Lesson 13 – Stage One Practice

The sky was actually clear when I got to the airport yesterday. This was my first clear flying day in a long time but, as it turns out, the airplane will still fly on days when the sky is blue instead of gray.

I got a chance to see a light signal from the tower in an actually radio out situation. I had called ground, got taxi instructions, taxied to the runway and was ready to go. I called the local controller and was told to hold short for landing traffic. Once the other airplane landed, I heard the controller instruct me to position and hold which I acknowledged and did. I was just thinking that we had been sitting on the runway for an extra long time when I saw a flashing white light in the tower. At almost exactly the same time, the radio came alive and I heard the controller telling me that, if I could hear him, I should take off immediately or get off the runway. I pushed in the throttle while Sandy got on to tell him that we had not heard him clear us for takeoff. Neither of us have any idea what happened. The radio worked fine both before and after that incident so, it must go into the unexplained file.

This lesson was a review of everything I have done so far and, at two hours, was my longest flight yet. I was worn out by the time we landed. I won’’t go into detail about each maneuver. I general, I thought that nothing was great but nothing was really horrible either. It was a good review. One more time like this should and I should be ready for the stage check.

The only new items in this lesson were power on stalls, my first simulated engine failure and forward slips. The stall was OK but did break to the left which, I think, was a good thing since I got to see what happens if I am not coordinated. The simulated engine failure was mostly just a demonstration this time. I picked a field and circled down but came out too high. That gave us an opportunity to do a forward slip – which we were planning to include in the lesson anyway. I enjoyed the view in the slip – – it’’s sort of like riding down in a glass elevator.