Flight #: 114 [Commercial VFR61]
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N2304W
Duration, as PIC: 1.1hrs
Cumulative Time: 136.5hrs
Been quite a while since a blog post. It's not that I'm losing interest in flying or anything, it is purely a perfect storm of Oregon weather, holidays and maintenance.
Oregon weather this time of year just plain sucks. Really, it is the inconsistency that gets you. Some days, like right now, it is cool and sunny. Others, rain. Others, pure white-out of clouds. Blech!
Holidays... friends, family and just fun take up time - and they get priority.
Maintenance... there had been a few times where friends or family wanted to go up for a spin, but depending on out combined weight, we would only be able to fly in the "Flying Tractor" a.k.a. the Schewizer 300CB. That sucker went in for its 100hr maintenance rebuild. There are very few people that fly the tractor, so it does not get priority... and so it sat. Almost 8 weeks.
Solo:
Anyway, I FINALLY got up the other day. Kind of a crazy day, actually. The weather was cold, a little windy, but relatively clear.
Headed out to, what is now a pretty common and mindless run for me, Portland Mulino Airport. 25nm South East of the airport. Takes you over some nice areas... and this is generally the flight I take friends on. The less "work" I have to do to fly, the more I can relax. A new place... I need 100% concentration and I can't answer any of the "hey, what is that?" type questions from passengers. It is their first flight, they could care less where we are going.
Anyway, good flight out. Ran in to some nimrod fixed wing dude who got his runways mixed up and was landing the wrong direction... wind at his tail. So, I had to loop around and wait for him to figure it out - with some help from me. Did a few patterns, headed back. As soon as I started looking North West, I noticed a serious weather cell coming in... and it appeared to be about 20nm west of HIO. I tried to tune in ATIS (Weather Reporting) for KHIO, but was getting too much static, so had to climb a little to listen in. Things sounded fine, so I headed back, via UAO, like I normally would. About 10nm from Mulio, I tried ATIS again, but things had not yet changed... however, the cell seemed to be quite a bit closer and looked really ominous. I tuned in to the tower frequency and heard them talking about gusts etc.
It was at this point where I decided to high-tail it back to the airport to see if I could stay ahead of the weather. I figured I had about 15 minutes before it hit... and I needed less than 10 to get there. Nosed 04W down, and brought it up to about 90kias and headed in. I was rather high at the time, 2500ft, and I started to encounter some precipitation, not freezing yet, but close. Then a few flakes started to hit the windscreen. We've been taught to have a real eye for ice. Not only does ice add extra weight to an aircraft... it spoils the aerodynamics. If you get build-up on the rotors... bad news. The last thing you want is your rotor lift efficiency to decrease.
So, we're taught to keep an eye on droplets on the window... do they freeze? Then, you also continually look at your skids. They are easily visible from the pilot seat, are direct into the wind, cold metal, and will get ice (most of the time) before any other part... especially any moving part. No ice, but I did not feel like taking any chances so I descended to about 700ft. The lower you go the warmer it should be... but the less time you have if you run in to an engine issue and need to execute an emergency landing. Hunch paid off, and things started to warm up and I was left with a little bit of spitting rain.
So, not going to ice up, but that weather cell was getting really serious. I was on Tower Frequency and they started talking about wind changing directions, gusts to 15knots. Not really dangerous stuff... yet, but it was certainly not the best choice of landing weather.
I requested access to the airspace, was granted and came in. On my way in, I started hearing chatter on the radio about the field "going IFR" (weather conditions bad enough to require special instrumentation and training). Luckily I was in a hover right off the end of my landing spot when the field did go IFR.
So, little bit of excitement.
Couple cool things as a result of this flight. I found Live ATC broadcasts, and recordings. This site broadcasts tower communications over net radio. So, you can listen in to the chatter for almost any towered airport. fly-geek, I know, but still cool. If you want to listen in to Portland-Hillsboro Airport (KHIO), you just search, or click this link.
The really cool part of it is that they archive the streams as MP3 files for up to 30 days. And, well, here is the audio from the 2nd half of the flight - the return. Apparently the feed was down for the first part, but that's fine since I was just requesting a south departure.
@3:20
Me: "Hillsboro Tower, Helicopter 2304W, 7 miles south with Siera. Request parking."
Tower: "Winds calm. Correction, Wind 260 at 15. Helicopter 2304W, Hillsboro Tower. Report 1 mile south."
Me: "Report 1 south, 04W."
@5:49
Me: "04W is 1 mile south."
Tower: "Helicopter 04W, not in sight, proceed to HAI"
Me: "Proceed to HAI, 04W."
If you are interested, take a listen. I've noted (above) the approximate time into the MP3 file these comms happen. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be downloading ALL my flights recordings from now on.
Live ATC Streaming Radio
GPS Tracks:
So far, I've been estimating my flight tracks with Google Maps, and their ability to superimpose a line over a particular map. I've done that here with this flight:
View Larger Map
The fun thing is that I've just purchased ($7.99) a great little iPhone Application, MotionX GPS. (iTunes Download) Anyway, it allows you to track, to a very high accuracy, the location of your phone, save the points, and then post them up on Google Maps to provide a very accurate map of where you have been. So, I set it up, throw it in my jacket pocket, and off I go.
Now, it would be really cool if I knew how to use the application before this flight... cause I have a really impressive GPS track of me walking out to the aircraft. Next time, I know what to do, and it will be sooooo cool.
Flight #: 106 [Commercial VFR61]
Aircraft: Robinson R22
Aircraft ID: N2223P
Duration, as PIC: 1.0hrs
Cumulative Time: 131.5hrs
Got a chance to take my high-school / long time friend Beck up for a spin. Beautiful day!
Flight #: 090 [Commercial VFR61]
CFI: Kristie E.
Aircraft: Robinson R22
Aircraft ID: N856HA
Duration, as PIC: 1.5hrs
Cumulative Time: 109.9hrs
As I'm starting my IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) training, today we did a bit of VOR Navigation. Put simply, a VOR is a radio beacon that broadcasts very focused signals radially out from the center at 1º intervals. Think of spokes on a wheel. The VOR below is south of Hillsboro airport and is named the "Newberg VOR". You can see the center of the blue circle is a box. That is the VOR itself. The blue "clock dial" around the VOR helps you determine the radials that are projected by the VOR. The blue line, pointing NNE is the 0º/360º radial... or magnetic north. Anyway, draw a line from your position to the center of the VOR dot... calculate the º on the VOR... you are on that radial. SO, draw a line from HIO to UBG, you will see that we would be on the 346º radial. Make sense?
Now, it is a little more complicated that that... but not much. Draw a line, perpendicular to the radial you are on, through the center of the VOR. In the diagram below, you will see a red side and a green side. Now, say we want to fly from Hillsboro to the VOR. Since we know we are on the 346º radial... we actually want to fly over the VOR, therefore we want to be 180º off of the radial we are on... on the other side. 346º - 180º = 166º. So, we want to get to the 166º radial. 
To use a VOR for navigation you dial in the frequency, 117.4, into your navigation radio, and then look at the instrument. If you were sitting at Hillsboro, tuned in the Newberg VOR (UBG), you might see something like this. The little knob to the lower left actually rotates the compass dial. The vertical line in the middle is ligned up dead center. The arrow is pointing to the radial we want to go to... and the tail is pointing to the radial we are currently on.
Now, in our specific example, we are North of the VOR.
If you split the VOR in half, perpendicular to the radial you are on... If you are on the red side, you are on the FROM side of the VOR. On the green? Then you are on the TO side. Think of it like this... the arrow points TO or FROM the VOR.
So... our indicaor actually would look like this:
We are on the 346º radial of the Newberg VOR, pointed to the 166º radial on the other side of the VOR. If we follow this course... we will cross right over the center of the VOR.
Using this logic, we can fly to/from the VOR to get anyplace... we just have to decide what radial we are on... and which radial our destination is on. There are VORs all over the place... so this is a really handy way to fly.
For my flight, we left HIO, headed to UBG, then to a private airport called Mach-O. About 15nm west of McMinneville (Town / Airport).
Here is what we did...
166º TO (To the Newberg VOR)
220º FROM (To Mach-O)
We then headed north just to explore a bit.
Once we were ready to head back, we dialed in:
244º TO (To Newberg VOR)
345º FROM (To HIO)
Pretty simple once you know the rules, eh?
Flight #: 087 [Commercial VFR61]
CFI: Kristie E.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N2548S
Duration, as PIC: 1.3hrs
Cumulative Time: 105.8hrs
Kind of a back to basics flight today. Headed out to Sandy River airport this morning but was diverted to Mulio airport due to low clouds. No biggie, found everything I needed to... first try. Really helps to see the airport first.
Anyway, decided to start flying the Shweizer 300CB as well. Primarily to gain more experience on different machines. Has a lot more lifting power and is not quite as squirmy as the R22... but it is a beast compared to the R22. See...
Flight #: 080 [Commercial VFR61]
CFI: Kristie E.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N2356T
As PIC: 1.5hrs
Cumulative Time: 95.9hrs
Now that I'm finished with Private Pilot certification, I've learned the basics. Know the rules, and how to stay in them safely. Commercial is all about stretching those rules to the actual limits of the helicopter, the real-world situations, so as to operate safely.
By that, I mean, since a helicopter can operate at 1500ft and have 0 airspeed... I should know how to deal with an emergency in those conditions. I should know, as I do, that I really don't want to operate there, but sometimes I may have to.
Also, there may be conditions, weather or airport closures for example, where I can't get to where I want to... and need to make a diversion.
That is what today was all about.
I had a flight plan for us to fly to Vernonia, OR (05s), made famous by the new show on History Channel - Ax Men. So, at lift off, Kristie decided to divert me with a South departure... and not my planned North departure.
At pattern altitude I got a request from the tower to check out some cloud bases to the south... so we did that for them. After that, she diverted me to Mulino airport. I'd been there before, but after the could base check, I was about 5 miles south of where I had been in the past, so it was a bit of a new path for me.
Anyway, found it without too much trouble. Once we got there, the fun began. We started the zero airspeed auto-rotation training. Think hovering at 1500ft, still... and cutting the engine. WOA! We did not start that today, but we're on the way. Kristie asked me to set up for 1300ft @ 40knots. 600ft higher and 30knots slower than a normal autorotation setup.
The key here is, you are looking for good rotor RPM to land safely. You get that by converting airspeed or altitude to upward thrust on the main rotor. In this case, we have less airspeed than we need, but more altitude. So, what do you do? You nose dive... get some speed, pull out gradually and wind up those main rotor RPMs. Which is exactly what I did.
True is, this was not such a stretch for me... as I'm known for being slow in my autos as it is... so I already know that nosing down gives me airspeed, but reduces the thrust on the main rotor... so I have to correct things on the way down.
Was a cool excercise, and I'm looking forward to doing 0 airspeed ones eventually. Althought, that has to be a little funny feeling when you kill the throttle.
One thing which I forgot to mention is Flight Following. Kristie showed it to me the other day. Think of it as your own personal radar operator telling you where to go. How do you do it? You call up Portland-International, ask them for "VFR Flight Following" to an airport, and they operator will tell you which way to go. They ask you to set your transponder to a particular number, "Helcopter 2356T, sqwak 4096, and Ident.". That way you will appear as an identified dot on his radar. He'll be there watching you all the way. Every so often he will come on the radio and tell you "Airport is 12miles out, at 1 O'Clock. Do you have the airport in sight." Once you have the airport in sight, you let them know, and they let you go.
Cool stuff today. No flights for a few days... holiday coming up.
Flight #: 050
CFI: Kristie H.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N8340S
Duration: 1.5hrs
Cumulative Time: 56.7hrs
Same run through the triangle. Except this time, as we were leaving Mulino, Kristie diverted me to another airport about 15 nm south of Aurora. No problem, I got there... I just got lost leaving.
Ugh. I hate being lost. Found my way, eventually, but man, did that suck.
Flight #: 049
CFI: Kristie H.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N2356T
Duration: 1.3hrs
Cumulative Time: 55.2hrs
WOAH, this was intense. The triangle of death consists of a cross country (XC) flight to three other airports. Portland-Mulino(4S6), Aurora State(KUAO), McMinnville (KMMV), and then back to Portland-Hillsboro (KHIO).
Round trip of about 70 nautical miles. The truth is, that is really not all that far, and when you are cooking along at 80 knots, things fly by pretty fast.
So, before you even start a XC flight, you need to prepare a flight plan. There is a standard form, and as you can see, it is filled with gobs of information. The one posted here is just the template I use, as it will change depending on wind conditions. But, this gives you a good idea of what is needed.
In flight, you actually fold it and store it in your kneeboard. This way you only look at the details you need to see in flight. Which is mainly the checkpoints, the heading, segment time, altitudes, and communication frequencies.
Once you get this form filled out, you call 1-800-WX-BRIEF, which will connect you with your Flight Service Station. It is a service operated by Lockheed Martin that maintains information, weather data, and other details for a given flight. It is not Air Traffic Control, but a service to give you weather details on your flight plan and to maintain a track of where you should be, and where you might be if something goes wrong. Safety service, really.
So, you call FSS and for our area, they will connect you with McMinneville FSS. You ask for a briefer and then give them details about your flight. They will verify your data; checking to make sure you have the fuel to make it, look into weather along the path of flight, etc. They will also let you know of any special reports that you might be concerned with.
Once you complete this, you can consider your flight plan filed.
Then, it is off to the helicopter. You pre-flight and run-up as normal. Rather than requesting a pattern, you request a departure. In this case we're heading SE, so in this case, I requested a East departure to take off into the wind.
Climb out as usual, and check my first compass heading, and start my timer. As we transition out of KHIO airspace, we call up our buddies at McMinneville FSS to let them know we want to open our flight plan. It goes something like this:
Kristie: "McMinneville radio, this is 2356-Tango on 122.45."
FSS: "2356-Tango, McMinneville radio, say full call-sign."
K: "November-2356-Tango."
FSS: "Afternoon, 2356-Tango, What can we do for you today?"
K: "I'd like to open my flightplan."
FSS: "2356-Tango, what is your departure airport?"
K: "Hotel-India-Oscar."
FSS: "OK, got you here. What was your departure time?"
K: "Approximately 5 minutes ago."
FSS: "OK, so departure at 2122 zulu, confirm?"
K: "Correct."
FSS: "2356-Tango, your flight plan is now open. We do request pilot reports on FlightWatch at 122.0 if you have them. Please make sure to close your flight plan upon landing. Have a nice flight."
K: "Thanks. 2356-Tango".
As this point, they know where we are, where we are headed, how much fuel have, and when we are expected back.
Then the fun begins. It is all about communicating when flying. Make sure everyone knows where you are, and you know where everyone else is. Rather than explain every little detail; look at the first image above. I'm flying the triangle, clockwise. Every time I'm 10, 5, 3, 2, 1 nm from an airport (the blue or magenta circles, with or without the handles) I'm talking. I'm also checking weather for each of the airports I intend on landing. Basically, constantly. When you get to an airport, you need to let everyone know your plans. Where are you coming from? What altitude are you at right now? Ascending, descending? What direction are you traveling in? What are your plans? Landing, approach, etc, etc. Lots of communication.
Keep in mind, I'm hauling ass too... not time to dilly dally and check out the scenery. I'm checking speed, altitude, traffic around me. Am I over my checkpoints? How's the fuel?
Anyway, there is a lot of stuff going on here. Granted, I'm stuffing a lot of action into a small 70 nm flight here... but the point is that this is supposed to be intense. It is supposed to give you a bit of stomach acid so that you know how to deal with stuff when it comes up for real.
Anyway, we got back, landed, and closed the flight plan.
It was really cool, but really stressful.
I got to be honest, I was feeling pretty big after all my solos the past week. Big man, flying a helicopter. Now, I've got my ass out of the baby pool and into the deep sea.
So much for the feeling of superiority. This is intense!
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