Well! It’s been 7 months since my last lesson due to Long COVID keeping my medical certificate (which is required to go solo) just out of reach, but I’m back armed with a LAPL medical certificate and back in some 1960s vintage flying metal. LAPL? Medical certificates? Let me explain…
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Learning to Fly: Lesson 8
Stalling 2. This was one of my most fun lessons yet. Building on the basic clean- and turning-stalls from last lesson today we would be simulating a bunch of close-to-the-ground stall situations that were a lot more dangerous – except we’d be doing them at 4,000ft (my new altitude record).
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 7
“We’re doing stalls today,” said my instructor. This was the lesson I’d dreaded the most. Being a plane geek for years, I could recite many crashes from stalls over the years. One stuck in my head as the briefing began – the tragic accident involving an Air France A330 over
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 5
Another day driving into dark clouds expecting to do ground school took a turn for the better as the clouds broke and blue skies peeked through the closer I got to the airfield. My instructor briefed that this lesson was going to be about climbing and descending, but as the
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 4
I did not expect to fly today. When I woke up it was raining and the sky was a dark grey in all directions, all the way to the horizon, but I drove the 45 miles to the airfield anyway, knowing I could do some ground-school with my instructor if
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 3
I arrived still buoyed by the joy of unexpectedly landing at the end of my second lesson. Perhaps even a little cocky. This flying stuff is easy! I even invited my wife and daughter to watch my take off. The friend who recommended the flight school to me gave a
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 2
We briefed today’s lesson then headed out to the Cessna, past an attention-grabbing 1950-vintage RAF Chipmunk, which I snapped (above). As last time, I started the engine and ran the ROSAMS checks and rolled forward to test the brakes before making a now-familiar radio call, “Golf-Alpha-Yankee-Romeo-Golf backtracking runway one-niner to
Continue readingLearning to Fly: Lesson 1
Dec 31st 2021 23:59 – As the minute hand of Big Ben hoisted itself to point straight up toward the ‘XII’ I took a moment to reflect on what I wanted to do in the forthcoming year. I made two resolutions: Invest in the friendships and relationships that had stagnated
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