Private Pilot

When I was working on my private pilot certificate, I thought that once I get it, that will be the end of my pilot training. I will use that to take my family and friends around to nearby locations for a day/weekend out. However, given that I live in PNW, the weather is not always great, and you only get a few weeks of good clear weather for you to venture out flying let alone spending a weekend at a get away destination. Due to this, I always hesitated taking my family and friends to further out destinations (where you could actually do something). All my trips were within the local area airports or just aerial sight seeing. To get around this challenge and as a safety backup, I decided to pursue my IFR rating. Due to the weather and the fact that I did my training on weekends, the progress on my IFR was slow. I completed most of my IFR training early March but had not met all the required hours for cross country and had not taken the written exam. While working towards my cross country time, COVID hit shutting down the flight school and then in April we had a baby. This threw a wrench on the timeline on getting my rating. Even after the flight school opened, I wasn’t able to go on both days of weekend to finish my cross country time because I needed to be there with the baby. I am trying to go once every weekend and get my cross country time in and I try to keep the cross country long enough such that I get enough flight time but short enough so that I am not away from my baby for a long time. Here is a screenshot of the flight that I did this past weekend.

Over the last several weeks, I have been doing 2 hour cross countries and I think I now need 9 such flights to get enough time before I go back to fly with my instructor for the required 250 nm long cross country get all my required flight time for IFR. The challenge with these long cross countries are that they are long and lonely. Because of COVID-19, I have been hesitant to take friends out as well making these 1.5-2 hour flights a bit boring since most of the time, I am flying in a straight line to destinations that I have already been to. I’m hoping to get done with this part of IFR requirement done quickly so that I can focus on getting to check ride and actually flying long distances, with friends and family, without worrying too much about IFR conditions. I still have to worry about freezing level, icing and storm activity though!

Since the end of October, I had been flying with my instructor to stay proficient in my flying as my medical certificate had expired. I had sent in the required documents but a couple of days prior to the expiration, I was asked to provide some more documentation which I did and the wait for the issuance of my medical certificate started. While waiting for the certificate to arrive, I got a complex endorsement from my instructor flying the Piper Arrow II. I had also started training in the Cessna 172S with a glass cockpit to get checked out in that flight when, after waiting several months, my medical certificate arrived. I checked out the Piper Arrow last week to practice landings but due to gusty winds, decided to abort my practice after a couple of touch and go’s.

Today though, I had planned taking a colleague out flying. It was a gorgeous day in the Pacific North West today but this was my first time since October flying with a passenger so I was a bit nervous. I rented a Cessna 172 as I had enough time in this plane and felt comfortable taking passengers on it. The take off was great and the flight was pretty smooth. After spending close to an hour sight seeing, we decided to land. The ATC gave me the permission to land and informed me of a plane behind me. The touchdown was smooth and the ATC asked me to take the next exit off the runway (with no delay) to allow for the next plane to land. In a rush to comply, I almost overshot the exit and had to break hard to make it.

In hindsight, I should have taken my time and let the controller know that I need a bit of time to exit. Since the only risk, if there was not much spacing between the planes, was that the other plane would have had to do a go around

I was always in control of the plane and my passenger was not concerned as well, but I felt rushed and my exit off the runway was not as smooth as it could have been. The lesson I learnt is that I should not hesitate to be assertive when I feel rushed/pressured into a request from ATC by saying unable to comply or asking for alternate instructions.