Sastre Air

Airline Pilot

2010-10-17T18:16:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the delay. Apparently I haven't posted since March. Between then and now a lot has happened. I've officially ended my career as a flight instructor and began the adventure as an airline pilot. As a look back, nothing really pushed me to pursue this particular airline (or a life as an airline pilot). I have a friend who I flew with during my training at ATP that works here and has always encouraged me to apply. I think I did apply back when I had a merely 400 hours. I was never very pursuant towards this airline before, but now I figured I'd give it a shot since I was now a veteran of flight instructing.

I got a call only 2 days after I had submitted my resume. I received an interview that was to be at the La Guardia airport in New York. I wasn't nervous until the day I was to travel to New York. What really gets me nervous is when there is so much complexity in something, that there has to be a failure in the execution. Here's the situation: drive 3 hours from my house to an international airport in California, catch a 2-leg flight to arrive in La Guardia, arrive to have time to accomplish apart of the 2-day interview, find somewhere to stay for the second day.

I had to wake up at 2 A.M. to make my flight at an airport that was 3 hours drive from my house. I said goodbye to my wife and 3-month old son and began my trek. The drive was eerie, but I arrived to the airport in time and flew across the country to finally make it to my destination. I figured no one would be at the interview location at the time I had arrived, but decided to make sure nonetheless. Luckily, there were still people there and I was eventually asked if I wanted to take the written examination right then. I figured I'd get it out the way and agreed to take it. A failure on the written would get you a ticket back home without an interview, but I missed only two questions, and I stayed. That night I got a much expected 4 hours of sleep. I had an original room that had poorly sealed windows right next to a freeway that ended up waking me up mid-sleep. I got a new room, consequently, where I finally was able to sleep for the 4 hours I was destined.

The interview consisted of a human resources portion, a logbook examination and a full-motion simulator evaluation, the latter being the most crucial. Despite my nervousness, I breezed through the first two portions and focused on the simulator. It was a Beech 1900D full motion simulator and we were required to takeoff, fly a published IFR hold and then fly an ILS back to La Guardia. I flew first since my sim partner was too nervous to accept it. God was with me because my flight was almost perfect except for a few expected little mistakes (I flew almost too calm). I had made it through the interview.

My flight home compared to my flight there was like 'night and day'. I felt very accomplished. It was now time to wait and see if this was the direction I would go.

Instructing Pictures

2010-03-20T00:21:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures I've taken as an instructor:

Mountain waves visible by fog.

Arrival into Burbank on a dual cross country to the IMAX theatre to see Dark Night.

IFR departure enroute for a PPL checkride.

My student doing a good job on a constant-speed climb.

Flying into Catalina on a dual IFR cross country.

Lake Tahoe airport enroute in the Seneca from Reno.

Enroute in an Arrow to Oceanside, California.

Another Milestone

2010-03-17T21:22:00.000-07:00

1000 hours is something of merit, but doesn't really go as far as a number. Recently, however, I've accumulated 1200 hours, which actually means something in the aviation world. As per FAR part 135, 1200 hours is the total hours required to fly for "commuter and on-demand operations" (i.e. charter and cargo). I've always thought of making one of these career choices my own, but it never became a reality until now. The schedules aren't as set or "normal" as the airline world. Cargo flying schedules are usually late through the night, while some charter is "on-demand", where the pilot is basically on call. Having a family makes these schedules difficult to maintain.

It seems that slowly the airlines are starting to improve financially. This is a good sign that there will be soon some movement. I'm not holding my breath, nor am I disappointed, however. Those who second guess flight instructing as a career, are missing something. It's definitely not the best paying gig, nor is it consistent, but if it were, I'd be here to stay. Flight instructing makes day to day flying the unexpected, it never gets dull.

I think the negativity that's being projected out there today by pilots is from those pilots who've always thought flying as an image, not as something they enjoy. When they realize the "job" part of the career isn't as new and glamorous as they thought, it's projected negatively. Sure, one wants to get paid and respected accordingly, but what job do these become reality on a day-to-day basis? I got into flying because it took me to a place where nothing else could. I know making it a career will make it less "magical" in the end, but the enjoyment, at least, keeps me sane. I think pilots deserve extreme respect and financial compensation due to the commitment and money it takes to become one. I've spent years and thousands of dollars to make it where I am and I think it deserves every bit of respect and compensation. With any job, we'll see if that stands.

I'm a devout musician as well a pilot. I've always asked myself why I haven't gone into a career in music. It seems to be similar to flying, though, more confined. I always thought doing something I loved, playing music, as a career would ruin that pleasure. I guess I'm glad I found flying as something I really enjoyed, because it allowed me to pursue that as a career, rather than music. I think I saw flying as a more lucrative/feasibly possible career than music, maybe I was wrong.

Thanks to all those (few) who read this blog. I hope it's enough to at least inspire someone to go for their dream.

1,000-pilot

2009-11-21T23:37:00.001-08:00

About a week ago I accumulated 1,000 hours of total flight time. A pretty big accomplishment I believe. It seemed so foreign to think of a pilot with this many hours not more than a year ago, but here I am. I didn't think I'd be where I am now. Training through ATP, it seemed like the majority's goal was to get to a regional airline as fast as you could, and I followed that sentiment naturally. Fortunately, realizing that this couldn't happen with the current hiring status of the airlines when I left ATP, I had received my CFI certificates, and I wasn't going to give up.

Fast forward to about 200 hours of dual instruction given (i.e. hours accumulated as a flight instructor), my mentality was misinformed. After barely a few hours of being instructor I realized I didn't know a fraction about flying as I should have. Then only after about 200 hours of flight instruction, I realized how much knowledge I had gained; a huge amount compared to the 200 hours I had spend gaining my commercial certificate beforehand. The saying rings true, "the best way to learn is to teach".

There's never a flight-hour that I regret being a flight instructor. I've come to realize that those who skip flight instructing miss out on a huge learning opportunity when it comes to the skill and knowledge of flying. I believe the hours spent as an instructor has shaped me to be a pilot that I could never be without it (i.e. a first officer of a regional airline starting at 300 hours). This has made me very fortunate to have had the opportunity to realize that flight instruction is one the best ways to improve as a pilot, wherever the profession direction may be.

I respect all the pilots who have dared into the career of flight instruction. It's a career that cannot be performed without challenging yourself to be a better pilot than what you think you can be and being able to see the extent of improvement that you need as a pilot that's always learning.

So called "approach"

2009-04-05T21:14:00.000-07:00

I made one of my worst approaches today as an instructor. The last part of our flight lesson I had my student do some "hood" work (he/she wears a hood where he/she can only see the instruments, i.e. simulating flight in instrument conditions, i.e. flying in the clouds.) Current winds as per the ATIS (automated terminal information service)=weather, were 210@18 knots. We have a main runway (29) and a smaller runway (25) at the airport. I enjoy using 25 because it's rarely used, and since the winds were mostly favoring this runway, I requested it from the tower. However, the tower instructed if I wanted to use that runway, that I would need to maintain 3,000 feet above the airport and enter left base for runway 25. He would instruct when to descend.

This seemed a bit odd for me since being that high above the airport would be difficult to enter a left base for runway 25 and land. I complied, and when we were about above the left downwind for runway 29, a Skywest Brasilia was departing the airport left downwind. Tower gave no indication the aircraft was there, so I took over the plane and descended a bit to be sure the Brasilia wouldn't be a factor. That scared my student a bit since he didn't realize I had taken the controls (my fault).

We were then above the airport at about 3,000 feet without indication from the tower when would descend. Finally, the tower instructed that we could descend at our discretion and make left base to runway 25, cleared to land. OK, we have to get down fast.

My student was still under the hood at this point, so I told him he could take it off and I took the controls and began a descending a left turn to land. When we made our 180-degree turn, I realized we were far too high to make the runway. At that point, tower had advised if we thought we could make the runway. I told him we probably could and I began a forward slip. When we got closer, I realized we probably wouldn't be able to make it and at that point an aircraft entering the right downwind for the main runway hadn't called in and became close to our position. Tower advised them of our position and afterwards I advised tower that we wouldn't be able to make the runway, some close calls.

At that point, tower made us to maintain runway heading and enter left downwind for the main runway (29), after a couple of aircraft passed by us. After we were in the left downwind, the tower then advised us to make a right 360-degree turn. "When were we going to land," I thought. Finally, we were cleared to land and we landed with a bit of a crosswind landing correction.

What an approach. I suppose it was both the mine and controller's fault that we made such an abnormal approach; it wasn't pretty however.

Mundane

2009-03-27T00:00:00.000-07:00

Flight instructing has its dull moments. Not that flying is dull, but doing the same things with students that you've done dozens of times, becomes mundane. It seems like certain portions of flight instruction builds up at the same time; for example, time before solo. In other words, all your students are preparing for their solo at the same time. So each flight becomes similar to the previous; landings.

As an instructor, you become an expert on landings. You see every little mistake and correction that occurs during a landing. You want to intrude, but you also want your student to see for themselves. So you sit there and see if they react appropriately. But they rarely do, so you interrupt and coach them down to the ground, and afterwards you feel like they landed themselves only by 50%. So off the ground you go again. "Maybe they'll do it this time". But it doesn't it happen.

So what makes being an instructor so enjoyable?

When your student lands the airplane almost exactly how you want to tell them. In other words, you stay quite and they're maneuvering the plane exactly how you would say they need to without actually saying it. Then all of a sudden, you're on the ground. They did it! Without your help (physical control) nor verbal coaching, they landed the plane.

It's an accomplishment that's indescribable. "I just somehow taught someone how to bring something that's thousands of feet in the air onto the ground at a specific point." How?

It's definitely something you acquire as an instructor. Basically you see all that goes wrong with landings (or anything else), and try to teach what not to do. But I suppose as you gain hours as an instructor, you also gain experience and knowledge to use towards instructing other pilots. One couldn't trade anything for the amount of experience and knowledge you get from instructing. It should be a mandatory requirement for any professional pilot. I tell people all the time that usually instructing happens before airlines or cargo pilots, yet it seems backwards to them. Wouldn't an instructor be someone who did these things BEFORE they became an instructor? One would think...

Long time coming

2009-02-23T16:14:00.000-08:00

Well, after not being able to complete my CFII due to the unfortunate events that took place during my training at ATP, I had finally committed to going for that final checkride, and fortunately for me, I passed. I am now, finally, a Certified Flight Instructor with an Instrument Add-on. And for those who don't know, the instrument add-on allows me to instruct students training for their instrument rating.

I was very pleased with the checkride. I scheduled the checkride the same day as my brother's Private Pilot's checkride so we could fly together to the airport where the examiner was. Maybe not the best idea after all was said and done. It was by far one of the longer days of my life. Not only had I been preparing myself for my CFII checkride, but also making sure my brother was to succeed as my first student to take his/her checkride.

I went first once we arrived, and we ran into some small glitches, but we got underway with the oral portion of the test. Having been an instructor for over a year, helped incrementally with my confidence to "act" as an instructor on a checkride. I also took the majority of my time getting to know every GPS regulation and operation with the particular GPS in our Cessna, the KLN 94. I've previously only used the Garmin 430 in our Piper Seminoles, and upon switching to the KLN 94, I thought it wouldn't be that much of a difference to have to really pay attention. I was wrong. There are many differences in the two units, and I'd have to say that the Garmin is far more user intuitive than the KLN. However, I did very well on the portion of the oral where the examiner had me talk about the GPS, and I'm glad I took the time to go over it. The rest of the oral portion basically tested my general knowledge of IFR flying, but with a teaching prospective, which went well. The oral lasted a little over 2 hours, and finally the examiner said to pack my things up and preflight the plane.

I wasn't too worried about the flight portion of the checkride, but I knew it wasn't going to be easy either. As always, I forgot some items during the flight that I beat myself up later for forgetting. Like forgetting to check the RAIM availability before the flight, which I practiced a hundred times. Our first approach was the ILS back to the airport we departed from, which I flew pretty strongly. I also wasn't pleased, however, with my partial panel, VOR approach afterwards. Partial panel is where the examiner, or instructor, covers up the attitude and heading indicators. One must rely on the turn coordinator and compass for bank, and altimeter and vertical speed indicator for pitch. Keeping straight and level, and standard rate turns wasn't difficult, but shooting the approach was. I used timed turns on every turn in the approach, however when trying to keep my CDI needle centered throughout the approach, all I did was turn a bit for correction. This was incorrect. The examiner later showed me how this technique is by far less accurate than using timed turns. Apart from that, my approach was mediocre. We then went out and the examiner had me teach timed turns with the examiner flying the aircraft, which I did and ended up saving myself from the approach previous. I then instructed the examiner on a GPS approach back the our departure airport where we did a full stop and taxied back.

Ask anyone, and they'll say that one never flies their best on a checkride; I am not an exception. Not only do you feel bad about how poorly you flew, but the examiner does a pretty good job critiquing your flying to the point where they seem disappointed in you. It doesn't ever feel good. So when the examiner said I passed, it wasn't the most excited I could have been, but mostly due to the fact that I had my brother doing his checkride next. This was going to prove whether or not I can succeed as an instructor.

I was able to sit in on my brother's oral portion of the test, and was very proud of his knowledge. A few things the examiner told me I needed to emphasize, but overall, he performed very well on the oral. It was definitely a good prospective to sit in on a checkride of one of my students for the first time. Afterwards, I went to grab lunch while they prepared for their flight. Once I got back, they had just began to taxi out to the runway. I ate, tried to sleep, but failed, and soon enough I heard a plane's engine and looked out the window of the FBO were we were, and saw the plane taxi back. It seemed a bit early for them to return, and thus worried me that he had failed. I stared out the window to find any cue that would tell me whether or not it was a pass or fail. My brother walked to the other side of the plane, which was odd, stood by the nose while the examiner walked away from the plane. I thought, what is happening? I see the examiner then take out a camera and take a picture. He passed.

At that moment, all the preparation of both checkrides, the fear of not being a successful instructor, was suddenly taken off my shoulders and it was a big sigh of relief and celebration.

We began our flight back home, flew into some light precipitation, and finally returned from a 11 hour day. It was worth it.

Instructing some more...

2008-11-22T16:25:00.000-08:00

Well I passed my one-year mark of instructing, and a while before that, I broke my 500-hour total time mark. I remember hearing people say that being an instructor is an invaluable experience and one learns more than they could ever learn from instructing. I didn't really think it would be as much of a valuable experience than it actually has. I think back to my first hour of giving instruction, and I've learned an incredible amount. Things become second nature and knowledge about instruments, flying and everything else about aviation become much more readily available. When it comes to landings, for example, my "picture", as they say, is so keen, that I can tell immediately the problem or the smallest bit of error. Ironically, I rarely get to land the plane. But even so, when I actually do, I've seen so many that I'm able to make a really good landing in spite of it being a while since doing it.

I'm also getting checked out in a G-1000 C172, which is pretty fun. But if you know any Garmin GPS, like the 430 in my case, it's pretty easy to understand.

My last bit of update, is that I should be taking my CFII checkride soon. I've been studying up for it for quite some time and I'm also waiting on one of my students to get ready for his PPL, so that we could do it at the same time (the examiner is at a different airport). Most likely, that'll be my next update. God be with me.

Life as a CFI

2008-06-28T15:11:00.000-07:00

Well, after the disappointing events of my pursuit to work for the airlines, I've switched mindsets and am now concentrating on instructing for a while more. I had other opportunities to interview with other airlines, but in the end I decided that the job I have now and where I live are far better than what it would be like at an airline, especially with the condition they're in now.

I've been gaining a lot more students and they're advancing their way towards their private pilot license, which means I'm not solely instructing people how to fly for their first time, this gets monotonous. And after flying a lot more during the week, I'm starting to really enjoy what I do. Not that I didn't enjoy it before, but before I only had 1 or 2 students and rarely flew, and when I did it wasn't advanced stuff. I'm also improving myself as an instructor and that makes me feel better everyday. I have more than 100 hours of dual instruction given. It's a really rewarding job.

I've also been blessed with students who fly very well. There have been some that require a little bit more work, but rarely. The area and the people I get to fly with really make what I do an awesome thing, and I'm very blessed for having a job like that. It's giving me experience that one couldn't get anywhere else.

On a side not, I've decided to get my CFII (flight instructor license to instruct instrument). The reason why I didn't receive this before at ATP can be read here. It'll add more students and allow me to instruct more advanced students, which will be beneficial. Also, I can add to my actual instrument time, which I need. More info on that as I progress.

Interview

2008-06-02T22:49:00.000-07:00

I interviewed with American Eagle on May 13th, 2008, a day before my 27th birthday. I was anticipating the call from them to schedule the interview for about a week, when I finally received the call. I was very excited and anxious. I flew from San Jose, California to Dallas/Fort Worth the day before and felt pretty confident all throughout the day. That night, however, was one of the worst nights I've ever experienced.

The day of the interview went very well. They made us all feel very comfortable and prepared. There were three parts to the interview; technical, human resources and a simulator evaluation. My first portion was the technical interview. I think I answered almost every question correctly except for one that the interviewer had to talk out of me. Afterwards they gave me a cafeteria coupon to get some lunch. The American Eagle facility itself was very impressive. After lunch, I had my human resources interview. This portion was very straight forward and I tried to just be myself and make the interview very conversational.

All throughout the day they would randomly call our names for each portion of the interview. However, if they call your name and tell you to take all your stuff with you, it meant you were not continuing with the interview. This happened a couple of times throughout the day and it made everyone very nervous. Fortunately, I made it to the final portion, the simulator evaluation. For some reason I performed the worse on this portion than the others, and flying is usually what I do best. There were only a couple of minor mistakes, but disappointing nonetheless. After returning to the room in which we were all waiting, there were only about 4 or 5 of us left (out of 9). One of the pilot recruiting personnel came in and said that we've all successfully completed the first day of the interview and gave us information on our hotel stay for the night.

From what everyone else had heard, if you made it to the second day, you basically got the job. The second day was no more than a medical exam (urinalysis and hearing test). We completed the necessary tests and they gave us our conditional letter of employment; basically saying if we pass the drug test, background test and captain review board, then we will be offered the job. I came home that day very happy and very worn out.

Unfortunately, on Friday I received an email rescinding my offer of employment. I was in complete shock. I kept questioning everything that had occurred to figure out what went wrong. I assumed it had to do with something with my background check, it couldn't had been the drug test, I don't take any. I even called the next Monday and asked about it, but was told that it was an American Eagle policy that they cannot divulge that information. Thanks for the heads-up for my next interview, huh?

I was pretty down the next few days until I started to see what started to happen with American Eagle, ironically. Hiring had all ready slowed down for them when I was interviewing, but this seemed contradictory to what the pilot recruiting personnel were saying that day. But about a week after my interview American Airlines, their parent company, announced that they would be reducing flying due to the high fuel prices and slowing economy. Since American Airlines owns American Eagle, American Eagle would also have to reduce flying. This put all interviewing to a halt and even canceled new-hire classes. So had I successfully made it through the background check and captain review, I would have probably not have had the job for long. I suppose that was God watching over me, thankfully.

So life continues instructing. Luckily, I still have a job flying. Others at the interview came out of ATP with no CFI ratings and therefore were pretty much left to looking for other airlines or no flying job whatsoever. I'm thinking more and more of getting my CFI-instrument rating. We'll see how that pans out. Instructing has been very good so far. The only complaint is the lack of flying I do. Maybe it'll pick up, hopefully. I'm still very blessed to be flying for a living.

Much needed update

2008-04-13T18:31:00.000-07:00

Well here I sit again in Arlington, Texas, not the most exciting place in the world.

Instructing back home has been great and recently I've been flying more and more. Still, instructing seems to be quite inconsistent. For this reason, I've been looking at expediting my journey to an airline. Many regional airlines have been lowering their minimums because they are so short on pilots. My ATP partner, Jon, got a job with Colgan Air, and he has been trying to get me an interview. They aren't my number one choice, but I'll keep them in mind just in case. I was able to get in contact with a captain for American Eagle who lives in Morro Bay. Fortunately, we were able to meet and we talked about Eagle and what my potential was. He said he'd talk to the hiring people there and I also told him about a program ATP does where you go through a regional jet course and then an interview preparation course for Eagle. He said he'd ask about that as well. When he called me back, he said that with my hours, they would strongly recommend me going through this program. So after much prayer and consideration, I thought it'd be worth it.

So here I am, in Arlington, Texas, doing a week-long course learning to fly the CRJ-200. We're using a CRJ-200 FTD (Flight Training Device). Although it's not a full motion simulator, it's pretty fun to fly. Learning the systems, flows, call-ours, profiles and how to fly the plane is proving to be a lot of work, but extremely fun. Our instructors are current airline pilots, and the two we've had so far have been great. The downfall, yet again, is that I'm forced to spend a week away from my wife. But hopefully the week will go by quickly and I'll be back home. Then I'll probably come back for the interview preparation for Eagle and hopefully a real interview shortly afterwards.

On a side note, I haven't been able to sign anyone off for their PPL checkride. My brother is on his last flights before his, so hopefully I'll be able to sign him off. I have a couple of other PPL students which I enjoy. I'll keep you updated, whoever reads this.

San Ardo Field Airport

2008-02-12T14:15:00.000-08:00

The photo shows the strip to the right of the 101 that is in San Ardo, California.

I haven't posted much lately. Mostly because much hasn't been going on and also because no one actually reads my blog, so there' really no point. I do, rather, like having the ability to go and read previous posts I read and reflect on them. This post serves that purpose.

I got a call from my flight school while sitting in church last Sunday. It was the first day that I didn't have to fly in 3 days, and I was looking forward to not having to drive down to work. I let my voice mail get the call and I listened to it shortly after while listening to the sermon. Turns out, there were two pilots flying one of our 152's up to King City that had to make an emergency landing in San Ardo, California (half way between Paso Robles and King City. The girl that left the message pronounced the city wrong, but I figured she meant San Ardo. I've seen the airport from the air during the flights I've made up north, but I also knew that it was a private field. I returned the call and she gives me the phone number to one of the pilots who was stranded. After calling him, I told him I would be more than happy to come pick them up and asked for some information about the airport. It was an awesome opportunity to fly up to an airport I would probably never have the chance to fly into, all without costing me anything, except some of my Sunday.

After church I drove to the airport (Paso Robles, PRB) and began preflighting. It was also a great opportunity to fly solo again. I haven't been alone in the airplane since the solo time required for my private. I took off and tried to see if the GPS knew where this field was. With the help of my brother, who printed out some information about the airport, I punched in the identifier CA88. The GPS recognized the airport and I flew direct. I asked before hand which runway the wind was favoring and they said the wind was from the south, so I would land on runway 14 (although there were no runway markings on this strip, just giant X's). I slowed down before reaching the oil fields that make San Ardo recognizable in order to make sure I didn't mistake the field for something else. There are a few other private fields out there. I finally saw the field, which was newly paved, and began to enter a left downwind. The runway is about 2000 feet, which isn't too short, but it's only 45 feet or less in width, which makes it tricky to get a proper glideslope picture while landing. I made an OK landing, considering it felt as if the wind was blowing from behind and this airport was a bit intimidating.

Here's me while flying.

The two pilots came walking along the runway, I made a 'U' turn and picked them up and we took off. The flight back was uneventful, except for the story they told of how they ended up at this private strip. I was able to log close to 2 hours of flight time and some solo time on the trip. It was an excellent experience and opportunity and I'm glad that I was the only instructor on this list that was available that day to take advantage of it.

Mineta San Jose International Airport

2007-12-07T17:52:00.000-08:00

In November, I was lucky enough to take my wife and her family up to Mineta San José International Airport so that they could catch a flight to Denver, Colorado. It was a very enjoyable trip and it was the first time my wife has flown with me since I've received my private license (she went up while I was still training to the exact airport for our honeymoon). The controller in San José kept me a little high for the approach due to parallel traffic landing 30L. But I was able to easily get it down in time for a nice landing. Also, there's a video of my landing upon returning to San Luis Obispo, California (SBP). Enjoy!

Life as a CFI

2007-10-30T19:06:00.000-07:00

Well, I officially have about 4 hours of instructing under my belt (not another notch on the old belt-quote from what movie?). The first flight I had was with a friend of mine who also wants to fly professionally. The plane I received my CFI checkout was a Piper Warrior, of which I've never flown, and is similar to the Piper Seminole, in which I have about 150 hours. This was the plane the friend of mine wanted to fly for his first lesson. I felt comfortable with it on my checkout, but as a first lesson I felt uneasy. The lesson itself turned out to be very constructive and my student ended up enjoying the flight. I, however, felt uneasy for almost the entirety of the trip. Maybe it was the plane, maybe it was instructing for the first time, but it was one of those flights I did not enjoy. I was even skeptical to give my student the controls to fly the plane. He did very well and we landed safely, although there was quite a strong crosswind which didn't help my uneasiness. Afterwards I felt completely drained and fatigued. Fortunately, my next flight, which was with my brother in a Cessna, went exceptionally well and reassured my desire to instruct. Flights following this flight became more and more enjoyable and I'm actually becoming comfortable teaching and letting my students fly the plane. I'm very excited for what's ahead.

Hired

2007-10-24T10:53:00.000-07:00

Great news, I was hired as a flight instructor for a flight school where I live in California. This was the school that I received my private pilot license less than a year ago. It's strange that I am now an instructor here. The facility and the company are great and I look forward to instructing here. I had my first student last Sunday and it was an experience in itself. I had a lot of fun, but it was a little overwhelming. I've officially logged one hour of flight instruction given.

*ACPP Completed

2007-10-16T10:29:00.000-07:00

After returning from Las Vegas, I spent a week or so at home and then drove down to Riverside to finish up my add-ons (single-engine CFI and commercial, and instrument CFI). I had a week to prepare for the single add-on, which I thought was strange that we would do the single-engine stuff first then go back to the Seminole. My checkrides were scheduled for Friday and Saturday respectively. Getting back into the Cessna was fun and I felt more than ready for the checkride.

However, when I woke up the morning I walked down stairs to find my car not where I parked it. I freaked out thinking that it was stolen and I had a lot of my stuff in it for my checkride. I called the police and thankfully it was towed, not like this was any better. I called my instructor and she gave me a ride to the towing company and I pulled my stuff out and we went to the airport. We weren't in too much of a hurry because the marine layer decided to linger over the Inland Empire and my checkride ended up being postponed until the following Tuesday. I drove home frustrated.

I drove back to Riverside and got up the next day and took my checkride. It was a fun ride and I received the two ratings. Afterwards, we flew the Seminole to prepare for the CFII checkride. I woke up the next morning and we flew over the airport where the DE was located. We arrived a little late and I pulled all my stuff out for the DE to look over. He took a look at my new Temporary Airman Certificate for my commercial rating and noticed that it didn't say "Instrument" on it (a mistake the previous DE made). I couldn't believe the misfortune. He couldn't legally give me a checkride if I "technically" didn't have my instrument. He seemed upset, I was upset, and we departed ways.

We flew back to Riverside and I told my instructor that I was going find a DE where I live and finish the checkride there. I was tired of those little mistakes that caused numerous delays and time spent away from home. I also desperately needed to start making some money since most of the money I had was depleted. Not the best way to end the program, but just glad I don't have to leave anymore.

Pink slip, passed, and moving on...

2007-09-24T16:56:00.000-07:00

Well unfortunately I officially failed my first checkride, the oral portion of my Multi-engine Instructor Initial checkride. I felt pretty comfortable up to the day previous my checkride when ATP informed me that I was going to take the checkride with a FAA examiner instead of the examiner I originally was supposed to go with. I was very hesitant to go through with it, but I studied all that day and prepared myself the best I could. It was a rough 4 hours the next morning. I knew the information sufficiently, but explaining it proved difficult and the examiner thought it would be necessary for me to get more training. I was pretty disappointed, both in the circumstances of my examiner being switched the day before, and also in myself for not being prepared or confident to perform adequately. I learned a lot from the experience and now looking back at it, I'm not as disappointed.

I returned home from Las Vegas that day and I was going to have to wait a couple of weeks until the examiner returned from a trip. Fortunately, ATP was able to schedule a different examiner for me and I returned to Las Vegas the next week. This checkride had it's moments as well.

Luckily the examiner just had me do the portion of the oral that I had failed on instead of requiring me to retake the entire portion. I felt a lot more confident and I passed the oral portion, not without some minor mistakes though. Then to the flying. We went out the plane and I was pretty nervous due to the fact that I hadn't been in the Seminole for two weeks. I made some stupid mistakes but luckily we took off and began to fly around the pattern. I immediately noticed that I wasn't able to maintain the proper climb airspeed as we were climbing to pattern altitude and I commented to the examiner about it. He continued with exam (pretending to be a private pilot student) and as we finally were able to reach pattern altitude, he failed one of the engines for me to teach and make a single engine approach to landing. When we fly on one engine we maintain an airspeed that will provide us the best performance, but I couldn't maintain this airspeed with a significant descent. He noticed the problem as well and decided to give me back the failed engine and I made a normal landing with both engines. He kept asking me what I thought the problem was but my mind was racing and I just made the decision to go back and park the plane.

According to the engine gauges, both engines were performing within their normal ranges and maximum performance, but we weren't seeing it. On final, him and I noticed the airspeed jump about 30 knots and he had mentally figured out the problem, when I was making sure I didn't mess anything else up. When we returned to the office, I thought he was going to fail me because he didn't seem happy and I thought I wasn't flying my best. We finally discussed what happened and we figured out (mostly he did) that there was something wrong with our pitot/static system which tells us our airspeed and it was giving us erroneous indications. So even though we were trying to maintain 88 knots to climb, we were really flying at about 120 knots, and not maintaining a proper climb. I learned a lot from this experience and wished I would have troubleshooted the problem accordingly, but I do give myself credit due to the fact that it was a checkride and I was under a huge amount of stress as it was, and I made a good decision not to continue with the flight. What bad luck to have on a checkride.

We then waited for another plane and we went up and I was able to perform without major faults. I felt very good about my ability during the second flight and he passed me. Overall, that day was one of the most stressful and both mentally and physically draining day I've ever had. We started at 10:00a and didn't get done until 5:00p. I was unbelievably relieved and happy for passing and I drove back home a lot happier than the week previous. I am now an instructor.

CFI School Update from Las Vegas

2007-08-29T11:45:00.000-07:00

It's week two in North Las Vegas, Nevada at CFI school. We operate out of North Las Vegas Airport (KVGT). Before coming to Las Vegas, everyone at ATP hears that the CFI course is the toughest part of the program, and from experiencing it first hand, it is definitely true. I haven't ever studied or worked this hard, even through my college years. The material being presented, although mostly review, is extremely overwhelming. The main instructor, who teaches the week-long CFI class, is a good instructor and knows his information well. I would say, though, that he lacks the small things that students look for in an instructor (motivation, encouragement, etc.). This may be a tactic of his to make us study as hard as we can, but in the end the checkride isn't nearly as bad as he makes it, from what I hear.

My checkride is this Friday. I've studied like crazy last week and this week and I feel prepared. I was lucky enough to get the same examiner as my roommate and flight partner when he attended the CFI course the week previous. He was gracious enough to write me a gouge on him. With that gouge, plus the two others that other students wrote, I can expect what the oral and flight portions of the checkride will be like. I'm still nervous, though. I want to pass and go back to California more than anything. And with the stress and overwhelming feeling I have, I know it will be all lifted off once I pass.

My last flight is tomorrow, and we'll be just flying the pattern. Flying wise, I feel prepared. I just don't know what will be asked during the oral. This is a big step in receiving my ratings and once I have this accomplished, I have a few more which will be down hill from here. I've also decided that I will most likely be teaching locally at the FBO at which I received my PPL. I'm not sure if I would enjoy teaching for ATP. A big part of which is not being be home with my wife. I'm looking forward to teaching, though, and I even have some future student prospects once I get back.

Moving right along

2007-08-09T15:03:00.000-07:00

Today I passed my checkride for my commercial certificate in the Seminole. I’m very pleased with the progress up until now and I’m looking forward to the last two weeks of the program in Las Vegas.

I was originally supposed to take my checkride last Saturday and then go to Las Vegas for the CFI course Monday the 6th. However, there were a few problems during the checkride. For one, there was a date that was incorrect on my application which the examiner caught and therefore we had to redo the application. This particular examiner is adamant about the paperwork being correct and ready upon the beginning of the checkride. He’s known to have charged people for them not correctly filling out their application. Luckily, he didn’t charge and we were able to redo the application and move on. The second problem occurred when he was checking my log book for the appropriate entries to be applicable for the commercial checkride. One of the flights my instructor and I made a few months previous had not been signed. The other flight that same day was signed, but not this particular flight. It is part of the regulations that this flight be completed before taking the commercial checkride, and with out a proper flight instructor endorsement, the flight is void. So, the examiner said that we’d have to reschedule and the earliest time was the following Thursday.

I was very disappointed because I was set on going to CFI school on the 6th, expecially because I had prior engagements the week after I would have been done. I’m over being upset about it now, there’s nothing I really can do. And I’m happy that I’m a commercial pilot now. Strangely enough, I’m only a commercial pilot in a twin engine plane, not a single engine plane. But I will get that certificate later during CFI school in Las Vegas.

Rumors are that the initial CFI certificate is the most difficult checkride yet. I’m not looking forward to that, but I’m sure I’ll get through it fine.

Cross countries completed

2007-07-31T15:59:00.000-07:00

I just recently completed the cross country phase of ATP. My partner and I flew clear across the United States from Riverside, California to Jacksonville, Florida. The students over in the west coast are lucky due to the fact that we are able to fly all the way to the other side of the country. They do this so that we can take our jet ride in the Cessna Citation, which is usually located somewhere in the east coast. Students on the east coast usually don't make it all the way to the west coast because there is no need.

The cross country phase was definately a learning experience. From the first day of you cross countries, you are required to call ATP dispatch between 7:00 AM and 7:30 AM and find out where you will be flying that day. My partner and I were lucky in that our second day we were able to fly up to Salem, Oregon. Not many students from Riverside are able to make this trip. My partner's family lives up there, so we were able to visit Portland and we had a good time seeing Oregon.

We began our journey to the east coast around the 4th day of the cross country phase. It took us about 4 days to reach Atlanta, Georgia which was where we would fly the jet. That was definately the best experience so far. It reminded me of the first time I started flying.

I gained a lot of hours and experience during our trip and it was definately a worth while journey. I created a Google map of the trip with each stop we made. The green line represents the trip to the east coast and the red line represents the trip back. The blue line represents the jet ride. By clicking on the lines it will tell you which day we made the trip and where we stayed the night.

ATP Cross Country Map

Picture 1: Me standing in front of the Citation.
Picture 2: Me and my flying partner.
Picture 3: The start of weather, which is nearly unheard of in SoCal.

Instrument Checkride Passed!

2007-07-11T23:55:00.000-07:00

I passed my instrument checkride today! It was the hardest checkride I've taken yet. I'll post more about it later.

100 hours!

2007-06-28T21:31:00.000-07:00

Somewhere between Van Nuys airport and Riverside airport I officially passed the 100-hour mark. Ironically it was one of the least enjoyable flights of flight training, but I feel that the mark was a milestone. This particular session was focused on instrument approaches and once I returned to the Inland Empire, it was one approach after another. In real life this particular situation would never occur, but for sakes of training, it was necessary. I think it was the frustration of having to complete multiple tasks at once that affected me, plus having an instructor next to me criticizing every move I made. I enjoy the steps in making a successful approach, it’s just when making such an approach happens in consequential order and in a matter of 5 minutes after completing a previous approach seconds beforehand.

Airports I've flown into

2007-06-27T17:33:00.001-07:00

I've inserted a link to a google maps rendition of all the airports I've flown into. Not too impressive, but slowly growing. Check it out if you're bored.

MEL

2007-06-22T23:44:00.000-07:00

Well it's been awhile since I received my Multi Engine add-on, but I wanted to post about the experience of the checkride. The date I had my checkride was June 9, 2007. I felt surprisingly prepared, although it seemed awfully quick for learning a completely new airplane (Seminole).

I knew which examiner I was going to have about a couple of weeks beforehand. Other students gave their insights on how he was. From their experiences and what my instructor taught me, I felt pretty prepared.

I was the first to go before my partner, Jon. As soon as we arrived at the airport, the examiner was there and he was ready to go into one of the rooms and begin the oral section. We arrived early because he was able to be at the airport at an earlier time than previously scheduled. The oral went really well. The examiner, Tom, likes to give real life situations as test questions rather than ask specific standard test questions. I enjoyed that. It was almost like we were just discussing aviation amongst each other. It seemed to end really quickly after it began.

After preflighting the plane, he arrived and I seemed to be over prepared for the flight. He asked where I wanted to go for the maneuvers and I had usually flown over Lake Matthews to perform them. He seemed like he wanted to go over San Bernardino airport for the checkride, so I said that would be fine, even though I was unfamiliar with that location. I had my terminal area chart, which I didn't use, and all the frequencies necessary for the flight (San Bernardino CTAF, SoCal approach, etc.) and I even tried to get the weather brief, which he didn't want.

We took off and headed towards San Bernardino. I made sure I kept lower than the Class C airspace for Ontario. Once we were clear, which he let me know (surprised), we climbed to 6,000 feet and began the maneuvers. Every maneuver went really well and he seemed pretty laid back (kept his eye outside most of the time, and at me to make sure I wasn't looking solely at the instruments). While setting up for a maneuver I heard Expressjet coming into Ontario and then moments later saw them fly over us at about 1,000. It was an awesome sight, I think I even vocalized "awesome".

We did an emergency decent to San Bernardino on one engine and then set up for landing. The only mistake I made, which seemed pretty existential, was that when I added power because we were below glideslope, I added a lot from the operating engine which caused us to yaw a lot towards the dead engine. I forgot to correct accordingly and the plane was yawing all over the place. Tom said, "watch that rudder!" I corrected quickly, but I felt like I made a stupid mistake. Once we went around the pattern a few times we took off and he said I could relax and he would fly the rest of the way back to Riverside.

It seemed like I didn't pass (on my own standards) but I knew that he was satisfied with my flight. He flew the entire way back and landed, then taxied back. I was very happy I had passed. It was a lot easier than I had expected, but I think I was sufficient enough to demonstrate I could fly the twin. Good times though.

IFR flights

2007-06-05T11:13:00.000-07:00

Here are the flightaware shots of my flight from Sacramento to Paso Robles, and then from Paso Robles to Riverside. Being an IFR flight, it was the first time I flew a flight that showed up in flightaware.

Since the time building flights, I've been studying and flying the Seminole simulator. I also passed the Instrument written exam and the Instructor Instrument written exam. There are four more days until my checkride in the Seminole.

First week at ATP

2007-05-31T12:06:00.000-07:00

I got to ATP in Riverside, California a week before the beginning of the program to build time. The minimum time for the program is around 85 hours, which I did not have. Unfortunately, the only Cessna they had was broken so there was a lot of free time I had to study and get situated. I decided to go home for a couple of days, though, before the actual start date. But the week the program started, it was a lot busier. I flew the Piper Seminole for the first time the second day and had an interesting first time.

We go around the pattern the first time and begin our "Gear down, before landing checklist". I put the gear down and I check the 3 green lights for the first time to check if they all came down. We get the nose gear and the left main gear light, but no left main gear light. My instructor and I look at each other, and he begins to troubleshoot. You can exchange the little lights so that you can make sure the light is actually working, to no avail. We cancel our landing and he tries to cycle the gear, still nothing. So we advise the tower and she verifies that the gear is in fact down. So we continue the pattern and come back around to land, leaving the gear down. We land uneventfully. It was pretty scary and exciting for my first time. Afterwards we find another plane and go up and have an uneventful flight. The Seminole is fun to fly, but very complicated compared to the Cessna that I'm used to.

We also did some time building to Sacramento Executive, Paso Robles and back in the Cessna. It took almost 8 hours of flight time, but a lot of fun. I'm obviously more comfortable in the Cessna, so I was a little more at ease. I was also able to fly through some actual IMC (instrument meteorological conditions) and fly above a marine layer in Southern California. When we turned to intercept the Lake Hughes VOR, we heard a traffic advisory for us. They were telling an Expressjet ERJ and we look to our right and see it fly past us at about the same altitude. It was a wonderful sight. Also flying back into the Los Angeles area was cool, seeing a lot of aircraft and being over the city. This evening I'll be flying to Phoenix for some more time building. It should be another fun flight. More to come...

ATP Flight School

2007-04-25T16:55:00.000-07:00

Due to the length of acquiring my Private Pilot's License, I decided I needed something to get me through my ratings a quicker pace. After researching some flight schools, I decided to go with ATP because of their location, price and multi-engine time. Even after this decision, it took me a couple of months to actually go through with it. One motivator, and it certainly isn't the best motivator, was their increase in price for their Airline Career Pilot Program. If I could reserve a slot before June, their old price would still apply. I then went to work.

I scheduled an interview at the KSAC (Sacramento Executive Airport) location and drove up there for the day. I studied basic private pilot knowledge and felt pretty prepared for the interview. The interview was very enjoyable, and I was able to fly a simulator, which I've never done before. I was a little rusty on some questions, but I felt I did pretty well.

A couple of days later James from ATP called and said that Ignacio, the instructor at the KSAC location who interviewed me, said he would like to recommend me for the program. James then did a phone interview asking several private pilot knowledge questions. I thought I did even better during the phone interview, but still missed some information I should have known. He said I had successfully passed the interview and we began the paperwork.

As of today, all of the paperwork, including loan paperwork, has been completed and I scheduled for the May 28th, 2007 slot at the KRAL (Riverside Municipal Airport) location. I decided to go here instead of KSAC because I know some friends down there and also have some relatives who live near by.

I'm very anxious to start and I can't wait until I'm 'immersed in aviation', as they say you will be during the program. It lasts 90 days and I'll have received the following ratings and hours (per the ATP website):

Private Multi-Engine
Instrument Multi-Engine
Commercial Multi-Engine
Commercial Single-Engine
Certified Flight Instructor:
- Multi-Engine
- Instrument Airplane
- Single-Engine
Jet Transition:
- High Altitude Endorsement
- High Performance Endorsement

200 Hours Logged Time
190 Hours Multi-Engine Time
- 75 Hours Multi-Engine Cross-Country
- 65 Hours Multi-Engine Instruction
  & Flight Checks
- Citation Jet Transition
- 50 Hours Multi-Engine FTD
10 Hours Single-Engine Time

There are a couple of downfalls. One and the most important one being that I'll be away from my wife for the 3 months. She'll be living here at our apartment while I'm there. I'm sure we'll be fine, but I know it's going to be hard. Another downfall is the loan I'm taking out. It's quite large and I'm a little skeptical of being that much in debt. Hopefully, though, I'll get a good enough job to pay that off.

I'll try to post more often on my progress and past accomplishments that I've omitted thus far.

ASEL Check Ride

2007-03-05T18:48:00.000-08:00

Well, I promised to post about my checkride, so I will do so. It took about a year for me to finally reach the checkride due to changing schools and insufficient funds. The good thing about it taking so long was that I felt pretty confident in my flying. This confidence, however, didn’t keep me from getting pretty nervous about my solo cross-countries I flew, of which I will post on later. Anyway, I studied everyday from the ASA Oral study guide and from the PTS (Practical Test Standards). I also read a lot of posts from different forums about other pilots’ checkrides. It seemed like it was going to be pretty intense and I was a bit concerned that my nervousness would cause my flying skills to drop below the standards the examiner was looking for.

It felt like the day of the checkride came up pretty quickly. All of a sudden it was the night before a day in which I thought about since I’ve began flying. I was scheduled at 12:00p and coincidentally I drove past the examiner on the way to the airport. My instructor said that this particular examiner was a good guy.

Out 2 hours or so of the oral section of the checkride went surprisingly well and I knew most of the questions he asked. Of the questions I wasn’t sure on, he helped me search for the correct one. It took about a half an hour alone to go through the visibility and cloud clearance requirements for each airspace, and surprisingly I got every part of it right. He drew a diagram on a white board and had me fill in the requirements and after I had painstakingly told him my answers, he said at the end, “everything looks right to me, let’s go fly.”

So on to the flying portion and I felt pretty good at that point. We did all the typical maneuvers that are done for the checkride and also flew the first portion of my cross-country to KSMO. One interesting point was when I did my steep turns. My instructor helped me in quickly trimming the plane to keep a constant altitude while doing the maneuver. Add a certain amount of power and trim two-full wheel turns of the trim. However, when performing the maneuver, I trimmed two-full wheel turns in the opposite direction, AND (aircraft nose-down), instead of ANU (aircraft nose-up). I quickly realized my mistake and trimmed accordingly. The examiner laughed and said he was about to say something about what I was doing. Thankfully I corrected quickly.

The landings (short-field, soft-field) went pretty well considering I was concerned about these the most. It was pretty windy and my short-field landing was pretty hard, but I guess he looked more into whether or not I landing within the space required. After the last landing, he said that I could taxi back and congratulations. I was ecstatic, but I didn’t show it. I guess in the back of my head I knew I would do all right. What a great accomplishment though, I thought. My wife was there to congratulate me first and she was sitting there the entire time watching me fly. She spoils me, but she’s awesome.

New place, new accomplishments

2007-02-27T00:05:00.000-08:00

I haven’t updated this blog forever. No matter, not many people read it, which I don’t mind. Maybe one of these days it’ll be read by few. Anyway, since the last post my wife and I moved back to our home town and currently live in a brand new apartment (brand new as in the just built the complex and we’re the first residents). I also was able to get a job at our local airport as a ramper for Mesa Airlines. It allows me to be around the aviation industry and it’s given me a lot of perspective.

Another huge update that pertains to this blog is that I passed my ASEL check-ride and am now a private pilot. I took the check-ride on January 22nd of this year. I’ll write another post about it later. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to fly since due to work and weather. But I hope to get up soon so that I can start gaining more time.

I’m looking into going to an accelerated school called ATP flight school more and more. It took me so long to attain my private license that I’m afraid it’ll take even longer to attain the remaining ratings I need to fly professionally. It’s quite costly to go to this school, but it seems to keep a good reputation and you go out of the school with a lot of multi-time which is very much needed. But we’ll see if it all pans out and I actually attend the school.

Throughout my training I’ve flown to some pretty cool airports on my solo cross-countries: King City airport, Camarillo airport, Santa Maria airport and Coalinga airport. I’ll also write about some of these flight as well.

First Solo at Whiteman

2006-03-09T13:57:00.000-08:00

Well, today was the first time I soloed here at Whiteman Airport. I felt comfortable while doing some landings with my instructor, and so he jumped out so that I could do some myself. I’ve done this before, so it was not big deal. Unfortunately, my first approach I made a mistake. The tower told me to follow another Cessna on final near the 405 Freeway making a right-base to runway 12 (that is what initially threw me off because normal pattern is left-base). But I couldn’t see him, and instead of asking tower to call my base, I, for some reason, turned my base only to see the aircraft on a long final. Whoops. So tower was a little upset and asked if I saw the traffic. I let him go in front of me, but I was too close behind him to land safely, so the tower had me do “S” turns to final. But I was coming up to the runway too quickly and so I requested to enter crosswind again for runway 12. I felt dumb, but I guess we learn from our mistakes. I hope I didn’t aggravate the tower controller too much.

Then on a takeoff, tower instructed me to expedite my takeoff due to a plane on short final, so I started to go, when I realized my window was still open, so while rolling down the runway I had to close it. I don’t know if tower noticed, but he had me make a sooner crosswind, so it was OK.

Then while taxiing, I came up to a Mooney that was coming off the runway, and tower instructed me to give way to him. But I couldn’t understand, and I heard the other plane say he was giving way to me (what I thought). But I asked tower to repeat, and he just told me to stop. He sounded frustrated, but it wasn’t too big of a deal.

I just hate silly mistakes like that when I’m by myself. But I guess I learned a lot compared if I were with my instructor. I’m good to solo for another 90 days though. I’m comfortable to fly myself, but I feel uneasy for some reason. I hope that mental part goes away. I’m at 35 hours today.

Long Time Flying

2006-02-13T23:26:00.000-08:00

So I finally was able to go up and fly today. It was surprisingly familiar to me. I was a bit nervous taxiing out, but by the time we lifted off, I felt right at home. We took off on runway 12, which faces the 4 stacks that separate Whiteman Airport and Burbank Airport airspaces. One must make their crosswind turn before these stacks or they'll end up in Burbank airspace. Another cool point was that our base leg is right over the 118 freeway. My instructor and I noticed a traffic accident on the 210 North. Cars were backed up all the way on the 118 for those wanted to take the 210 North. It was cool to see these traffic jams and I'm sure very few people get this view on a common occurrence in LA county. My landings were OK, not perfect. I couldn't maintain my 65 knot descent speed to landing, but something I'll probably fix next time. I had to work on using knots instead of miles-per-hour like the plane I flew previously, also the flap switch, which wasn't too difficult. These are some of the communication procedures I have to get used to being at a controlled airport:

Taxi and takeoff procedures:

125.0: ME: "Whiteman Ground, Cessna 4936D at Vista ready to taxi."

GROUND: "36D (winds and altimeter setting), taxi to and hold runway 12."

ME: "Taxi to and hold runway 12, 36D."

135.0 ME: "Whiteman Tower, Cessna 36D holding short runway 12 departing left closed traffic."

TOWER: "36D cleared for takeoff, left closed traffic approved."

ME: "Cleared for takeoff, 36D"

Landing procedures:

ME: "Whiteman Tower, 36D left downwind abeam."

TOWER: "36D cleared to land"

ME: "Cleared to land, 36D."

Taxiing after landing procedures:

Returning to departure:

ME: "Whiteman Tower, 36D taxiing back to runway 12."

TOWER: "36D taxi back runway 12."

Returning home:

ME: "Whiteman Tower, 36D taxiing to Vista, good night."

TOWER: "36D good night."

I also need to remember to "clean the airplane" after taxiing beyond the hold short line (flaps up, carburetor heat cool, transponder on standby). It was great to be back up there!!

Here's the cockpit:

Vista Air

2006-02-10T18:31:00.000-08:00

I finally was able to take a trip down to Pacoima and get things ready for me to start training at Vista Air at Whiteman Airport. My new instructor is Robert. We're going to get me back up so that I can get back into flying again, since I haven't for more than a month. We'll do a cross country to KSBA (Santa Barbara) and that's where I'll probably fly for my first solo cross country. I'm excited to get back into the air. The plane that I'll be flying is a 1979 C172. The plane I flew at KPRB is a 1973 C172. The differences include: airspeed indicator in knots instead of MPH, flap extension switch is notched at each degree of flap. So instead of having to hold down the switch until the needle points to 10 degrees, I can just switch it to 10 degrees and not have to wait until it gets there. These differences will make my flying experience a little less stressful, especially when I'm solo. I can't wait to get used to being up there. Here's a picture of the plane:

New Home

2006-01-25T13:31:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of our new dining room table from IKEA in our new apartment. We really like it.

We've moved to Santa Clarita, California finally and we've been enjoying it. The only downside is that I haven't been able to fly, for what it seems like a year. I was going to go up for a weekend to do some more flying, but it's not working out. So, I've decided to change flight schools and go to one closer to where I live. I hope that the whole thing works out. Mel's been working, which she really loves, and I'm happy for her. Other than that, it's been fun hanging out throughout Los Angeles County.

Flying, flying & more flying

2005-11-14T15:00:00.000-08:00

I’ve been flying a lot lately, which is really good. I have about 10 hours as of today. My last lesson ended well with a pretty good landing that I made. Before that, we’ve been practicing landings and they haven’t been easy. I was getting a little frustrated until I made a pretty good landing to end our last lesson. My friend Ben was in the back when I went up, and he seemed like he enjoyed himself for the most part. It’s been really fun though. The most exhilarating experience so far was flying to San Luis Obispo Airport (SBP) and landing at a towered airport, which those of you who don’t know, Paso Robles Airport is not. It was beautiful flying back because it was near night and you could see all the lights from below. I hope I can reach my goal to get my Private Pilot License by Christmas.

Flying day!

2005-09-10T22:54:00.000-07:00

Today my dad, Mel, her brother and I went to Paso Robles airport to go to the Airshow they were having. There was a stand there for a new flight training school that just opened up in July. We talked to the flight instructor and he was offering an introductory flight for $50.00, which is the basic price for any flight school. I didn't think, though, that I would be able to have another introductory flight since I've all ready had one in Monterey. He said I could so I was able to go up and fly with Mel!!

He treated it more like a flight lesson rather than an introductory flight since I had a good knowledge how to fly. We spent a little bit over a half hour up there and I was able to do some basic maneuvers and also talk to traffic. It was an awesome day. It fueled my desire to fly that much more.

24 Days Officially

2005-09-01T22:58:00.000-07:00

Today is the 1st of September, 2005 and there is now 24 days left until our wedding. Things are getting crazy.

Hoy es el primero de septiembre, 2005 y quedan 24 días hasta nuestra boda. Las cosas vuelven locas.

Nuevo

2005-08-01T02:21:00.000-07:00

I just set up this Blog for me and my future wife.