Solo X/C - Day - South

Flight #: 127 Commercial VFR61
Aircraft: Robinson R22
Aircraft ID: N2356T
Duration, as PIC: 1.5hrs
Cumulative Time: 160.6hrs

Another cross country solo flight... this time during the day. It was a beautiful day and just there just happened to be an open helicopter for me.

No real special stuff to note on the trip, except this time I decided that I wanted to circle some things to look at later. And, as you can see from the map below... I did.

You'll see a prison, a logging yard where the logs are stacked radially, and this really odd building up on a hill - in the middle of nowhere. I think it might be an insane asylum or possible a rehab for movie stars. Who knows.




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Long cross-country to the coast...

Flight #: 116 [Commercial VFR61]
CFI: Kristie E.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N779SH
Duration, as PIC: 4.1hrs
Cumulative Time: 142.0hrs

I'm going to do this blog post with minimal text. Just three words to describe it:

IT
WAS
AWESOME

Leg 1 of 3: Hillsboro (KHIO) to Tillamook (KTMK)

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Leg 2 of 3: Tillamook (KTMK) to Independence (7S5)

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Leg 3 of 3: Independence (7S5) to Hillsboro (KHIO)
Sadly, the battery in my iPhone died. Have to fake it a bit.

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Frustration, thy name is ABBA

Flight #: 086 [Commercial VFR61]
CFI: Kristie E.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N956SH
Duration, as PIC: 1.5hrs
Cumulative Time: 104.5hrs

See the airport in this picture?



















No? Really, it is right there. I swear. How about this... you fly 40 minutes to this friggin' airport that some joker named ABBA, btw, to prove how you can find things. Well, I fly around in circles... looking for the airport. NW of the town of Sheridan, OR and at 200ft. Looking, looking.





Give Up?










Scroll down...











Little more...










Take a look.


















Airport my ass. I found it, eventually tho... so there is a bit of positive. Stupid ABBA.

Triangle of Lost

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.

Triangle of Stress (a.k.a. Triangle of Death)

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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Off airport to Sportsman, no wait, McMinnville.

Flight #: 011
CFI: Kristie H.
Aircraft: Robinson R22 Beta II
Aircraft ID: N7526S
Duration: 1.3hrs
Cumulative Time: 10.7hrs

Off airport flight to Sportsman (2S6) then McMinnville Airport (MMV).


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I was unable to grab a pattern this morning, so we had to do our work elsewhere. The north looked a little hazy so we opted to head to a new airport, Sportsman, which is to the south a bit to try some approaches. The flight out was nice... different areas, but when we got there they were doing lawn maintenance, etc, and there were tractors all over the runway. Rather tangle with them, Kristie decicided to jump us down to McMinnville Airport. Usually it is too far to fly on a single 2 hour block, but since we were already 25 minutes south, we just kept going.

Interestingly enough, I recognized McMinnville from the air... mainly because of the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum buildings. We went there last year with my dad to see the Spruce Goose aka Hughes Flying Boat, H-4, HK-1 - the largest airplane ever constructed.

In any case, you can imagine the museum building that is needed to house this monster. To give some idea, all the other planes in the museum fit (more or less) within the area it covers. Not little planes, mind you, big ones like the SR71 Blackbird, etc. Anyway, worth the visit.

Since we had to fly about 50 miles to get here, we ended up doing only a few patterns and had to head back. School rule, you need to return with 1/4 tank of fuel. And, we were going to push that limit as it was. I've been losing weight, but still we're only taking 16gal of 100LL fuel with us. The more I lose, the more fuel we can take.

Overall, decent flight and enjoyable, although I can't say I stretched myself at all on this... straight level flight is pretty easy these days. More of a tour than a lesson. Suppose that is why I need to get myself a pattern!