The Joy of Aviation

Today was supposed to be my first day of IFR flight training, but my CFI had a cold and was as he put it, “running about 7 seconds behind the world.” With such lousy weather the past weeks and more in the future, I can’t resist having a weather window open and a plane with my name on it sitting on the ramp. I decided to go out for a jaunt.

I get my flight briefing and head out to the airport. While driving, I’m hoping that the snow and ice have melted off the plane since the last storm. What a pain cleaning off a plane is in the winter.

YES! The plane is clean. The ramp around the plane is clean. All I have to do is plug in the pre-heater and do my standard pre-flight. Schweet.

With the pre-flight complete and the engine all toasty, I get my notes and chart out and fire up the engine. I’m going to do some of the Hudson Corridor and I want to be ready. Radio set to 123.05 – Check. Chart folded and next to me – Check.

Launching from runway 24, I turn left to 185* and climb to 3,000′. The visibility is incredible. I can see for 80 miles in all directions. The ceiling is solid at 11,000′ with an impending storm in a few hours. The air is calm and so, so smooth. As I leave POU Class D airspace, I flip to 123.05 and I settle into a nice relaxing flight.

On my way south, I make some performance notes in preparation for my IFR training. RPM/Indicated Air Speed (IAS) measurements. 2200 rpm gives me 93 knots (kts). 2300:98, 2400:103, 2600 -you get the idea.

I’m over Beacon Mountain now really enjoying the clear view below and NYC in on the horizon. As I get to the south of the mountains, and the ground returns back to a couple hundred feet and this becomes a good time to find out what exact power reduction will give me 500′/minute descent – another handy thing to know for IFR.

I start with 400 rpm reduction, thinking that’s what I use on my standard 500′/min landing approaches. The needle on the VSI (vertical speed indicator) dives to 800′/min. Whoa horsy. Bring the rpms back up, climb back to 3,000′ and start again – this time 100 rpm less. Ah.. that’s better, about 300′/min. Next I try 200 rpm. Nope. 650′/min. I settle on 150-175rpm gives me a perfect 500′ constant speed descent. Nice. Check that off the list.

Oh… how come the first try at 400rpm didn’t work? Because when I reduce power in the pattern, I also start to extend the flaps. Dah. Forgot that for a minute.

I’m now level over Croton Point and below the 3000′ shelf of the NYC Class B airspace. I can’t believe how quiet it is on the corridor frequency. Normally it sounds like a hundred people all talking at once. I can hear clearly three or four heli tours – all chatting with each other about how slow business is today and one Bonanza pilot heading south. Wow. This is very unusual.

I reach the Tappan Zee Bridge and decide to break it off. This is as far as I planned on going today. But the air is so smooth, vis so clear, and hardly anyone is out today I think “What else can I do today? What else is on my mission card?”

Landing at Sullivan County Airport [MSV]. Yeap. I can do that. It’ll be good “diversion” practice – having to find all the pertinent information while on the go – as if I had to divert my flight plan for some reason like bad weather or such. I grab my chart, my AFD and get to work. Always scanning for traffic, I grab glimpses of the data I need. Airport elevation, ATIS and Unicom frequencies, runway alignments, traffic pattern. This also gives me a chance to “play” with my GPS to see if I can pull this data from it in a real world, live scenario. Mission accomplished all around.

Sullivan County Airport is in the Catskill Mountains so I start my climb and adjust my heading to about 320*. Again, I settle in and enjoy the clear seemingly unlimited views from my aluminum perch.

It’s been 15 minutes since I turned northwest. I wonder where the heck the airport is. I truly have “finding new airport anxiety”. Being 1500′ AGL doesn’t help of course. But I being lazy, and figured it’ll be easy to find (it’s a pretty big airport). I do have the GPS, but I hate using it. I’m kinda old fashioned and resist using that technology. (yeah, this from a guy who makes his living from via the Internet). Call me weird.

Five minutes later: There’s the airport. Right where it’s supposed to be! Time to loose a thousand feet. I try my new found “constant speed descent throttle position” and in two minutes I’m at pattern altitude and setting up a 45* entry for the left downwind for runway 15. As I turn downwind, I marvel at Sullivan’s huge 6300′x150′ runway and wonder what kind of planes they get in here to warrant such a large tarmac.

Turn to base then final and coast down the ILS glide slope. I’m a bit high with only one red light on the PAPI. It’s a sweet greaser of a landing and I’ve got tons of runway left. I can’t resist. I raise the flaps, push in the carb heat and the throttle so I can do it all again. I round base to final and this time I’m exactly on the ILS glide slope and grease it yet again. This is too much fun, but it’s getting late. A quick reconfiguration and I’m off again.

As I climb out I reflect on what just occurred. I believe those were my first ever touch and goes. There’s a lot of debate about touch and goes and I’m partly on the side of not doing them. But this time there was soooo much runway, I couldn’t resist. And.. they weren’t for practice, per se either. So, in my mind they were justified this time.

Back to home base I fly strictly via VOR. Another greased landing (ok, yeah there’s like no wind today so greasers are easy) and a quick taxi back to the tie down.

Winter pre-flights are the worst but winter flying is some of the best. Today was surely one of those wonderful days.

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