Lucky number...12

Well it is officially summer down here in Kansas. In my opinion being less than an hour from Oklahoma we are far enough south to be considered south so yes it is summer in the south. This of course means it is hot, the high today was about 105. Thankfully though there was not much wind which was great for flying. We spent the entire hour and a half flight "in the pattern" (flying around the airport) doing touch-and-go's. This just means we go around land and take off again. I ended up doing 12 of these and finally on the last one I had an almost perfect landing. Now I don't say that the other 11 previous were bad...just not quite there. As my instructor put it "you are doing great, you have not scared me and I haven't yanked the controls back." So I got that going for me. The more I continue this the more excited I get to do more and be challenged more. Check back next week for another update!

Windy...

That is the best way to describe today's flight. The wind was at about 160-170 degrees (Out of the south south east)at 20-25 gusting to 30. This was great for the ground reference maneuvers, I was able to do the rectangular pattern (basically flying around a square mile always flying a quarter mile from your points(usually roads, tree lines or fence lines). Do pass this maneuver you have to maintain the equal quarter mile distance, correct for the wind and stay within +/- 100 feet of your assigned altitude. I was able to do it 3-4 times around keeping it with +/- 40-50 feet. We then moved on to S turns which I am improving on and almost have down. After this came the interesting part. Until today I only had two landings so still pretty much learning. Even with the cross wind my instructor had me try it and we did two touch and go's and a full stop landing. The first one was rough figuring how much to correct for the wind. The second one was a reminder to fly the plane all the way to the ground. The third was better...until the flare. This is the point when you are basically just holding the plane off the ground burning off airspeed and altitude. Everything was going great until the wind decided to die and I learned the lesson to recover quickly as we pretty much fell out of the sky (only from a couple of feet but enough to ruin an otherwise good landing) without the wind. Taxiing with this much wind is also a little tricker but I slowly got the hold of it. After we got done I asked my instructor how he thought I was progressing and he thinks I am doing very well and I could solo in 2-3 weeks with good weather. Sadly the rest of this week looks hot and windy (in other words summer in Kansas) so we may not be able to fly Monday night, we will see. Thanks for reading and as always feel free to ask questions!

Flight Two

Today's experience was a bit interesting. We had planned to do some more steep turns, as well as turns around a point, square pattern, and stalls. We started with about an hour of ground school talking through what we woud be doing such as the aerodynamics at work, angle of attack (AOA), critical angle of attack (CAOA)and how to do the maneuvers. The issue with todays flight was the weather. At the time we met there were storms 30-50 miles to our east and southeast. At take off they had moved a little closer but were not a threat. I handled the entire flight this time, takeoff went pretty well with the only issue being keeping it on the centerline. After taking off we headed to the north. At this point we were able to climb to 4,500 and started doing some steep turns. I kept struggling a little but each one was improved. We then moved on to stalls. We these with a power on stall, this is at it sounds you leave the power on and just keep pulling back until the plane stalls. They are not too hard to recover from since you already have the power on and simply have to push over and then pull back. Cessna 172's are known as being one of the most stable aircraft out there which make them such a popular trainer. As soon as it stills the nose is already naturally "nosing over" and it does not take much to recover from. The power off stall is designed to simulate a stall while landing or taking off. In order to recover from this one you have to put full power back on, turn off the carb heat and slowly retract the flaps. At this point the ceiling was slowly dropping and the rain was getting closer. We actually had a brief shower on us while we were doing the power off stall. We decided to head back to the airport and call it quits for the day. It was kind of interesting flying on the edge of the Flint Hills (this is the really boring with almost nothing between Emporia and ElDorado along I-35)seeing numerous roads just end and then there be just prairie is kind of interesting. I again handled the approach and even the landing this time. I was a little slow and that didn't help matters when I cut the power and dropped like a rock. We only bounced once but hey it was my first landing. We have somewhat set our schedule for Monday, and Wednesday nights along with sometime on Saturday. Check back after those times for more updates! Happy fathers day to my father and grandfathers along with my father in-law and grand father in-laws (if that is the right term)

First Flight

Although the forecast high for today was 100 it turned out to be a great morning for flying. We met at 9:30 went through a thorough pre flight inspection before taking off. Once we got up we climbed to 5,500ft ASL(Above Sea Level) which is about 3,200 feet AGL (Above Ground Level). To start off we just flew around so I could get used to flying again and get a feel for the controls. As we progressed through the flight we did more turns as well as climbing, and descending turns. My instructor then added in steep turns, these are turns at a 45 degree angle. Once you get a feel for them they are not that hard but there are several things to remember when turning. Due to your angle of flight no longer being straight and level you have to "pull back", the steeper the turn the more you have to pull back. If you did not do this your nose would drop and well that is not the goal of having a nice level, coordinated turn. This was the most difficult maneuver of the day for me, thankfully after a couple of attempts I started to get it down pretty well. To finish the flight we descended down to 2,500 ASL and practiced tracking along roads on our way back to the airport. Flying this way is jokingly referred to as IFR or I follow roads. For those that don't know IFR officially stands for Instrument Flight Rules which is a special rating you have to get in order to flying in IFR conditions. This maneuvers also allowed me to get a little more familiar with the area we will be using as well as the area in general since I am fairly new. Overall we logged about 1.5 hours. We are going back up tomorrow weather permitting, it is supposed to cool off (down to 90!). There are also a 40-50% chance of storms tomorrow so we will see what happens. Dinner is almost ready and I have some studying to do before tomorrow. Thanks for reading and let me know if you have any questions!

Flight Training

So it has been some time (years) since I have done this. While sitting at work today I figured this would be a good format for keeping family and friends up to date on my experience and progress on earning my private pilots license. Which I start this Friday June 14. For those of you who don't know this is a life long dream of mine. My father and grandfather were pilots so I have grown up around aviation. This is also a reason why I wanted to work in aviation. For those of you who don't know I am a Project Integrator (PI) at Bombardier Learjet in Wichita. What it comes down to is I am in project management working with the forward structures engineering groups on the new Learjet 85, my main project is the doors for the plane. I really like my job and it has already allowed me to contribute in a big very visible way to all levels of management inside and outside of the company. Back in April I traveled to Manchester, England to visit our supplier. Anyway back on topic. I feel very blessed that the stars have somewhat aligned and I will be able to use my aunt and uncles Cessna 172 Skyhawk to do my training in. I hope this blog will best allow friends and family to stay up to date and share with me this process and milestones I will come across. Some weeks I may fly and update more than others so just hang in there. Let me know at anytime if you have any questions or comments about what I am doing, the plane, or how to get your license!