Practice Forced Landings
It had been a while since I had tried these and with the hope of a solo land away being tried soon – Full Sutton Attempt 4! – Stewart thought I had better have a go.
It had been over a month since my last flight so I hoped it would all come together without a problem, but I had to admit I was not feeling a 100%, I thought I had a slight cold coming, but it was not as if I was going solo.
First job was uncovering the plane and checking the leading edge of the plane for ice. It was melting fast in the sun. Stewart went through all the outside checks while we waited for the ice to clear.
We were soon ready and strapped in, I gave it five primes because of the cold and the engine started straight away.
EGNJ 170603Z 170716 23006KT CAVOK PROB40 TEMPO 0710 7000 NSC
The sky was clear and a beautiful blue but with a trace of mist on the horizon. For once the ATIS agreed with the METAR above and confirmed the 7000m visibility.
First of the many mistakes for the day. I called up and asked for taxi instructions and called Humberside Tower, Humberside Radar.
Second mistake of the day, I then started off with two much throttle and Stewart had to take over to get the plane round without hitting the Jet Provost that was as always parked in front of us.
Once round, I had control again and I parked up at holding point Bravo to do my power checks.
Mistake number three. I missed one of my checks and had to start again with the power checks.
Take off and climb out was simple enough and I took the usual heading to Trent Falls.
Mistake number four. I seemed to have forgotten how to hold a heading and When talking to Radar I called them Tower!
Despite wondering all over the sky I managed to get us to Trent Falls and Stewart killed the power on me.
When people ask what happens when the engine fails, they don’t seem to like the answer that you glide to a suitable field and land. Most people think the plane will just fall out of the sky.
Its all relatively straight forward and I’ll not go into too much detail as I have covered this all before.
First establish a gentle glide and turn downwind. Stewart said to leave the engine restarting procedure and just assume that the engine could not be started.
I soon saw a suitable field and turned far to early on to a base leg. Then on to finals, still far to height and with full flaps selected we flew over the selected field.
Oh well try again. Carb heat off. Engine to full power, remove a stage of flaps and get some speed, then remove the rest of the flaps and climb back to 2000 feet for another go. Well I had three goes and each time was far to high.
A real disappointing day. Generally bad flying all round and a bit of a blow to my confidence, and also in Stewart’s confidence in my ability to take the plane away on Navigation exercises alone. Looks like a dual Nav to restore my confidence and Stewart’s faith in me.