My Flying Career

Please forgive me, as it has been far too long since I have posted.  I apologize to those of you who  have been sitting at the edge of your seats waiting to hear what I have to say next (all one of you)

So what the heck have I been doing?  Well a lot has happened in the last month, and I have had to put blogging on the backburner.  First off, I am pleased to announce that I passed my Flight Instructor Airplane (FIA) knowledge test with a 90%!  A quick note on that test.  I think the computer was reading my mind and found the areas that I was the weakest in, and giving me all of those questions.  I was actually kind of upset to get a 90%.  I had been working REALLY hard, and felt that the computer didn’t give me any easy questions.  But oh well, 90 is good too!

I also lost my job on January 14th due to financial difficulties the company was having.  I had worked for the company for over five years and both parties were sad to see each other leave.  That was the main reason I have not been posting anything.  Because frankly, I have been extremely busy with Resume’s, application, interviews, working through finances, you know the drill.

As of February 1st, I now am an employee of McKenzie Books, Inc. and Cash4Books.net in Beaverton, OR as a Software Developer.  I was very happy to not be unemployed for very long and hope to get back into my flight training soon.  So the plan now is to wait for a little bit longer days and continue my Flight Instructor training at Hillsboro Aviation in their Cessna RG.  I will, of course, keep you all posted when I start that.

Until then…

Wow, 2010 already?  Time flies when you’re having fun (John, do not make a lame joke using this pun).  I have yet to fly this year because  have been studying diligently for my CFI-A Knowledge Test.  I really want to get a good score on this test and even more, I want to REALLY know this stuff backwards and forwards.  So that’s where I am at.

My IFR PIC currency lapsed at the end of November because I did not meet the requirements in the last 6 months to remain current.  The way the currency works, for IFR at least, is that you must have accomplished, in the last 6 months, the following:

• At least six instrument approaches;
• Holding procedures; and
• Intercepting and tracking courses through the use of navigation systems.

You can find all this information in Part 61.57 of the Code of Federal Regulations.  Well by the end of November I had all but 4 instrument approaches.  It had just been such nice weather the last 6 months, I haven’t had to shoot an approach.  So what happens when you lapse like I did?  Well you are given a 6 month grace period where the FAA allows you to go up with a Safety Pilot and shoot the remaining requirements in simulated conditions.  Who qualifies as a Safety Pilot?  All they have to possess is at least a Private Pilot’s Certificate and a current medical certificate.  I decided to give my Grandpa a call and ask him to be my safety pilot.

My grandpa is a corporate pilot out of Hillsboro and used to be an airline pilot for Eastern Airlines before they went bankrupt.  So you can imagine how much fun we have when we both are in the cockpit.  I really enjoy flying with him and I get a kick out of his comments on how slow the Cessna is compared to the Learjet 35 he currently flies.  So I flew up to Hillsboro, picked him up and we got my required 4 approaches in.  Did the ILS to Aurora, ILS to McMinneville, the VOR approach to Hillsboro, then got radar vectors for the ILS back into Hillsboro.  It reminded me of when I was training for my Instrument Rating.  Approach after approach after approach.  It mentally wears on you.  I think it is one of the toughest things I’ve had to do in aviation.  I think the only way to make it more difficult would be to have to do it in a light twin.

Well I’ve rambled on long enough.  Happy new year everyone and hopefully my next post will be on how well I did on my CFI-A Knowledge Test!

Wishing all my readers a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Thank you all for the support and encouragement in 2009!

This is the first of possibly more reviews I would like to start doing to promote some of my favorite aviation products. I have a plethora of products I like to use on both my PC and my iPhone that you need to know about, if you don’t already. I attribute many of these products to my success thus far in my aviation journey and one of my absolute favorites that I will recommend to all of my future students is Dauntless’s Ground School software and RideReady software. These two excellent products led me to be able to review one of their other products, Safelog. So enough brown nosing and lets find out why I use Safelog.

Rich Features

I have yet to find a feature that isn’t portrayed in some way in Safelog. You can import/export flight data to your own backup location and/or SafelogWeb.com. You can add/modify/review your flights and currency online at Safelogweb.com, which is great for pilots who have ‘Smart’ phones and can access the internet immediately after every flight and record the information. Doesn’t get any easier than that. You’ve got reports, graphs, currency evaluations, flight computers, Google Earth integration, the list goes on.

Ease of Use

The software is incredibly easy to use. It’s also great for pilots such as myself who often fly to and from the same airports. Your most recent airports are readily available on the flight entry screen with a single click. It also keeps track of all of the aircraft you fly so you don’t have to keep re-entering data. That is one of the nicest things I like about Safelog. They really tried to put repetitive entry to a minimum. If you entered it once before, you don’t have to enter in that data ever again. This goes for airports and aircraft.

In Detail

For those of you that are nerds like myself and like to track data. This logbook software has the capability of tracking incredible amounts of data. For every flight you can record your general flight information plus photos, comments/notes, files/documents, milestones/events, people you flew with, what was the flight instructor, examiner, or SIC’s name! There is so much information you CAN record I can go back to just about any flight, look at that information and recall the exact flight. These features are of course optional, as this could overwhelm some of you. But for some of us, it’s just plain fun!

Mobility

Dauntless knew that for a logbook application to be truly complete, it would need to have mobile access. They boast multiple mobile platforms Safelog can partner with. The iPhone, Blackberry, WindowsCE / Windows Mobile PocketPC PDA or your PalmOS-compatible PDA. I only have had the pleasure of using Safelog for the iPhone, but the fact that they have made it a priority to make available all of the important information in your logbook wherever you are is a definite plus in my book.

Conclusion

I’ve used two other logbook applications and none of them beat the features and ease of use Safelog provides. You can purchase many different bundles and should have no trouble finding the bundle that is right for you. If you only want to use the web features and don’t necessarily need the companion PC software, then you have that option. You can find more information on Safelog at Dauntless’s web site.  Have a safe and Merry Christmas!

Legal Note: The FTC requires that I inform my readers that Dauntless did provide me with a copy of Safelog for review. However I would like to point out that I am/was not required to provide a positive review. Basically I meant every word I said.

Paul Bukta of KATU Portland Channel 2 interviews me on the Charles Bishop suicide flight into the Bank of America building in Tampa Florida on January 5th, 2002.

Today I took my FOI (Fundamentals of Instructing) knowledge test.  I felt very confident as I have studied hard for a while.  Not only did I pass, but I got a 100% test score!  Funny little side story – recently the LaserGrade testing centers have been able to reveal what answers you got incorrect at the end of your test.  I know, most of you are thinking, why hasn’t that always been the case?  Well, they have been a little behind the times, and until now, you never got to see which questions you got wrong.  It was very depressing.  Well the proctor was very excited to see how the new system works, and how it shows you your missed answers.  Well when I had finished, she was confused at how come we didn’t get to see my missed answers, then she looked at the score.  ”Wait a second, no wonder….you got ALL the answers right!”  I chuckled and apologized for not being able to be the guinea pig for this new system. Maybe next time…. hopefully not, but maybe.

Next up, studying for my FIA (Flight Instructor Airplane) test.  This is a 100 question knowledge test spanning basically everything I have learned thus far (minus Instrument Rating questions).  So this is a big question bank they will be grabbing questions from.  So I will need to review and study A LOT!  So let me get back to that, so I can get another 100%.

Today I passed my Single-Engine Commercial addon checkride!  Which basically means I can use the commercial pilot privileges in a single-engine aircraft as well as a multi-engine aircraft now.  How’d it go?  Well I woke up this morning, looked at the TAF for the time that we had scheduled for my checkride, which was 3pm, and saw that it was forecasting 2,500 broken and winds somewhere around 20+ knots and gusting.  Perfect day for a checkride huh?  Well, my checkride rolls around and the clouds were 8,000 feet overcast, which was perfect. The winds were 19 knots gusting to 26 knots!  Luckily it was straight down the runway.  Well, when it wasn’t randomly gusting sideways.  I got to say though.  When I walked outside and felt how string the winds were, and was watching a little Cessna 152 struggle to keep the blue (or grey) side up on takeoff, I wasn’t worried.  I don’t want to say that I have every come to a place where I can’t learn anymore, or become over confident, but it never cross my mind that I couldn’t do this.  Anyway, I felt very professional walking out there in the gusting conditions and feeling confident that I could complete the task at hand in a safe manner.

A couple things to let you know how windy it was…  When I was taxiing, I had to slow to a crawl on turns, or else the wind would start lifting the plane and skidding it sideways!  It was one of those times were your Aileron placement was extremely important to keep from flipping over.  After takeoff, my examiner got this idea that I should get the plane as slow as I possibly could into the wind, then look down and see if we are moving over the ground.  It was incredible, I got the plane to about 50mph or so, then looked down.  It reminded me of when you look out your window and you see that lone bird just fighting the wind and not going anywhere.  Just hovering.  Well that’s what we were doing.  I turned an airplane into a helicopter!  Well enough with the playing around, we had maneuvers to accomplish.

The chandelles and lazy eights were not much more difficult with the high winds.  As those are not ground reference maneuvers, it doesn’t matter as much what the wind is doing.  I felt that it was a little different, but I still think they went really well.  The eights on pylons and the steep spiral on the other hand were MUCH more difficult in those high wind gusty conditions!  I did them within standards, but they were by far the hardest maneuvers of the day.  The short field, soft field, and 180 degree power off landings were a bit less than perfect.  I didn’t get the kiss (chirp chirp) that I like to get, but I also didn’t cause back pain either.  They were adequate.  It’s hard to expect a chirp-chirp landing when you have winds gusting like they were.

Anyway that was pretty much it.  Oh yeah, the Oral exam went really well.  I felt very prepared and don’t remember a whole lot of questions that I didn’t know the answer to right off the top of my head.  It was also a very fast oral, since it was just an addon rating, all that was tested was the performance and systems of the airplane we were flying.  And there isn’t a whole lot to a Cessna 172.

Ok, so what’s next.  CFI!  Starting immediately I will be studying for my FOI (Fundamentals of Instructing) knowledge test and then my CFI-A (Certified Flight Instructor – Airplane) knowledge test.  I seriously can’t wait.  Now I get to learn all the nitty gritty details about pretty much everything I’ve learned up to this point.  I also get to learn about how to instruct and get some skills in that arena.  I’m very excited.

I will try and do my best to find things to post about as I study while not making it dry and boring.  With my writing skills that’s difficult enough as it is.

Until next time…

In response to Zach’s comment on my last post, I would like to take you on a little journey through my short and long-term goals.

My long-term goals are probably not that of most.  ’The Airlines’ do not necessarily entice me that much.  The schedules and what I’ve heard about how some pilots are treated does not outweigh the pay.  It doesn’t seem to be the dream job it used to be.  From what I have seen, it looks like charter, air taxi, air ambulance, corporate, or any other job that has a little bit more excitement is what I am pursuing.  This goal of course has its baby steps (to quote ‘What about Bob?’), so for my short term goal, I would like to get hired at a flight school as an instructor.  I think that instructing is a great way of building skills for yourself and a way of giving back a little of what you have learned (It’s also a more inexpensive way to build time).  From their I will start my search for a ‘puddle-jumping’ company hopefully here in the northwest.  Ameriflight, Empire Airlines, Seaport Airline, to just name a few.  You can only plan so far in advance before the plans are no more than hopes and dreams.  I’m the kind of guy who is very goal-oriented and having these short-term and a long-term goals is what drives me.

To shift gears a little bit, I have been practicing my Single Engine Commercial maneuvers and will be taking my Single Engine Commerical addon checkride very soon.  I’ll let you all know how that goes.

Thanks for reading!

Well it’s official, I am a Commercial Pilot! For multi-engine aircraft at least. How did the checkride go you ask?  I’m glad you asked!  The checkride is a pass or fail situation, so I am unable to give you a letter grade or percentage.  But what I can give you is how I felt it went.  The checkride  consisted of two parts, the Oral quiz, and the Practical flight.  The oral was about 2 hours long and I felt very comfortable answering all of the questions the examiner asked.  Examiners tend to like to find an area that you seem to know the least about, and question you for more details on that subject.  On this particular checkride, she found out my inexperience with crossing the U.S. border and what steps are needed in order to do so.  I knew the basics.  You must have a radio operators license, you must call ahead to Customs and let them know you are coming.  However the examiner was also very practical, and I told her I would certainly not plan on crossing the border without first studying and questioning someone who has.  From what I’ve heard, it’s not something you just go willy-nilly doing without first knowing what’s going on.  She asked a lot of questions about VFR operations.  I had no problem answering those.  She also asked a lot of questions about performance in the Seminole, which I thought was weird, since I already had my Private Multi-Engine license and had already been drilled on a previous oral about that.  But hey, I’m not complaining, I knew all the right answers!

Ok, onto the flight.  When we started the Oral portion the clouds were reported at 3,500 feet broken and expected to continue like that for most of the day.  I was really worried that we would only be able to knock out the oral portion of the practical test that day because I needed at least 4,000 feet AGL to do an Engine-Failure, which was required on this checkride.  By the time we finished the oral to go flying the ceiling had raised to 7,000 feet.  Sweet!  Well, almost sweet.  There was a 12 gusting to 17 knot 20 degree crosswind.  Oh joy! Welcome to the start of fall.  Now it’s important to note, I have not flown the Seminole in a crosswind of this caliber before.  But again, the examiner was great and said, “lets just make our first trip around the pattern a normal takeoff and landing so you can get a feel for the crosswind”.  Off we went, takeoff was great, immediately went into a crab on climb out.  But man, the downwind leg went super fast with that tail wind.  In a matter of seconds I was putting the gear back down, few more seconds later I was turning base to final and trying to slow her down.  First landing was not terrible.  A little bit harder of a touch down than I like, but within standards.  Anyway in an effort not to make this blog post unnecessarily long, I will just say, the rest of the flight went very well, my best landing (which was honestly my main concern for the flight) was the short field landing, and it was beautiful.

Ok, so what are my plans now.  What’s next on the list of accomplishments for my career?  Well I need to get my Commercial Single-Engine addon.  This will just add Single-Engine privileges to my existing Commercial license.  It should be a faily short Oral (just questions about the performance of Single-Engine aircraft) and then the flight.  The flight has some different maneuvers than the twin.  So I need to get up and practice the maneuvers a bit before I take the checkride.  I expect to take my checkride in the next few weeks.  After that, I will start studying for my flight instructor ratings.  I would like to get all three flight instructor ratings.  The CFI (Certified Flight Instructor), CFI-I (Certified Flight Instructor – Instrument), and an MEI (Multi-Engine Instructor).  In order to take those checkrides, I will need to knock out three knowledge tests.  The CFI-A, the CFI-I, and the FOI (Fundamentals of Instructing).  I will also need to start practicing the same maneuvers I did for my commercial rating from the right seat.  And also practice teaching.  I need to be able to explain to a non-pilot how to perform a maneuver.  So my friends may be getting some free flights, provided they listen to my jibber-jabber for a bit and tell my how I did.

Thanks to everyone for their continued encouragement and support.  It really helps having people interested and encouraging me to “keep it up”!  So I thank you.

Until next time…

Wow, I can’t believe I am preparing for my Commercial Multi-Engine checkride (or the official name, Practical Test)!  What a ride it has been so far, and it is only just beginning!

The last several weeks I have been working towards meeting time requirements, cross-country requirements, practicing maneuvers, and studying for my oral.  All in preparation to meet the PTS (Practical Test Standards) on the day I have to shine the most.

As I have been preparing for my checkride, I notice a few things different about this checkride as opposed to any of the others I have taken since.  For one, this checkride is a culmination of practically everything I have learned to this point.  This is not like an Instrument rating, where the examiner can only really ask you questions about Instrument related issues.  Or a Multi-Engine rating where the examiner can only ask you questions pertaining to Multi-Engine aircraft.  This is a Commercial certificate, which basically gives the examiner the right to ask you questions about nearly anything I’ve learned up to this point.  The amount of knowledge I need to know and have readily available is much larger than my other recent checkrides.

Anyway, last Wednesday, I took a practice oral exam with one of the senior flight instructors at Hillsboro Aviation.  I felt pretty confident about my knowledge.  My biggest challenge was getting what was in my head, out my mouth.  For some reason I really struggle with putting what I know into short, concise, detailed statements.  I turn them into these huge bloated paragraphs that in turn confuse me and the guy asking the question.   It’s frustrating to me, because I know the answer, I really do.  But when I put it into words, I sound like an idiot.  Need to work on my communication skills I guess.

The flight portion of the practice checkride we scrapped due to weather.  The weather wasn’t terrible, but I needed 4,000 feet to do single-engine maneuvers in the twin, and it didn’t look like we were going to get that.  I opted to just wait until next week and do all the maneuvers at once instead of breaking it up into two flights.  So barring any weather issues, I’ll do the practice flight this Monday and let you all know how that goes.