The Good, The Bad, and the (just plane) Weird

I apologize for being a day late and a dollar short on this post. Since the beginning of April, I have been to Virginia, bought a house, returned to San Diego, worked a lot, went to Honolulu, worked a lot, and finally drug myself home last night. Whew!!! Anyway, you can thank United Airlines for missing my post deadline. Like K, I haven't been flying too long, so most of my (mis)adventures are already written up. I'll just give you a brief synopsis and a link to the previous post in case you missed it.

The good: My best flight so far has probably been my trip to Las Vegas. This is what flying is about. I was able to to use the airplane as a form of transportation to get from Point A to Point B, do some great desert flying, practice my navigation, etc. This definitely improved my confidence as a pilot.

The bad: Flying into KPSP on my long solo cross country. The original post is here, but that is only a partial story. It was my early days of blogging and I was nervous about putting things up. As Paul Harvey says, here is the rest of the story (assuming you have read the original post). The controller called my final late because he was shooting the breeze on the tower control frequency with other pilots about the shiny jet at the hold short line (a Navy T-45). I could hear the whole conversation, but I couldn't get a word in edgewise to request my clearance to final. When he finally turned me to final (after overshooting), I banked to the left. As I turned, I spotted some very close traffic, too close in my book, that I previously hadn't seen due to our separate approaches to the runway. Had the controller not unnecessarily delayed my clearance to final, the separation would have been adequate. I immediately steepened my descent to gain vertical separation and called "N12345, Close Traffic" on the tower frequency. The tower controller immediately responded that I shouldn't be making unnecessary transmissions on his frequency. I finished the landing to make it legal for my logs, then cancelled my previous request to fly closed pattern and requested a straight out departure. I wasn't going to hang around that idiot's airspace any longer than I had to.

The just plane weird: I would have to say that my weirdest flight so far has been in The Crooked Indian. The radios didn't work right, the plane flew crooked, and I felt like I was leaning to the left the whole flight. I haven't flown that airplane since, which hasn't kept the Chief Photographer from hitting me in the head for other reasons, some of which may be my fault.

In other news, we are in the process of setting up our move back to the Old Dominion. The Chief Photographer picked out a great house with a nice view of the Blue Ridge Mountains, so she will be moving at the end of May. I will remain under SOCAL/LA Center airspace until mid-July, then I will head to Washington Center to begin grad school. I have found a nearby airport to rent airplanes when time and money allow, so I will be doing some sightseeing flights up and down the Shenandoah Valley. Additionally, the Chief Photographer finally agreed that I could buy my very own airplane. That's the good news. The bad news is that I have to wait until I am out of graduate school and employed again before I can buy it. You can't win them all, but I'm going to start keeping a closer eye on airplane prices.

Cheers,
BC

The Old Dominion (Redux)

As a new Hoo, I join with the rest of the Old Dominion in writing that today we are all Hokies.

Hokie Flying Club

A few electrons short of a full charge

I had a promise to keep to the Chief Photographer. She has only made a few flights with me and I am trying to get her to fly with me more leading up to the inevitable day when, post-MBA and employed, I beg for an airplane. However, she didn't want to do any more $100 hamburger runs to the French Valley Cafe. She wanted to "go somewhere."
Accordingly, I planned a flight to Santa Catalina Island. Catalina is one of the Channel Islands off the coast of California near LA. Having been at various times a smuggling station, ranch, mine, etc, it is now under conservation and has one airport, two towns, and is a favorite destination among Southern Californians. The plan was to fly over in the morning, take the shuttle to Avalon for the day, then shuttle back to the airport and fly home in the evening. I reserved a Warrior out of KMYF and called it a plan.
Knowing the problems that can crop up with rental planes, especially club planes, I went to the airport Friday night to preflight the plane. It looked great, it had just come out of annual, and the gas was clean and filled to the tabs. Perfect!
Saturday morning, we went to the airport, did the preflight, loaded up and started up. I noticed a slight buzz in my radios, but nothing that is unusual for we pilots who fly older airplanes. We taxied out to 28R, did the runup, cleared for takeoff, let's go! Everything looks normal on the takeoff roll, liftoff, all conditions normal, we're on our way.
As I passed 500AGL or so, the buzzing faded away. I figured there must have been a little moisture in the contacts or something and it had cooked off. I climbed to 1500MSL, turned north along the coast, then called SOCAL for flight following since I would be conducting an extended overwater flight. I flew north of the 1800ft Class B shelf, started climbing to my cruise altitude of 4500MSL, and SOCAL was passing me my squawk and ident.
I dialed in the squawk, but the ident light didn't light when I hit the button. Funny. Hit it again. Zip. Cycle transponder off and back on. Nada. Do it again, same thing. "Cherokee 12345, SOCAL Approach, I have you on primary target but negative transponder. Please reset." "SOCAL this is Cherokee 12345, roger, standby." I shielded the top of the glareshield from the sun streaming in the passenger side windows and saw what I had feared, the ALT warning light on the panel that I had been unable to see due to the glare. A quick look at the Alternator output meter, reading zero, and I realized my alternator had tripped off the line.
Okay, Country, think. What's next. Airplane is trimmed and flying fine (aviate), you know where you are (navigate). Alternator master off, back on. The meter jumps up, the buzzing comes back for about three seconds, and goes away as the alternator trips back off. I call SOCAL (communicate), tell them I have lost my alternator and that I need an immediate return to KMYF. As I call them, the lights on COM2 (the radio I was working) go out, but come back on when I release the transmit button. SOCAL hears me and responds, but I am definitely wearing down the battery quickly. COM1 Off, transponder off, lights off, everything off but COM2. SOCAL clears me through the Class B direct KMYF without restrictions (Miramar was closed), do you want to declare an emergency? Acknowledge clearance, negative emergency, and as I acknowledge my clearance the lights on COM2 stay on. Good. I'd like to keep at least one radio working as I fly through Class B with no transponder into one of the busiest GA airports in America on a Saturday morning.
I point the aircraft directly at KMYF, start descending to pattern altitude, and focus on aviating. I tell the Chief Photographer that we have lost the alternator but that the battery will keep the radio going for a while and that the engine will keep running forever. Request quiet now as I make the approach. Approach and landing checklists complete. Switch to tower freq (already dialed in, just hit the button), briefest of transmissions to save the battery. Tower clears me to land #1 28R. Hit the speeds, hit the points, landing a little firm in my opinion but nothing that would get me yelled at by a CFI. Cleared to taxi same freq no restrictions. Ack the taxi clearance, back to the line, shut down. Done.
In retrospect, I probably should have declared the emergency. When I think of "declaring an emergency," I think of crash trucks rolling and the Feds landing on your head. Being without electricity in the cabin is no big deal, for some pilots it's their normal mode of operation, just not in Class B and busy Class D airspace. What I really needed was priority handling and the shortest route home. The controllers were great and gave me exactly the help I needed, but declaring the emergency would have formalized this process, especially in airspace as busy as we are. When do I declare the emergency, when the radios won't transmit anymore? Too late then. Declaring an emergency is free, may cost you a little paperwork (emphasis on may), but can get you the help you need when you need it.
I will probably also buy a handheld. Many folks say it is handy for VFR and a must have for IFR. As much flying as I do in and around Class B airspace, having no radios is not a good option.

Aftermath

We secured the plane, called the owner and the club to let them know it was grounded, then found another plane (an Archer) and flew to Catalina. It was a beautiful day and I was going to fly, by God. By the time we got there it wasn't worth taking the shuttle into town due to limited time. Instead, we had a relaxing $100 lunch at the Airport in the Sky, took some pictures of this classic airport, and headed back out. We circled the island to enjoy the view, then headed home. A nice finish to a bad start. I'll post some pictures once we download them from the Chief Photographer's camera and she has time to do some of her fancy photographer stuff to them.

Cheers,
BC