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Jerry's 27th Lesson: YMPP ( Yet More Pattern Practice )

Yesterday, I went out the the airport just to hang out and watch the planes. They have a park bench next to the runway. I sat there listening to the tower with my handheld radio ( not a real aviation one, just a ham transceiver with air-band receive ) and watching the airplanes go round the pattern. There was another guy sitting there doing the same thing, he was a four-hour student. We discussed the positions of the airplanes, the merits of the various landings, pointed at planes when we found'em....a good time was had by all. I made a point of finding an airplane, then looking away, counting to five, then looking back and finding him again.

Today was an actual lesson. I got out to the airport after work, preflighted the airplane, my CFI arrived. Somebody stepped out of the flying club's Citabria and walked across the field to us. "Wow, a C140? I used to have one of those! Oh, it's a C120!". I finished up the preflight, my instructor talked old airplanes with the newcomer.

We got into the airplane, started it up. I listened to ATIS, got set to rehearse the radio call with my instructor, he said "just call them, you know how, you've done it a zillion times". OK. "Palo Alto Tower, Cessna 2-3-2-4-November is in row Echo to takeoff for taxi with Zulu". Oops. :-)

I took us to the runup area, got our takeoff clearance, took off with no muss, no fuss. Then I took us across the Bay, changed frequencies when we left one class D, got HWD's ATIS and called them before we busted THEIR class D, and in general, did everything that needed to be done to get us from point A to point B. The air was smooth as glass, the C120 stable as a business jet. Sometimes it's just fun to make perfectly coordinated half-standard-rate turns in smooth air, you know? Just enjoying that cadillac feel.

OK, that's enough enjoyment; time to get to work. We shot the usual fifteen landings. Things worthy of note:

• A very large jet passed overhead, low and slow, and ATC gave us the option to make right traffic instead of left, to avoid wake turbulence... We took that option. We had to cross the other runway to do that; kind of like crossing the street - ATC says there's no planes coming, but we better check anyway!
• I did pretty well at seeing other aircraft: This time, I figure I saw about two thirds of them in a timely fashion. The previous day I'd learned that if you look and look, and can't see another airplane, you can always ask ATC to "call my base". Beats heck out of panicking, although seeing them is still better.
• I did three of the landings without any help or advice from my instructor. I looked at the traffic and decided when to turn base, I decided whether we were high or low ( mostly high ) and when to chop the power.
• When one crosswind was a bit long, we wound up on downwind pretty far from the runway. He asked me "If our engine went out here, do you think we could glide to the runway?" Point taken.
• On the way back, he gave me a pep talk. "You've almost got it now, just landing is the hardest thing you're going to do in this taildragger. With the amount of study you've done, I know you're going to just zip through the cross-country stuff....
• Coming back to PAO, there were three of us crossing the Bay at the same time. I saw the the Cherokee south of us, but he didn't see us! In fact, he still hadn't seen us when we turned final. My instructor cracked open his door so he could lean out and look back; yup there that guy was, on final also! When my instructor opened the door, it was like another rudder: I felt the aircraft turn, and had to compensate with my own, official, rudder.

Well, those landings aren't quite there yet. But I can tell they're getting better and better. I still tend to flare high, and the airplane still tends to slide on across the runway when we stall out, looking for that tailwheel-first touchdown.

- Jerry "38.6 hours" Kaidor

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