Nothing happened, & lots happened.

[Guest TOSGcentral]

A lot of threads around here get a bit tense about regulation, exact interpretation and have a distinct tone of officious procedure to them. I am not taking issue with any of that but there is the other side to the coin and it is by far the largest side – it is just pure recreational flying conducted by people who know what they are doing and do so in a relaxed, efficient and friendly way. That is 99% of the flying that most of us do.

 

 

So a non-story for you.

 

 

Of late I have been asked to sit in with one of my ex-students in the Lightwing that he has bought. He has not flown for a couple of years and simply wanted a full run through on various exercises and me check over the aircraft.

 

 

I no longer instruct but was pleased to sit in with him as PIC and discuss various aspects once more. This has dragged on for quite a while with the lousy weather we have had around here, but in due course we whistled up Kev Walters to do a BFR which was got out of the way with no drama.

 

 

Ken started building up a bit of command time again and was going well – evenly three pointing or wheel landing the Lightwing but keeping it based at Watts while he organised a hangar for himself at Kilcoy. However, he wanted to keep going with the advice and looking at various exercises – particularly conditions appraisal and forecasting, cloud avoidance, etc and steadily building up to the aircraft going over to Kilcoy to really go through sensible procedures on engine failure on take-offs or low level emergencies and runway selection for normal ops. in the Kilcoy environment.

 

 

We had the weather for that this morning so off we went – eventually!

 

 

We started late (7.00am) but the fog was still thick and slowly lifted into low cloud – but happily dispersed reasonably early. Meantime the few people there (Watts Bridge is really very quiet for such a large airfield) pottered about with odd jobs on aircraft or hangars, drank coffee, and told lies to each other. Then, as conditions cleared, we did daily inspections and fuel drains nice and leisurely, and carried on waiting.

 

 

In the fullness of time it became flyable – and in fact fully legally flyable! There was no impatient spearing through the low scud to get on top and stuff what would happen if the engine stopped when you were half way through it at 300’ – or – some non radio aircraft had arrived and you emerged out of cloud right with him!

 

 

There was little or no wind so first aircraft out set the runway direction in use and everyone fell in with that OK even though you could have operated equally in any of the four directions available as far as take-offs and landings were concerned.

 

 

Aircraft involved were:

 

 

Radio. Our Lightwing; a Cardinal; a visiting C172 that flew in for a visit; a couple of C172s transiting near our CTAF but not actually in it. Some kind of helicopter that was active in the vicinity but actually nowhere near the airfield.

 

 

Non- Radio. A Trike flying circuits for self continuation training and (as we later discovered) a Drifter that had flown over from Kilcoy and actually got onto final but rejected the deteriorating slant visibility and had returned to Kilcoy (sensible chap).

 

 

So Ken and I got going. The Trike was flying immaculate circuits so was not difficult to keep an eye on and anticipate where he was likely to be.

 

 

The Cardinal took off just in front of us as the inbound 172 was calling inbound and then joining circuit. We departed and set up to clear the CTAF to track direct to Kilcoy.

 

 

I would not say the radio procedure was ‘by the book’ just nearly by the book. The important thing was that it was clear, steady voices and each of us knew where the other was and what they intended to do next even though we could not see each other.

 

 

Aircraft transiting our CTAF area, even though not in the CTAF, took the trouble to change from Area to CTAF and let us know they were local and passing through, where they were, what they were doing etc etc.

 

 

Enroute to Kilcoy we have a range to traverse so we could discuss terrain clearance, outlanding options and glide range potential - and we had some patchy orographic induced cumulus so could do a bit of VFR cloud avoidance.

 

 

We changed to Area frequency called inbound and slid into circuit using the entry time to discuss outlanding options from the two runway directions available vis a vis the runway is sloping at Kilcoy so a number of factors determine which direction you land and take off in if light winds are in place.

 

 

Ken flew an immaculate circuit, placed us right at the threshold and we taxied in.

 

 

I then had the chance to catch up with a couple of acquaintances that I had not seen for years, take a look at a very special Thruster I had not seen for yonks – and then we went for a walk for half an hour.

 

 

We did on the ground what we had just done in the air – but this time from more the perspective of ‘where would you go’ from the low view having already seen the high view.

 

 

With everyone satisfied we clambered back on board and departed for Watts.

 

 

En route we had more Area traffic reporting along Somerset Dam – which was helpful – plus we had some minor tension when the coolant started over-heating but Ken’s engine management was spot on so we made it back with no dramas with Ken not forgetting the freq change to CTAF and approved calls.

 

 

The circuit and landing was boring and the bird was put back in the shed so I sloped off to go back to work!

 

 

I came away from the exercise curiously content. I am a long way past flying for just pleasure, but oddly enough I did feel pleasure. Nothing much had happened, everything had gone as planned, it was only a total of an hour of flying – so what.

 

 

What I particularly liked was the reminder that we do have people flying alongside us who treat regulatory rules as for the ‘obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men’! I had just spent some pleasant and rewarding flying in the company of airmen none of which I saw and will probably never meet in person. Between us we preserved a safe environment with little effort.

 

 

That is what happens most of the time in Rec Flying. Start pushing the envelope with desires that get ahead of a training regime that is not yet in place and you are going to get angst – particularly in the student area who carry enough load in learning to fly as it is.

 

 

I for one, especially after over 40 years of teaching airmanship and survival, do not want to see the basic survival skills having to be minimised to cater for what is perceived to be the now far more important procedural aspects.

 

 

As I said – nothing happened – but actually a lot did. And I enjoyed my flights!

 

 

Aye

 

 

Tony

 

 

[Yenn]

Sounds like a good day Tony. I have always said that a good pilot doesn't get noticed, and that is as it should be. When you are noticed it is usually for something you would rather forget.

 

 

[octave]

Great post Tony, this is what recreational flying is about, in my opinion. For me debates about the exact legal meaning of the word "practicable" or the idea the one should consult legal practioner are a real flying passion killer.

 

I am looking forward to flying tomorrow knowing that after I should be able to say that "Nothing Happened & Lots Happened"

 

Cheers

 

 

[pudestcon]

Tony,

 

I too say 'Great post' and you have hit it on the head with "it is just pure recreational flying conducted by people who know what they are doing and do so in a relaxed, efficient and friendly way. That is 99% of the flying that most of us do."

 

I am currently doing a conversion to a Thruster with Steve Vette at Northam in the Avon Valley Western Australia and whilst most of my flying will be from a private farm strip at North Gabbin purely for the joy of flight, I am very happy with the attention to detail being taught by Steve - such as correct radio procedure, precise circuits and circuit heights.

 

Great stuff Tony.

 

Pud