Grounded Pilot

I now have lesson number two completed. First of all, one thing I’ve noticed about this flight was that I did not feel nauseous at all. Perhaps it was all the peppermint tea I’ve been drinking, the fact I wore sunglasses this flight, or maybe it was because my flight instructor was working me a lot harder this lesson that I did not have time to feel sick. Either way, it’s a very promising sign, and I’m starting to feel much more relaxed and enjoying the training.

This lesson I was learning how to do climbs, descents, and turns. The steps for doing a climb is basically (hopefully I get this right, as I was absorbing a lot of information in this lesson) atitude, power, trim (or APT, think climbing up an apartment). The steps for making a descent are, power, attitude, trim (or PAT, think bending down to pat the dog). We also covered power off descents; I got a feel for how long the plane will glide without any power, and the best rate for a power off descent in the 172N is about 65 knots. We practiced a bit of coordinated turns: stepping on the ball, or another visual reference you can use to make coordinated turns (hopefully I remember this correctly), note the spot where the horizon intersects the dash and keep it in the same spot.

One little bad habit I have, and my instructor reminded me of this periodically; I guess the reason for this habit is that I’ve never been taught or been told this, is that I have to remember to keep one hand on the control stick, and my other hand on the throttle.

Lastly, when were coming in to land, I confirmed a little suspicion I had ever since I moved into my house. During the summers when I’m setting on my deck, or doing yard work I would always notice Cessnas and other small aircrafts would always fly directly above my house, then cutoff their engines once they pass my backyard. As I suspected, my house is directly below the base turn for runway 25. So why is that the Cessnas always fly over my house, and never fly over the neighbours? The answer is simple. When flying the downwind leg of the circuit, pilots will use the grain elevators on the Lake Superior shore as a point of reference with which to line themselves up. Then when they cross the expressway (which my house backs onto) they power off their engine and make the base turn. Maybe one day I’ll put a giant sign on my roof that says, “Base Turn.”

Next lesson is air work: stalls, slow flights, and maybe spins. I asked my instructor about spins and she said for private pilot training we only do partial spins, and for the exam Transport Canada recently took out the section on spins, so they’re no longer required as part of the exam.  That’s reassuring!