Ski's Flying Blog - April 2006
last updated 25 Apr 06
This blog is an ongoing account of my flying career. The opinions expressed within do not necessarily represent those of Cabair, BCUC or OFT.
After spending about 4.5 hours travelling on the National Express, The London Air Show at Earls Court, London was a pleasant surprise - not nearly as crowded as I thought it would be! It was a Sunday after all... There was a multitude of pilot-orientated exhibits, all of which demanded my immediate attention. First & foremost was the very shiny, very expensive Diamond DA-42, which I proceeded to drool over for the best part of 45 minutes or so. The Typhoon mock-up also caught my attention...until I climbed into the cockpit and found that the avionics had been replaced by a video game...(Well I wasn't really expecting to clamber in and then jet off at Mach 99 to dogfight with Russian MiG-28s...but the impression that the potential was there would have been nice! I got a very cheesy photo of me in said cockpit anyway, so I was happy).
Other notable displays included the Breitling Fighter Challenge, which turned out to be a bit disappointing as it was merely Lock On Modern Air Combat runnng on some souped-up PCs (looked very nice though), the Cirrus display aircraft with a deployed (mock-up) ballistic parachute, the numerous pilot shops, flight sim stores, and so on. Two other stands of note included the CAA, where I had my preconceptions smashed when the gentleman in charge of licensing queries was very helpful in answering my questions re. my eyes. The other was Cabair, who in addition to a diesel-retrofitted PA-28 had a....John Furley! John was single-handedly fielding questions regarding our course at BCUC, and seemed to be getting a lot of interest. Good on him! Back to Top
After my previous LASIK procedure to correct an astigmatism in one eye (see previous posts) I was informed that a folow-up procedure would be necessary, as the surgery had not performed as well as expected. However, during the examination today (which then had the option for more surgery) I was told that this was not the case..... the astigmatism was now within Class 1 medical limits! Highly relived. While my vision is not perfect, it's within limits. I could have another operation to make my vision better, but I don't consider the slight improvement worth the risk of surgery (again). I'm not out of the woods yet though - I still have to convince the CAA that my eye muscle imbalance (the other one of two conditions that prevent me from gaining a Class 1 medical) is not as bad as it sounds on paper. 2 independent opticians have now told me that the imbalance on paper should give me double vision - but as I've had to deal with it from birth, I don't in fact have double vision.....which would disqualify me from flying totally. So I hope two letters from 2 opticians, plus laser eye surgery, will convince the CAA to let me fly for a living. Back to Top
Congratulations first to Neil, who completed his qualifying cross-country flight today. Well done mate! By now I've managed to just about master circuits, with the frustrating exception of landings. The approach is generally fine, it's just the flare and roundout that is escaping me. However, my instructor tells me it is merely a question of practice and more importantly RELAXING! Which I agree strongely with, as I have been able to complete a highly satisfactory circuit in the past, including a very good landing. More practise it is then! And relaxation - uni has broken up for Easter now, and the break neatly coincides with the Seend Beer Festival - which should be highly relaxing!
Back to Top
Considering that today I had planned only to stay in and revise Met, quite a lot happened..... Having revised myself to the point of loathing with Meterolgy, I decided to bit the bullet and take the exam. I scored 95%, which I was very pleased with (needless to say). Then an unexpected opportunity arose, which was to fly to Biggin Hill and back as a passenger on a ferry flight (G-OOFT was due a check). The flight to Biggin, skirting round to the north and then the east of City's zone, afforded some quite good views of London - I was able to make out the Millenium Dome, City Airport itself, Wembley Stadium and the London Eye. We also made out some Fokker 50s on approach to City....since we overheard them being advised of "unidentified traffic in the open airspace, at your 11 o'clock, we gave them a friendly wave. All in all a very worthwhile and interesting flight which I was very grateful to the staff at Denham for allowing me to tag along on. To round off the day, me & a pilot student collegue made a rather spontaneous road trip into London to visit another colleague. Spontaneous because from the word "go" we were at her house in less than an hour, despite no prior planning & getting lost! Back to Top
My first flight was in the back seat of a PA-28 flown by my coursemate; this helped to reinforce circuit drills and procedures into my mind. My subsequent circuits were a vast improvement over last week; however that is not saying very much at all! Despite having a crowded circuit, forcing a few go-arounds, I'd managed by the end of the lesson to make a passable landing. I also tried flapless approaches, and found them easier to fly, but I was invariably too fast, and unable to make a full stop landing. They were fun though! I also got cut up.....a (I presume visiting) aircraft had called a reporting point too early, and therefore "barged in" onto base leg ahead of me, forcing a go-around. My instructor and I were not impressed, and neither was ATC, who proceeded to communicate said displeasure to the offending aircraft. Once my slot was over, the remaining BCUC studes on the ground shot a few posed photos with the line of PA-28s (there were 7 aircraft on the ground by the end of the day, which is unusually many). These rather student-like photos can be seen in the gallery (plus also some other additions). We also witnessed the arrival of 3 instructors who'd taken G-OXOM across the channel, and one of our number's first solo flight! Quite a day.
23 Apr 06 - Fly! The London Air Show
19 Apr 06 - LASIK Surgery & The CAA
12 Apr 06 - Landing Technique
10 Apr 06 - Meterology & Biggin Hill
Due to a combination of flying partner changes and students taking advantage of "slots of fortune", there were an awful lot of BCUC student pilots at Cabair today, and a damn rowdy bunch we were too! Last year one of the instructors we fly with had made a forced landing after take-off onto the golf course, landing safely. However he'd not realised he was in the press until today when one of the studes told him! Cue much merriment as the technical mistakes and gaffes in said article were pointed out by him.