Long Solo Xcountry - Lesson 38
Sep. 9th, 2006 02:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
slipstreamsurfrThe morning the alarm goes off at 5:15.
I don't even get up this early to go to work!
Drag myself out of bed, and log on the computer and check the weather. Things are looking good at home, at each of my main stops. The forecast looks good. I make a few more notes on my flight plan and call a briefer. I get the briefing and even she is telling me that it'll be a nice day today.
I file my two cross country flight plans with them. I always do them in pairs, there's is always some point that I count as the point where things start to come back, and usually where I stop for a bit and stretch my legs. I finish getting ready and leave the house at 6:15 for the airport.
On the way, about a mile from the house I drive into some light rain. This wasn't in the cards for today. I continue heading to the airport, wondering if it's just an isolated shower that I'll drive out of . For now, a steady light rain follows me. Hrmm. I call the briefer again. He's very surprised to hear that there's rain in Arlington. He checks his radar and he thought that the returns were just ground clutter at first. He promises me that there's a little here and there, but it'll all go away as soon as the sun is up, and it's not even supposed to be here today.
At the airport at 6:30 I pick up the book for the plane. Today's flight is with the little 152. Basic, slow, exactly what I need for a cross country flight. :) I open the door to the cockpit and start setting up my gear for the flight. The bag goes in the back. I fill out the paperwork for the days flight and Kathy arrives at the airport. She is going to go with David to the pancake fly in shortly after I depart on my cross country. She came out to sit in the 152 and chat while I preflight. Around the airplane I go in the light rain. Checking everying as I normally would. My little flashlight with me as it's still a little dark at 6:45 this morning. The tanks are full, I'd called for fuel the night before when I was at the airport getting my cross country approved. I double check, the caps are on tight, the fuel is the right color. I need a quart of oil, so grab one out of the back of the plane and pour it. All the while talking with Kathy. She'll be doing this herself before too long. ;) While we sit watching the weather, the clouds, the rain stops as the sun just peeks over the horizon. The briefer was right.
I say goodbye to Kathy and climb into the cockpit and set things up. Checklist is run and the engine is started. I moment to think, then a call to ground and I'm cleared to 16. Run ups are done while I let the engine warm the oil for a few minutes. It's not flown since I last flew it Thursday. I call the tower and I'm off and rolling. I ask to depart the pattern and it is granted. I climb away from GKY heading towards Spinks along I-20. I tune Fort Worth Radio and open my flight plan. No problems this time. I turn at 35 and I can see FWS just ahead. A call to their tower, and silence. A second call to their tower, still silence. I grab the AFD, I thought they opened at 7, they open at 8. A call to Spinks traffic, of which there is none and I am on a straight in final. A full stop landing and I taxi back to take off. I run a pattern and do one more landing just to feel good about it and I'm off to grab the Glen Rose VOR radial that'll take me most of the way to Stephenville.
A mile or two from Spinks I call Departure and request flight following. They set it up, assign me a transponder code and I'm good to go. I fly along the radial, checking off the checkpoints I picked along it and when I get to lake Granbury I ask Flight Following if I can go off frequency for a few to pick up the weather at my destination. They grant it, asking that I check in with them when I return. Running the flight with only one radio isn't too bad. I can do this. I grab the weather at SEP and tune back for Flight Following, I check in and things are good to go.I make my turn at the VOR and track in towards SEP and Flight Following drops me. The field is in sight and I make a nice smooth entry into the pattern, an okay base and final and I'm down for a full stop. Park the airplane for a minute or two, take a picture or two, then it's back in and I'm taxing for take-off. Off I go and I fly one more pattern and do a touch and go for good luck and I'm heading for Graham.
I pick up Flight Following again while I head to RPH and fly this leg by pilotage. One checkpoint to the next. Only one checkpoint I never saw, not too bad. The little lake with the power plant was on the right side of me where it was supposed to be. I crossed the freeway where I should have. I was lining up with the dam end of Possum Kingdom lake. Things were working well. I took a small detour from my planned course to fly across the front of the dam for the lake to take some pictures. It's an awfully pretty lake from the air.
Back on course and over the lake heading for Graham I'm dropped from Flight Following. No problem, I see what I think is the airport ahead of me. Sure enough it's RPH and I make an entry into the pattern. It's an odd little runway setup they have but I make my landing and stop, the taxiways are really strange and the most expedient way to taxi back for takeoff is to turn around and back taxi on the field. I make the radio call and spin the plane around and taxi back to the displaced threshold, turn around again and I'm ready to take off. Power in and I'm off the wheels again and climbing as I fly past the end of the runway. Where, the ground drops off abruptly. Hey! That's pretty neat. I remember Craig warning me about that. I fly the pattern and make a second landing before I go park by the fuel pumps. 2.2 hours. Not bad, I'd called it for 2 hours when I filed it and I've been throwing in extra landings all over the place. I call the briefer on the cell phone and close my flight plan.
I get a phone call and Craig and Gary are heading back to Graham so I wait for them. Refuel the airplane. They get back and we chat a few, then hop back in our planes and take off again. I open my second flight plan taking me home then switch to the air to air frequency because Gary was going to take some in air photo's. We talk as Craig comes up and Gary takes the pictures. Lots of room, good zoom lens. Craig's got a speed demon in the RV he flys. She sure is a pretty plane, even when she just leaves me in the dust. They head on their own way to Hicks while I head towards alliance. Flight Following is picked up and I start the challenging part of my navigation. There is just not that many good, easy for me to see checkpoints on this leg. I've marked a few and backed them up with a VOR trick. I tuned the Millsap VOR and set the radial to one that would cross one of my more dodgy, hard to see checkpoints. Flew my course and looked for my checks. The needle would sweep from one side to the other full deflection when I flew past the end of the radial and I'd look really hard all around and under my airplane and I'd usually find the goofy checkpoint I'd picked. Tune for another radial and fly for my checkpoint. I even tuned the Bowie VOR and did a quick fix check to mark my point between the radials on the two VOR's. This is working well. Even with so so checkpoints, I can stay comfortable where I'm at.
I'm getting close to Alliance so I drop from Flight Following and call their tower. I'm a bit too far away and my transmission is breaking up so I bide my time a few minutes longer. I try to call them again just after I pass Copeland 4T2 and this time they can hear me. I let them know I'm a student pilot that would like to come in for a landing. He clears me right base for 16L. I repeat the clearance back to him and he asks me what I'd like to do on the field. I've been wondering that myself all morning. I tell him that if possible, I'd prefer to do a stop and go on the runway. He tells me no problem and changes my clearance for the option 16Right. I read it back to him and I'm the only one landing. AFW is HUGE. I'm landing on the shorter of the two runways and it's still 8220 feet long. It's got a displaced threshold, but no problem. My 152 can just about land and take off 3 times on it's length. It's really wide, 150 feet, that throws my depth perception off a bit and I land a bit firmer than I have all day long. Usually it's the narrow fields that give me grief, but today, they've all been wonderful to me. I bring the 150 to a stop. Then advance the throttle and I'm rolling for a take off. It's a REALLY long runway. It seems like forever that I'm climbing with it still under me. I am cleared to make right traffic and I request a south departure from his airspace. This is one field I don't need to make a second landing at. :)
I'm okayed for my course, and then cleared to change frequencies as I approach the outer edge of his airspace. I thank him and I'm looking at Meachams airspace ahead of me. I had originaly planned to skirt to the east of them and avoid them all together but figure what the heck. I call their tower and request to transition their airspace to the east of them at 2500 feet along I35. The controller approves my transition and I fly along I35 alongside downtown Fort Worth. This is pretty. A few more pictures are snapped and I head for I20. I turn east at I20 and fly to Lake Arlington along I20. I call the Arlington Tower to let them know I'm 5 miles to the west and inbound for landing and they tell me to call right base for 16.
I fly to the right base and call the tower again. They clear me to land and I'm making it work in the 152. Full flaps, lose the altitude and a serviceable landing. I turn off on the first turnoff and call ground for taxi clearance back to parking in front of Katie Hawk.
I park the plane and shut it down. 1.2 this leg. I'd planned for 1.5. Not bad. Called the briefer and closed my flight plan. All is good there. Packed up the plane and thought about it a bit.
I'd just planned and executed a flight of 213 nautical miles. Stopping at two airports that I'd never been to before. I not only found everything without too much difficulty, but I made it pretty close to my estimates. I tried something new with the VOR's and they performed as I expected them to. Doing the flight with only one radio wasn't that difficult. I felt miles and miles ahead of the airplane. I conquered my fear of the radio and even talked to an extra tower to make my life slightly easier and more scenic across Fort Worth. This has been a great day. :)
--3.4 solo cross country (all solo cross country time required now complete!)
--8 landings spread across all the airports
I don't even get up this early to go to work!
Drag myself out of bed, and log on the computer and check the weather. Things are looking good at home, at each of my main stops. The forecast looks good. I make a few more notes on my flight plan and call a briefer. I get the briefing and even she is telling me that it'll be a nice day today.
I file my two cross country flight plans with them. I always do them in pairs, there's is always some point that I count as the point where things start to come back, and usually where I stop for a bit and stretch my legs. I finish getting ready and leave the house at 6:15 for the airport.
On the way, about a mile from the house I drive into some light rain. This wasn't in the cards for today. I continue heading to the airport, wondering if it's just an isolated shower that I'll drive out of . For now, a steady light rain follows me. Hrmm. I call the briefer again. He's very surprised to hear that there's rain in Arlington. He checks his radar and he thought that the returns were just ground clutter at first. He promises me that there's a little here and there, but it'll all go away as soon as the sun is up, and it's not even supposed to be here today.
At the airport at 6:30 I pick up the book for the plane. Today's flight is with the little 152. Basic, slow, exactly what I need for a cross country flight. :) I open the door to the cockpit and start setting up my gear for the flight. The bag goes in the back. I fill out the paperwork for the days flight and Kathy arrives at the airport. She is going to go with David to the pancake fly in shortly after I depart on my cross country. She came out to sit in the 152 and chat while I preflight. Around the airplane I go in the light rain. Checking everying as I normally would. My little flashlight with me as it's still a little dark at 6:45 this morning. The tanks are full, I'd called for fuel the night before when I was at the airport getting my cross country approved. I double check, the caps are on tight, the fuel is the right color. I need a quart of oil, so grab one out of the back of the plane and pour it. All the while talking with Kathy. She'll be doing this herself before too long. ;) While we sit watching the weather, the clouds, the rain stops as the sun just peeks over the horizon. The briefer was right.
I say goodbye to Kathy and climb into the cockpit and set things up. Checklist is run and the engine is started. I moment to think, then a call to ground and I'm cleared to 16. Run ups are done while I let the engine warm the oil for a few minutes. It's not flown since I last flew it Thursday. I call the tower and I'm off and rolling. I ask to depart the pattern and it is granted. I climb away from GKY heading towards Spinks along I-20. I tune Fort Worth Radio and open my flight plan. No problems this time. I turn at 35 and I can see FWS just ahead. A call to their tower, and silence. A second call to their tower, still silence. I grab the AFD, I thought they opened at 7, they open at 8. A call to Spinks traffic, of which there is none and I am on a straight in final. A full stop landing and I taxi back to take off. I run a pattern and do one more landing just to feel good about it and I'm off to grab the Glen Rose VOR radial that'll take me most of the way to Stephenville.
A mile or two from Spinks I call Departure and request flight following. They set it up, assign me a transponder code and I'm good to go. I fly along the radial, checking off the checkpoints I picked along it and when I get to lake Granbury I ask Flight Following if I can go off frequency for a few to pick up the weather at my destination. They grant it, asking that I check in with them when I return. Running the flight with only one radio isn't too bad. I can do this. I grab the weather at SEP and tune back for Flight Following, I check in and things are good to go.I make my turn at the VOR and track in towards SEP and Flight Following drops me. The field is in sight and I make a nice smooth entry into the pattern, an okay base and final and I'm down for a full stop. Park the airplane for a minute or two, take a picture or two, then it's back in and I'm taxing for take-off. Off I go and I fly one more pattern and do a touch and go for good luck and I'm heading for Graham.
I pick up Flight Following again while I head to RPH and fly this leg by pilotage. One checkpoint to the next. Only one checkpoint I never saw, not too bad. The little lake with the power plant was on the right side of me where it was supposed to be. I crossed the freeway where I should have. I was lining up with the dam end of Possum Kingdom lake. Things were working well. I took a small detour from my planned course to fly across the front of the dam for the lake to take some pictures. It's an awfully pretty lake from the air.
Back on course and over the lake heading for Graham I'm dropped from Flight Following. No problem, I see what I think is the airport ahead of me. Sure enough it's RPH and I make an entry into the pattern. It's an odd little runway setup they have but I make my landing and stop, the taxiways are really strange and the most expedient way to taxi back for takeoff is to turn around and back taxi on the field. I make the radio call and spin the plane around and taxi back to the displaced threshold, turn around again and I'm ready to take off. Power in and I'm off the wheels again and climbing as I fly past the end of the runway. Where, the ground drops off abruptly. Hey! That's pretty neat. I remember Craig warning me about that. I fly the pattern and make a second landing before I go park by the fuel pumps. 2.2 hours. Not bad, I'd called it for 2 hours when I filed it and I've been throwing in extra landings all over the place. I call the briefer on the cell phone and close my flight plan.
I get a phone call and Craig and Gary are heading back to Graham so I wait for them. Refuel the airplane. They get back and we chat a few, then hop back in our planes and take off again. I open my second flight plan taking me home then switch to the air to air frequency because Gary was going to take some in air photo's. We talk as Craig comes up and Gary takes the pictures. Lots of room, good zoom lens. Craig's got a speed demon in the RV he flys. She sure is a pretty plane, even when she just leaves me in the dust. They head on their own way to Hicks while I head towards alliance. Flight Following is picked up and I start the challenging part of my navigation. There is just not that many good, easy for me to see checkpoints on this leg. I've marked a few and backed them up with a VOR trick. I tuned the Millsap VOR and set the radial to one that would cross one of my more dodgy, hard to see checkpoints. Flew my course and looked for my checks. The needle would sweep from one side to the other full deflection when I flew past the end of the radial and I'd look really hard all around and under my airplane and I'd usually find the goofy checkpoint I'd picked. Tune for another radial and fly for my checkpoint. I even tuned the Bowie VOR and did a quick fix check to mark my point between the radials on the two VOR's. This is working well. Even with so so checkpoints, I can stay comfortable where I'm at.
I'm getting close to Alliance so I drop from Flight Following and call their tower. I'm a bit too far away and my transmission is breaking up so I bide my time a few minutes longer. I try to call them again just after I pass Copeland 4T2 and this time they can hear me. I let them know I'm a student pilot that would like to come in for a landing. He clears me right base for 16L. I repeat the clearance back to him and he asks me what I'd like to do on the field. I've been wondering that myself all morning. I tell him that if possible, I'd prefer to do a stop and go on the runway. He tells me no problem and changes my clearance for the option 16Right. I read it back to him and I'm the only one landing. AFW is HUGE. I'm landing on the shorter of the two runways and it's still 8220 feet long. It's got a displaced threshold, but no problem. My 152 can just about land and take off 3 times on it's length. It's really wide, 150 feet, that throws my depth perception off a bit and I land a bit firmer than I have all day long. Usually it's the narrow fields that give me grief, but today, they've all been wonderful to me. I bring the 150 to a stop. Then advance the throttle and I'm rolling for a take off. It's a REALLY long runway. It seems like forever that I'm climbing with it still under me. I am cleared to make right traffic and I request a south departure from his airspace. This is one field I don't need to make a second landing at. :)
I'm okayed for my course, and then cleared to change frequencies as I approach the outer edge of his airspace. I thank him and I'm looking at Meachams airspace ahead of me. I had originaly planned to skirt to the east of them and avoid them all together but figure what the heck. I call their tower and request to transition their airspace to the east of them at 2500 feet along I35. The controller approves my transition and I fly along I35 alongside downtown Fort Worth. This is pretty. A few more pictures are snapped and I head for I20. I turn east at I20 and fly to Lake Arlington along I20. I call the Arlington Tower to let them know I'm 5 miles to the west and inbound for landing and they tell me to call right base for 16.
I fly to the right base and call the tower again. They clear me to land and I'm making it work in the 152. Full flaps, lose the altitude and a serviceable landing. I turn off on the first turnoff and call ground for taxi clearance back to parking in front of Katie Hawk.
I park the plane and shut it down. 1.2 this leg. I'd planned for 1.5. Not bad. Called the briefer and closed my flight plan. All is good there. Packed up the plane and thought about it a bit.
I'd just planned and executed a flight of 213 nautical miles. Stopping at two airports that I'd never been to before. I not only found everything without too much difficulty, but I made it pretty close to my estimates. I tried something new with the VOR's and they performed as I expected them to. Doing the flight with only one radio wasn't that difficult. I felt miles and miles ahead of the airplane. I conquered my fear of the radio and even talked to an extra tower to make my life slightly easier and more scenic across Fort Worth. This has been a great day. :)
--3.4 solo cross country (all solo cross country time required now complete!)
--8 landings spread across all the airports