Lesson 13 - Level Up !
August 18, 2022
Have you ever played the game Mario? As the first level starts, mario comes across so many hurdles, hits his head against the bricks, so many times, fights the demons, and finally after all the hardships, reaches the much awaited flagpole. He climbs on top of it, enjoys the “Top of the world” feeling, walks through the door, and enters Level Two. As soon as Level Two loads, Mario stands in a whole new world, with whole new set of challenges, worse demons, and brand new bricks to hit his head against. You realize that it is a new endeavor altogether.
That is how I felt today.
Right from the beginning, right from the moment Drew told me that we were going to Latrobe airport (KLBE). That's equivalent to graduating from elementary to middle school. I was going to be in a big boys league and if that didn't overwhelm me, whole new set of procedures and settings surely did.
First, I had my knee-board on me with some basic information about Latrobe airport - such as radio frequencies for communications.
Second, I used in-flight GPS to navigate to Latrobe airport.
Third, Latrobe airport falls under Class D (Delta) airspace, which is a controlled airspace. There is a specific protocol entering and exiting “Delta” airspace, so I had to familiarize myself with it.
There are six different airspaces, and they are spread across in an imaginary vertical border. The diagram below shows the airspaces and their respective altitudes.
Towards Latrobe Airport
Okay - so with that preparation, I took off from Rostraver. We departed to the south and from there headed towards East for Latrobe airport.
What did I need to know
Before arriving at any destination, you need to get the weather information at the destination. Usually at Rostraver, I simply call AWOS (Automated Weather Observing System) and get the wind and pressure related information, because I need to re-calibrate the altimeter based on those inputs. For Towered Airports, this information comes with an information letter - such as “A”, “B”,………, or “Z” and I need to relay that information to ATC (Air Traffic Controller). Every hour the weather information updates with a new information letter. So communicating that information with ATC makes sure that I have the most recent weather data and that makes ATC guy's life much easier.
ATC means no-nonsense business. There is a specific radio phraseology that I/Drew (as a PIC) have to adhere to, and once an instruction is given to you - you FOLLOW.
No pressure there.
Alright, so radio communication with towered airfield is a whole another discussion. There is literally 500 pages long book on it. The radio comms - if they didn't overwhelm me, they certainly oversaturated my mind with all the verbiage. Here's how it follows:
Me: Palmer Tower, Cessna One Niner Six Eight Zero (wait for him to acknowledge) ATC: Cessna One Niner Six Eight Zero Palmer Tower.
Me: Ten to the West with information letter “Bravo” Six Eight Zero
ATC : Roger Six Eight Zero, enter right midfield downwind runway Two Four. Report entering Delta.
Me: Report once enter Delta, Six Eight Zero.
All this chitter-chatter just to tell ATC that I am coming….
Now once I entered the “Delta” airspace I had to report in. That communication followed something like this:
Me: Palmer tower Cessna Six Eight Zero. In the delta, Six Eight Zero.
ATC: Roger Six Eight Zero, Report the right midfield downwind runway Two Four
Me: Report the right midfield downwind runway Two Four, Six Eight Zero.
You see, I had to repeat everything he said to acknowledge that I understood the instructions given to me. This was totally new. My active listening skills failed me for the most part, but I believe that was expected. As all Matrix fans out there know:
No one ever made the first jump.
Soon enough, we joined the right midfield downwind. There was a Spirit Airlines plane parked around the midfield area, so it was really convenient for me to join midfield downwind.
As I joined, I reported in. That communication followed something like this:
Me: Palmer Tower Cessna Six Eight Zero, Right midfield downwind runway Two Four, Six Eight Zero.
ATC: Six Eight Zero, Clear to land.
Me: Clear to land, Six Eeight Zero.
After this conversation, next job was to land the plane.
Latrobe airport is a much bigger airport than Rostraver airport. So the usual markers, such as - captains Bars and width of the runway look comparatively big from above, which gives you false indication of your height from the ground. So that was a completely new experience for me. Also, runway 24 has a displaced threshold.
Displaced Threshold is a part of the runway that cannot be used for landing. It can be used for taxi and take-off, but not for landing. If you do land on it, you not only end up getting deviation, but also might end up harming the airplane.
Having Displaced Threshold added to the original illusion of the larger airfield view. Fortunately for me (and Drew) we landed without much trouble and then taxied back to runway 24. After we landed, the communication with ATC followed something like this:
ATC: Cessna Six Eight Zero, left delta taxi back to alpha.
Drew: Left delta taxi back to alpha, Ssix Eight Zero.
So as instructed, we taxied back to runway 24 and took off for Rostraver.
Journey back to Restraver was completely based on pilotage and dead reckoning. Drew made sure of that by messing up my GPS so that I wouldn't enter Rostraver airport in it.
I knew we flew East for Latrobe, so after take-off I started flying towards West, while looking down for any familiar landmarks.
There were NONE. NADA. ZILCH. शून्य.
It was a complete new scene down. None of the highways, rooftops, churches, billboards looked familiar to me. Far away in the distance Pittsburgh Downtown was visible and I could see the UPMC building, Highmark Tower, and few other familiar buildings, but that was it, and that was not much of any use to me. Then I started to look for the river, while still flying in general West direction. Soon enough I saw a stream and that gave me some confidence, but until we were very close to the airport, I couldn't see the airfield - mainly because I was not familiar on the East side of Rostraver.
During the flight, Drew threw me a curveball. Ten minutes in, we cleared the Delta airspace and reported that we were “Clear of Delta”, he pulled the throttle idle and announced - “Engine Failed”. My first reaction was to get to the best glide speed of 70 knots. I quickly controlled the plane and got to 70 knots. Next thing in the checklist is to look for suitable landing point. While I started looking down at the ground, Drew showed me how to use GPS to look for nearby airports. I mean why land in a field if you can glide to an airport, right?
As I managed my airspeed and descent, soon enough Drew asked me to recover and we were on our way to Rostraver.
Once we reached Restraver, I did another traffic pattern. Now that I have figured out my airspeed management, my traffic pattern legwork has improved significantly. My current Work In Progress item is landing - espacially Flare or Round Out, with more finesse. I am also learning, in a difficult way, that “The task does not end at landing. You have to taxi the plane back to parking”. Not having that finesse and consistency is taking the plane all the way to other end of the runway to taxi back. Drew called it the “Full Length Landing”.
That was a Lot to take in. As I said, this was definitely a LEVEL UP. Now I have to work towards this new normal.
One step up the ladder. Keep it up.