It's not like shaver
didn't warn me or anything. It's just that I can't resist
sometimes.
Last Sunday I had my first instrument flight that included
actually flying in a real live airplane. There was an airmet
for turbulence and I have to say the aviation weather service
didn't disappoint. It was pretty bumpy and poor shona would have
been terrified if she had come along for the ride.
We flew the VOR RWY 23 approach into bedford and I did quite well
on that one, all things considered. I was having problems
maintaining a constant altitude, some of which was due to the
turbulence but had more to do with my apparently inability to use
the trim wheel on that particular day. From there, I was vectored
around via ATC and got set up for the ILS RWY 29 approach also
into bedford. That also went relatively well, except that I had
trouble following the glide path down for similar trim reasons.
At about 400 feet above the ground (200 feet lower than the MDA)
my instructor had me remove the hood and I was right on target.
It was quite nice to be able to see that. I'm just looking
forward to the day when we can do that in real clouds. However,
given the current weather, that's going to be quice some time from
now. From there, a nice landing and we were done for the day.
Major stumbling points included: occasional fixation and ommision.
Managing the workload while maintaining a scan (changing to the
approach plate from VOR 23 to ILS 29 took about 30 seconds, which
is an eternity.) Thinking about my descent rate on the ILS
approach and translating that into what was happening on the glide
slope and how it should have told me something about my actual
ground speed. Failed to use my 5 Ts a lot of places.
Positive points: I handled the 40 knot winds that were basically
off my wing on the VOR approach quite well. Managed to stay
basically on target most of the way down. Tracked each of the
altitude changes as required as well as keeping awareness of my
MDA and where I was in relation to it. Also managed to keep ahead
of the plane in the sense that I remembered to tune in the right
radio frequencies ahead of time.
Did I mention it was cold that day? I mean, really cold.
I took my glove off during the preflight and it was almost numb in
about 15 seconds. But I managed to get some flying in, and that
was good.