{"id":472,"date":"2016-06-18T20:00:51","date_gmt":"2016-06-19T03:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/?p=472"},"modified":"2016-06-27T00:48:46","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T07:48:46","slug":"lesson-nine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/?p=472","title":{"rendered":"Lesson Nine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yay! Back in the left seat for the first time in nine days. It was refreshing showing up and performing the pre-flight. I like the systematic approach taken toward the entire feat\u00a0of flying. There are checklists and redundancies in place that reinforce the safety culture surrounding aviation. I was asked today by a co-worker: &#8220;What is the number one <em>fatal<\/em> mistake made by pilots?&#8221; Why I&#8217;m sure there are statistics that back up a better answer than what I told my buddy, I replied to him that becoming comfortable\u2014skipping a checklist or neglecting to do a pre-flight\u2014seems like a very unnecessary risk to take that I would imagine contributes heavily to fatal accidents.<\/p>\n<p>Our lesson today consisted of departing PAO for <a href=\"http:\/\/www.airnav.com\/airport\/KLVK\" target=\"_blank\">Livermore Airport<\/a> (LVK.) The weather was perfect for VFR flying today\u2014not a cloud in the sky this morning. Entering the pattern at LVK, I was on alert for traffic to follow as I had not been addressed by the tower since my initial call about 8 miles out. Finally the local controller calls out my traffic to follow and I immediately get them in sight. The Cessna was turning downwind just off our nose. While I was a little startled by this proximity (because we would never let two get that close together without so much as a traffic call at PAO), it did not quite compare to the following scenario&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>About 60\u00a0seconds later, the local controller issued a right-360 to a Cirrus (SR22) in the left-downwind\u2014a control instruction\u00a0that caught my attention. Here was my thought process:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"padding: 10px;\">\n<li><span style=\"line-height: 1.71429; font-size: 1rem;\">We were in the left-downwind&#8230;<\/span><\/li>\n<li>The Cirrus was in the left-downwind&#8230;<\/li>\n<li>But I didn&#8217;t have the Cirrus in sight&#8230;<\/li>\n<li>&#8230;LOOKING for traffic<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I immediately looked out the right window and BOOM, there was a SR22 peeling away from us in what I would describe as a 45\u00ba bank. A few moments later I clarified with the controller that we were following the correct aircraft, which she confirmed. The Cirrus pilot then began to question her about the &#8220;Skyhawk\u00a0that peeled right in front of [them].&#8221; All ended well, but it was a rather startling sight to look out the window and see an aircraft&#8217;s belly as they turn away from you. This scenario definitely gives meaning to the phrase &#8220;see and avoid.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">\u2193 Listen to the ATC audio below. I&#8217;m N738GE if you can&#8217;t tell from the voice. \u2193<\/p>\n<!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-472-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/LVK-Pattern-Work_061816.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/LVK-Pattern-Work_061816.mp3\">http:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/LVK-Pattern-Work_061816.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p><em>Audio courtesy of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.liveatc.net\" target=\"_blank\">www.liveatc.net<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Save the entry to the pattern at LVK, the rest of the lesson was enjoyable and informative. My landings still have a way to go before solo flight, but I&#8217;m improving my control inputs and lightening my grip on the yoke. On the way back to PAO, we simulated an engine failure at 3,500 feet over the San Antonio reservoir. You can see in the map below the tight turns over the water feature. I picked a landing spot directly below us when my CFI cut the power, established best glide, then completed the checklists for &#8220;engine failure.&#8221; We had more than enough altitude to make the field I chose, so I decided on a right-270 back to &#8220;base&#8221; to bleed off more altitude.<\/p>\n<p>Check out the map below. It shows my track from PAO to LVK, a quick circle around the reservoir, than back to PAO for a few more landings.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/mappingsupport.com\/p\/gmap4.php?q=http:\/\/brockshetley.com\/flying\/maps\/flight9.kmz\" width=\"100%\" height=\"350px\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yay! Back in the left seat for the first time in nine days. It was refreshing showing up and performing the pre-flight. I like the systematic approach taken toward the entire feat\u00a0of flying. There are checklists and redundancies in place that reinforce the safety culture surrounding aviation. I was asked today by a co-worker: &#8220;What [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=472"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":506,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/472\/revisions\/506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.brockshetley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}