the faster they move, the worse it gets. We started out doing an intersection hold – something I’d only done on the simulator – and took quite a […]
Coming together!
Once again, there were a few lessons between this and the last one, but there was nothing exciting enough to report. I’ll do that more no doubt, but this is the last time I’ll mention it. Tonight we went out to do more maneuvering work, and ended up doing holds instead. I’m at the point […]
Approaches on my own
Today we had planned to do more airwork to get everything tightened up, but it was SO nice out, we decided to shoot approaches instead. Just the VOR-A into SMO and the VOR-A into VNY. Did it all myself – no help of any real substance from Kent, which made me feel good about my […]
A little frustrated, a little better
There were a couple of other lessons in there that focused mainly on aircraft control, but I didn’t want to bore you with the details. Today the plan was to do a hold, some airwork, and an approach. After departure, he told me to “proceed direct Fillmore, hold north on the 360 radialâ€. Easy enough. […]
More by myself
An early morning flight, we decided to do some more airwork, with an approach into Camarillo (CMA) and then the ILS back into Van Nuys. The VOR into CMA was educational, because the step-down fixes come pretty quick, so the workload is high. I flew it fast as well, which made things even tougher. I […]
Too much time off
I’d been unable to train for almost two weeks, so we decided to just go out and work on maneuvers and perhaps shoot a VOR approach or two. We did Kent’s “brutal†exercise once – he says if you can master that, instrument flying is a no-brainer. You basically fly a big square, with climbs […]
A little break
After a particularly tough few days at work, Kent gave me a break. We just went up, shot the ILS at Oxnard to the missed approach, and then back to Van Nuys for the ILS there. I flew it all pretty well I think, with Kent pointing out things here and there. The lesson learned […]