There are surprisingly few AMEs in the area by me given how many people. It took a little bit of calling around to find one that could take me in. It became especially urgent when the word “solo” starting floating around. The evaluation was pretty quick and straightforward. My blood pressure was a little elevated since I was coming from work and had to drive through traffic for an hour to get there on day when I was a little sleep deprived from a very early morning meeting, but it was nothing worrisome. The snag all came from needing a note from my doctor – I happen to have a fairly uncommon yet easily managed condition that really doesn’t cause any problems, but the FAA still needs to know that is the case, so it was all delayed waiting on the one doctor to get in touch with the AME.
I was supposed to have a lesson, and after two days of pretty successful and ever-improving landings, that I didn’t have the medical certificate in hand led us to reschedule the lesson to the evening to get some night flying requirements taken care of, so we agreed to meet up at 4:30 pm to prep for a sunset takeoff. It happened that I finally heard back from the AME and my certificate was ready to be picked up. I rushed over there and went straight to the airport and arrived at 4:00 pm. My instructor wasn’t expecting me and he was chilling in the FBO lounge. I usually get there early to get the preflight out of the way, but I showed off all my required paperwork, he looked over my logbook. “You want to solo today?”
We did two practice circuits and I was trying to show off my improved takeoff and landing skills. The first landing went fairly well. I floated just a little bit, but made a pretty good touchdown. The second we did a simulated power off, made a short base to final call, and I started the procedure. Pitched up to get from 85 to 76 KIAS and started a shallow 5° turn from downwind towards the runway. It still makes me nervous cutting in between the water tower and the runway. I made the runway, added flaps, transitioned to slow flight, touched down, and rolled out. We taxied back in front of the FBO, and my instructor headed out. “You got this.” “When you make the radio calls just say, ‘student pilot, Archer…’ If you need anything I’ll be on the UNICOM. Good luck!” He also imparted to me, “I don’t why but my students when they solo like to ride the brake at 15 knots when taxiing. Just don’t ride the brake, okay?” He closes up the cabin, I wait until he’s clear away from the airplane, and away I go down the taxiway. Now the giddy nervousness of adrenaline starts flowing, and I spend the entire taxi talking to myself, verbally pinching myself that this is happening!
I recited the whole checklist to myself at the hold short being extra sure I’m doing everything right. I checked the pattern, made my student pilot radio call, lined up, added 2000 RPM, checked the gauges and directional gyro (it likes to drift with each landing), released the brakes and go! I knew going in that taking out one adult from the airplane would make it lighter and it would jump off the runway. It’s one thing knowing it and another feeling it. 60 KIAS came really fast and the airplane didn’t hesitate to get off the ground. The climb felt extra fast to 1300 ft MSL. The pattern was unremarkable but I was talking to myself the whole time at every stop. I checked the pattern, turned to final, and started the descent. The airplane was a lot more sensitive to inputs with only one person. After idling the engine and adjusting pitch I pulled with just a little too much pressure and felt the aircraft rise a foot when I did not expect it, but nothing too much that it scared me. Touch down, roll out, clear the runway, after landing checklist, and back to the hold short for another lap.
On the taxi back to the hold short a C172 entered was entering the pattern. Okay this is new, we never actually practiced with any traffic before. I knew he was only just entering downwind, so I figured I was not going to be a factor and that I would get off before he got to final, but my one worry was chasing him on downwind. I figured I’m going to be climbing at around 80 KIAS and he’s going to be doing around 100 in the pattern so no real worry there, so I made my call, lined up, powered up, checked the gauges, and away for the second lap! On my downwind I was keeping watch over how he was landing and rolling out. He was on final at around half way through downwind, so I could see his progress. However, I wanted to be extra sure of what was going on with him so before I turned base I checked to see where he was at. He was all the way at the taxiway at the end of the runway, but he looked like he was clearing off. My downwind was a little extra long this time, but no worries. Called my base, called my final, got a nice stable approach, kept my body loose and relaxed, made sure to keep the rudder in to account for the left turning tendency and keep it as close to the centerline as I could. Another okay, not great touchdown, roll out, and taxi back to the FBO. My CFI hand-signaled me in, I parked, shut down, and we took some celebratory pictures.
Adrenaline was still flowing, but we waited around a bit for sunset to deepen. I noticed after a little while that the back of my shirt was damp. It was good to have the time to calm down a little and reflect on the fact that I SOLOED! At 12.7 hours flight time!
After that we did 8 landings to full stop. I think the fatigue of the adrenaline from the solo, the heater in the cabin, and the fact that it was night was taking its toll after a few landings. Nothing about night was particularly hard I think. I didn’t have my “29 and line” to really gauge the centerline and aim point, so it was substituting the red end lights. After a few the landings started to be not so great anymore. On either the third or the fourth landing the Johnson bar for the flaps didn’t lock at 40°. After three tugs and no lock I figured I’d give up on it and just land at 25° so I let it go back to the second notch. Apparently the thumb-lock still wasn’t engaged and it clicked back to 10ׄ° on me all of the sudden. We were fast, but no worries, just make the transition to slow flight. That was new – it never did that to me before! On one turn to final was late and I had to correct back to the runway. I had thought for a moment to go around, but my instructor that it was fine, just work back to the runway and so I did. I was thinking about maybe asking for a small rest between circuits, but my CFI was getting a little antsy so he wanted to do one takeoff, which was great because I was feeling the fatigue. He did a soft field takeoff for the fun of it. It was in that circuit that I started to notice that I was feeling warm. We turned off the heat, and the landings started to improve again. A couple of the landings we did with the landing light turned off. I guess this is supposed to change your perspective on how the runway looks, but a snowy day with overcast skies glowing from the light pollution of a larger metropolitan area not too far away still made the runway markings visible to me.
Fatigue really will take its toll and it really does sneak up on you before you notice. I did not appreciate how much it was going to drag on my landings, and maybe that’s something to remember when flying – a high adrenaline event will wear you out, so take some time to relax if you need to. I think maybe a body scan added to my personal checklist would be good whenever I write one up. Definitely included in that – relax on final. Lots of little inputs instead of big ones, and remember to keep making inputs all the way through touchdown.
Holy crap…I soloed!
FencerPTS 