Hey everyone, this is my first post in the flying blog, hopefully it is a good one!!!
As I have stated on the left, it has been two years since I have flown an airplane as PIC (Pilot In Command.) While still in high school, I had decided that I wanted to fly for a living and thus began to take flying lessons, working solely to pay for flying. I eventually got my private license two and a half years later, six months after I graduated, and flew a few times in the months following the checkride. However, I started flying less and less, and soon lost my personal currency. Then, life got in the way, and I neglected flying altogether. Here, I find myself two years later, now doing all that I can to again get current and start flying again, even if it is only once or twice a month.
Anyway, the point of this blog is to show my adventure of getting current again, as as an outlet of the flying adventures that are had after achieving currency. I had the unique and exciting opportunity to go flying again last week with a friend of mine, his blog can be found here: http://thejournal-postman.blogspot.com/
We met up at Apple Valley airport (KAPV) at 10 or so in the morning last Thursday. We did the usual preflight duties and were wheels up by about 10:40, heading on our way to William J. Fox field in Lancaster, CA (KWJF.)
It was an interesting ride, as it was the two of us and quite a bit of fuel in a C-152. I had done most of my private pilot training in a C-150 and thus knew the aircraft quite well, but I still prefer the slightly roomier 172 (my pocket book doesn't agree with that sentiment, however.) The trip out was the usual trip in the High Desert Airspace of California, busy, but not so to the point of insanity or danger.
We flew through Victorville airport's arispace (KVCV) and headed out to Lancaster, keeping our eyes on the unmanned flying drone and its chase plane, a Mooney M-20. This is one of the more neat things that VCV has the opportunity to support, being a former military base with all the hangers and space still available, and out in the middle of nothing but desert with only moderately busy airspace, it is a perfect base to fly and train with the unmanned drones, usually with trips into and out of Edwards AFB airspace. Just a fun side note, as it is often quite entertaining to dance around with the heritage of air force planes that come through VCV.
Anyway, onto the rest of the story. We passed El Mirage dry lake and spotted the hill with the water tower on it, our two major landmarks for finding WJF. Fox is an interesting airport in terms of cross country. I always laugh about it, as if one fly's from KAPV to WJF, it is technically a cross country flight (52 NM, the minimum is 50!) If one fly's from VCV, it is technically not a cross country flight, less than 50 NM. So, this one is considered more of a local flight, which is good because the C-152 only cruises around 90 KTS. or so, you could almost walk faster, almost!
The enroute portion of this flight is always interesting, as you never know what you'll hear on the radio. We were in contact with Joshua approach and we told then that we had the field in sight and wanted to cancel flight following. The conversation, as I recall, went something like this:
Us: "Josh approach Cessna 25P, has field in sight, will cancel at this time."
Josh Appr.: "Cessna 6526P, stay with me for just a minute, I have a military C-130 heading your way."
Us: "25P, roger."
Again, only in the high desert airspace, you never know what you'll hear. Of course, the two of us began to frantically look around for this plane coming for us. If you have never looked for aircraft in the daytime before, go up with a pilot and do it just for fun, it is not the easiest thing to do! Aircraft seem to hugh and lifelike on the ground, yet when you get into the air, they cannot be big enough, they always seem to disappear. The only exception to this is when flying at night, where aircraft are lighted up like christmas trees. The accident record also reflects this, as there are practically no midair collisions that have occurred at night.
I eventually spot the C-130, heading towards us to our left about a thousand feet below us, we report into Josh approach and let them know that we have visual separation and they cancel flight following for us. We contact Fox tower and set up for our approach.
The most common approach for Westbound flight to Fox is to give them a straight in to runway 24, assuming the winds aren't too God awful crazy, which the desert can unleash from time to time. As we expected, we got a straight in assignment and were told to report a 2 mile final at the freeway. We do and are cleared to land, a beautiful landing courtesy of Andrew and we taxi off to park and finally get out to stretch our legs, which are mostly numb by that time, too much cramp and not enough room.
We get out, chain the aircraft down and make our way to Foxy's landing, the local restaurant, that brings a subtle blend of people together, local townsfolk, transient pilots (like us,) flying enthusiasts who just want to eat and watch takeoff's and landings, and many more. I order the pastrami on Rye and Andrew get a grilled cheese, good food at Foxy's by the way!
It was at that time that we started talking and realized that neither of us had been up in a control tower, even at our local field of VCV. So, we start the quest on our smartphones to find the number to the control tower of VCV and ask if we can fly in for a tour. We have no luck and we decide to pay and just land at VCV and call from there and ask for a tour. We were on our way again.
I do a majority of the enroute flying back to VCV, again we get flight following and the C-130 is still out and about flying out of Palmdale Airport KPMD. We make haste at our speedy 85 knots and spot VCV from a long way out. We cancel flight following and call VCV tower. We are cleared to land on runway 17, one of the longest runways around, at 15000 Ft.! We land as long as we can and turn off and taxi to Millionaire watching as the drone did touch and goes on runway 21. We park and head into millionaire, where we get the number for the tower.
Andrew calls up and asks to enter the dominion of the NAS (national airspace system.) We are told to stand by for about 45 minutes. Not a worry, they have a pilot theater there, we kicked back and watched a program on WWI on the big screen in some of the more comfortable chairs around. After 45 minutes, we call back and we granted permission.
We take the short walk over to the tower and are buzzed in. We begin the trek upward. I now know why air traffic controllers are required to hold medical certificates, the workout they get everyday is pretty incredible. We finally get to the top and meet Wayne, the local controller. It is a pretty spectacular view and we talk with him for quite a time. We learned that the reason we were told to wait was because he had city councilmen up looking getting ready to approve money that he'd probably never see. He explained how his tower was no where near on par with what it should be, no recording of the transmissions, the radio's were old, etc.
He also told us how, since VCV is the ONLY civil airport dealing with unmanned drones interacting with manned flights, the FAA came out to watch how he did it, so they could come up with protocol for other airports to use, so don't let anyone tell you that Victorville has not contributed to society!
After our tour, we decide to head home to APV, it had been a long day already. I take this flight from the right seat. We taxi and take off with an intersection departure, an uneventful takeoff, a head to APV. I take us in the pattern , we are the only ones by this time a day, and set us up for approach. I have never landed from the right seat before so I wasn't expecting much; the approach was picture perfect, accounting for the slight x-wind with a beautiful side slip. However, it was one of the hardest landings I've ever done! I do a go around and tell Andrew to to the last landing of the day, having been humbled, he does and we taxi in and tie the bird down and get our for the last leg. We head in and pay then go our separate ways.
All in all, it was an amazing adventure for me, it has been way too long since I've been up flying, it has reminded me of the bug that aviation leaves in anyone who draws near for even the swiftest of moments!
Pics of the tower below.
As I have stated on the left, it has been two years since I have flown an airplane as PIC (Pilot In Command.) While still in high school, I had decided that I wanted to fly for a living and thus began to take flying lessons, working solely to pay for flying. I eventually got my private license two and a half years later, six months after I graduated, and flew a few times in the months following the checkride. However, I started flying less and less, and soon lost my personal currency. Then, life got in the way, and I neglected flying altogether. Here, I find myself two years later, now doing all that I can to again get current and start flying again, even if it is only once or twice a month.
Anyway, the point of this blog is to show my adventure of getting current again, as as an outlet of the flying adventures that are had after achieving currency. I had the unique and exciting opportunity to go flying again last week with a friend of mine, his blog can be found here: http://thejournal-postman.blogspot.com/
We met up at Apple Valley airport (KAPV) at 10 or so in the morning last Thursday. We did the usual preflight duties and were wheels up by about 10:40, heading on our way to William J. Fox field in Lancaster, CA (KWJF.)
It was an interesting ride, as it was the two of us and quite a bit of fuel in a C-152. I had done most of my private pilot training in a C-150 and thus knew the aircraft quite well, but I still prefer the slightly roomier 172 (my pocket book doesn't agree with that sentiment, however.) The trip out was the usual trip in the High Desert Airspace of California, busy, but not so to the point of insanity or danger.
We flew through Victorville airport's arispace (KVCV) and headed out to Lancaster, keeping our eyes on the unmanned flying drone and its chase plane, a Mooney M-20. This is one of the more neat things that VCV has the opportunity to support, being a former military base with all the hangers and space still available, and out in the middle of nothing but desert with only moderately busy airspace, it is a perfect base to fly and train with the unmanned drones, usually with trips into and out of Edwards AFB airspace. Just a fun side note, as it is often quite entertaining to dance around with the heritage of air force planes that come through VCV.
Anyway, onto the rest of the story. We passed El Mirage dry lake and spotted the hill with the water tower on it, our two major landmarks for finding WJF. Fox is an interesting airport in terms of cross country. I always laugh about it, as if one fly's from KAPV to WJF, it is technically a cross country flight (52 NM, the minimum is 50!) If one fly's from VCV, it is technically not a cross country flight, less than 50 NM. So, this one is considered more of a local flight, which is good because the C-152 only cruises around 90 KTS. or so, you could almost walk faster, almost!
The enroute portion of this flight is always interesting, as you never know what you'll hear on the radio. We were in contact with Joshua approach and we told then that we had the field in sight and wanted to cancel flight following. The conversation, as I recall, went something like this:
Us: "Josh approach Cessna 25P, has field in sight, will cancel at this time."
Josh Appr.: "Cessna 6526P, stay with me for just a minute, I have a military C-130 heading your way."
Us: "25P, roger."
Again, only in the high desert airspace, you never know what you'll hear. Of course, the two of us began to frantically look around for this plane coming for us. If you have never looked for aircraft in the daytime before, go up with a pilot and do it just for fun, it is not the easiest thing to do! Aircraft seem to hugh and lifelike on the ground, yet when you get into the air, they cannot be big enough, they always seem to disappear. The only exception to this is when flying at night, where aircraft are lighted up like christmas trees. The accident record also reflects this, as there are practically no midair collisions that have occurred at night.
I eventually spot the C-130, heading towards us to our left about a thousand feet below us, we report into Josh approach and let them know that we have visual separation and they cancel flight following for us. We contact Fox tower and set up for our approach.
The most common approach for Westbound flight to Fox is to give them a straight in to runway 24, assuming the winds aren't too God awful crazy, which the desert can unleash from time to time. As we expected, we got a straight in assignment and were told to report a 2 mile final at the freeway. We do and are cleared to land, a beautiful landing courtesy of Andrew and we taxi off to park and finally get out to stretch our legs, which are mostly numb by that time, too much cramp and not enough room.
We get out, chain the aircraft down and make our way to Foxy's landing, the local restaurant, that brings a subtle blend of people together, local townsfolk, transient pilots (like us,) flying enthusiasts who just want to eat and watch takeoff's and landings, and many more. I order the pastrami on Rye and Andrew get a grilled cheese, good food at Foxy's by the way!
It was at that time that we started talking and realized that neither of us had been up in a control tower, even at our local field of VCV. So, we start the quest on our smartphones to find the number to the control tower of VCV and ask if we can fly in for a tour. We have no luck and we decide to pay and just land at VCV and call from there and ask for a tour. We were on our way again.
I do a majority of the enroute flying back to VCV, again we get flight following and the C-130 is still out and about flying out of Palmdale Airport KPMD. We make haste at our speedy 85 knots and spot VCV from a long way out. We cancel flight following and call VCV tower. We are cleared to land on runway 17, one of the longest runways around, at 15000 Ft.! We land as long as we can and turn off and taxi to Millionaire watching as the drone did touch and goes on runway 21. We park and head into millionaire, where we get the number for the tower.
Andrew calls up and asks to enter the dominion of the NAS (national airspace system.) We are told to stand by for about 45 minutes. Not a worry, they have a pilot theater there, we kicked back and watched a program on WWI on the big screen in some of the more comfortable chairs around. After 45 minutes, we call back and we granted permission.
We take the short walk over to the tower and are buzzed in. We begin the trek upward. I now know why air traffic controllers are required to hold medical certificates, the workout they get everyday is pretty incredible. We finally get to the top and meet Wayne, the local controller. It is a pretty spectacular view and we talk with him for quite a time. We learned that the reason we were told to wait was because he had city councilmen up looking getting ready to approve money that he'd probably never see. He explained how his tower was no where near on par with what it should be, no recording of the transmissions, the radio's were old, etc.
He also told us how, since VCV is the ONLY civil airport dealing with unmanned drones interacting with manned flights, the FAA came out to watch how he did it, so they could come up with protocol for other airports to use, so don't let anyone tell you that Victorville has not contributed to society!
After our tour, we decide to head home to APV, it had been a long day already. I take this flight from the right seat. We taxi and take off with an intersection departure, an uneventful takeoff, a head to APV. I take us in the pattern , we are the only ones by this time a day, and set us up for approach. I have never landed from the right seat before so I wasn't expecting much; the approach was picture perfect, accounting for the slight x-wind with a beautiful side slip. However, it was one of the hardest landings I've ever done! I do a go around and tell Andrew to to the last landing of the day, having been humbled, he does and we taxi in and tie the bird down and get our for the last leg. We head in and pay then go our separate ways.
All in all, it was an amazing adventure for me, it has been way too long since I've been up flying, it has reminded me of the bug that aviation leaves in anyone who draws near for even the swiftest of moments!
Pics of the tower below.