Posted by Kevin, on November 2nd, 2005 It was that time again…time for me to get up flying or lose my currency with the club. I decided that today was the day (actually the day chose me – it was day 30 since my last flight) and luckily the weather cooperated. I asked my coworker Gregg T if he wanted to go, but he’s not crazy about the thought of flying in a small plane so he turned me down. Then I asked Chris Foo, who I’ve been meaning to take up for a while now, but he was busy. So then I asked another guy from work, Paul Smeulders, and he jumped at the chance. We arrived at the club just after noon and the plane was waiting for us. After doing a walk around we got the plane fired up. I tried to check ATIS but wasn’t hearing anything. I checked other frequencies and the radio was working fine so I called up clearance and told them I wasn’t able to get the ATIS. They informed me that it was offline for maintenace. Good – I was hoping my radio wasn’t the problem. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on September 6th, 2005 I went flying this past Sunday and I took a co-worker, his son and his son’s friend up with me. We took a quick trip out to Carleton Place so they could snap some pictures of their houses. I lent my camera to one of the boys because it had the big zoom on it. We didn’t end up with any spectacular pictures. :) The weather was beautiful! Nice warm sunny day with only a little turbulance. I brought the ‘barf bag’ with me just in case. It wasn’t needed. On the way back I decided to swing by the Carp airport and do a touch and go. Probably a good thing I did because I got one of my worst landings ever out of my system before heading back to Ottawa. The boys seemed to enjoy it though. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on August 22nd, 2005 Wow! It had been a long while since I went flying! I checked my log book, and the last time I was flying was with Steve and JK on our trip down to Brockville and back in April. I was definitely due for some flight time. I booked a plane and Brad for some time yesterday. When I got to the club, the plane I had booked was offline, but fortunately we were able to get another 172 instead. Brad and I flew some circuits (in a pretty good crosswind) and now I’m current again. Need to make sure I keep it that way this time. Not only because it costs me more when I need to go flying with an instructor, but also because I miss it when I don’t fly. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on April 17th, 2005 The weather has been beautiful all weekend and luckily I had a plane booked so I really got to enjoy it yesterday. I asked JK and Steve if they wanted to join me for a flight to Brockville and back. They both said yes, and Steve even brought his GPS receiver with him. The planned route down was Ottawa (CYOW) to Smiths Falls (CYSH) to Brockville (CNL3). Then on the way back the route was Brockville (CNL3) to Morrisburg (CNS8) to Ottawa (CYOW). I had the plane booked for three hours so we had lots of time. Here is the actual route we flew (in yellow) that Steve recorded with his GPS receiver: [...]
Posted by Kevin, on March 20th, 2005 I booked a plane for this past Saturday because it was coming up on 30 days since my last flight and the club has a 30 day currency policy for pilots with less than 100 hours of flight time. Once I reach 100 hours, the requirement drops to 60 days. I asked Trev if he and Julie wanted to go flying with me since I haden’t taken either of them up yet. He wasn’t sure if they already had plans but said he’d get back to me. In the end only Trev came up because Jules had to stay home to look after Lotus (a dog) who ended up staying with them this weekend. I had booked COH for the flight but when I got there I was told that COH was offline and that I’d be taking PMR instead. I was a little disappointed since COH has the bigger engine but oh well. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on February 20th, 2005 Wow! What a perfect VFR day today! Clear blue skies and zero wind! Andy had booked CVO for us from 1100-1530, plenty of time to get to Maniwaki and back. We showed up at the club right around 1100 but the plane was taxiing out to runway 22. We got some story about the battery being dead and someone was taking it up for a spin to recharge the battery. When it got back (probably around 1140 or so) a whole pile of people got out of it so who knows if that story was true… (I suppose they could have just went along for the ride, but then why were they getting their picture taken with the plane afterwards?) [...]
Posted by Kevin, on February 18th, 2005 So Andy booked CVO for our flight on Sunday, the one plane in the fleet of 172s that I haven’t been checked out on. Well actually there is another 172 that I haven’t been checked out on yet, BOF, but neither has Andy so… Anyways, that was the only plane that was available so he booked it. That meant that I had to get myself checked out on it before Sunday. I checked the schedule and found a slot with Brad for Friday (today). I was a little skeptical about the weather cooperating but in the end it was ok. The wind was strong, no doubt about that, but not a problem. We took off on 22 but I opted to land 32 cause the wind was strong and gusting and coming from 300 degrees. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on February 13th, 2005 I finally got to take up my first passenger yesterday. I’ve been waiting to take Amy up for a few weeks now, but we finally made it. I had COH booked for 1400, and I showed up a bit early to discuss the flying club’s phone system with Andrew. Well, 1400 came and went and COH was nowhere to be found. Eventually, the person who had it booked for the time slot just before me brought it back, 20 minutes late. No apology, nothing…I wont mention who it was. Anyways, after having a bit of trouble getting the plane started (thanks for the help Dave) we were eventually on our way. My plan was to fly over Stittsville to check out our house and the dog park and then fly over Richmond so Amy could get a look at JK and Dana’s place. I figure we got about half way to Stittsville, perhaps a little more (it was actually very close to the Corel centre) and I noticed it was snowing pretty good. Seeing as I haven’t done a lot of flying in the snow, and I didn’t know if it was just a temporary thing, I opted to turn around and head back. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on February 10th, 2005 Well thanks to John and Grant I managed to get my 172 checkout done this past Saturday. They thankfully volunteered to act as guinee pigs for my load test. The load test is just so you get a feel for how the plane handles under a different load and C of G. We went out to the practice area and did a couple of steep turns and then headed over to Carp for a touch and go. It was quite busy at carp at the time, including a helicopter which was hovering around. After the touch and go (or as Brad called it, the bouce and go) at Carp, we headed back to Ottawa and did a few more touch and gos. Unfortunately on the final approach which was supposed to be the full stop, we didn’t get clearance to land because of some guy yapping away to the tower so we had to overshoot and try it again. That was about the most eventful thing that happened during the flight. Oh and the fact that there seemed to be a problem with the jacks in the back of the plane and so Grant and John could only hear about half of what was being said. [...]
Posted by Kevin, on January 24th, 2005 Since passing my flight test way back on December 6th, I haven’t been flying. It was a combination of a lot of things – weather, Christmas, other committments, but mostly it was because I’m out of money. :) Luckily, I have some pretty fantastic friends who all gave me money for my birthday so I could afford to go flying again. You guys are the best! The club has a rule that in order to be ‘current’ you have to have flown in the past 30 days. If you go past that then you need to go up with an instructor to renew your currency. Actually it’s 30 days until you have 100 hours of PIC time and then 60 days after that. I’m obviously in the less than 100 hours of PIC category so… [...]
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