I'm sad to admit that I let my currency for carrying passengers lapse. Regulations (FAR 61.57 to be precise) says that I have to have 3 full stop take offs and landings in the preceding 90 days to be able to carry passengers with me. As of June 9, I only had 2 T.O.s and landings. When my wife starts to hound me about staying current, I know I'm overdue for some stick time.
So I toddled on out to the airport and flew in the pattern for an hour. Here are the results of my landing attempts:
1. Too high, too fast - REJECT REJECT REJECT
2. Trying to remember how to fly the pattern. Landing was smooth as silk.
3. Figuring out how to fly the pattern. Landing was good but not perfect.
4. ATC threw me a bunch curve balls. First, they had me extend upwind (takeoff heading). Next, they had me extend my downwind (opposite takeoff heading) for an incoming medical helicopter. But my training and experience finally started to drizzle back into my head and I adjusted my pattern nicely for a greaser landing.
There were a few planes flying around but it was congested due to one runway being out of service to be extended from 3900' to 5000'.
The weather was partly cloudy, no wind to speak of, 75°F. I'm now current to carry passengers again. Woohoo!
4 comments:
It's hard to keep it up with all the things in life between work, family, and everything else. All that matters is you're still flying when you can and enjoying it!
Haha, yeah, I really need to do some cross country flying. This local stuff and pattern work is good for keeping skills from getting dull, but I'd like to stretch my wings a bit more.
We're thinking of taking a day trip to Superior / Duluth and landing at Sky Harbor airport (DYT). It's essentially an airport right on the shore of Lake Superior. I recently bought a Lowrance 500 someone offered for sale on the Purple Board so it would be a great opportunity to play with that.
Sounds like a nice plan. That's one thing that's been bugging me as well, no real XC flying - other than the usual jaunt to the restaurant up in Urbana. I'd hoped to fly with Gina up to Michigan but now that's on hold till she can fly again. Maybe I'll still make the trip on my own, but we'll have to see how that all pans out. I'm definitely in the mood for a long flight somewhere, though!
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