PPL training - Landings 3

Less than ideal weather conditions still made it difficult to continue on the lesson plan. So we continued, for the third time, with pattern work while waiting for weather that was good enough for the stage check.

This was not a great day for flying, but it was a perfect day for pattern work! Since we’re staying in the traffic pattern, we can just land if the weather gets worse.

I got to try more flapless landings, and landings with simulated engine failure on keypoint. We pull the throttle to idle, and then I have to land without using any power (or at least try to - we never force it down).

The first one didn’t go to well, but the rest was a lot better! This is a really good way to learn energy management.

There’s a network of gravel roads right where we turn from base to final, and I noticed some people walking around there. I wonder how the pattern work looks from down there.

I had significantly better patterns today, much more rectangular. But it took a couple landings before my flares started to improve. And I had a tendency to land to the left of the center line. There’s always something!

Priority traffic, and a helicopter, meant we had to do some holding as well.

We finished the lesson with another simulated engine failure, this time on departure, at roughly 650 feet. So I got to try the infamous impossible turn myself for the first time! That was both scary and exciting at the same time.

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