Lesson 27 3/11/09

1.6hrs - Remaining required night landings, class C airspace, cross wind landing

The goal of this lesson was to work a little more on night flight and completing the night landing requirement, as well as gain some experience in class C airspace.

We departed Twin Oaks in 40H (which I was feeling much more comfortable in after the day's earlier lesson), into a clear night.

This lesson offered the opportunity to fly directly over downtown Portland at night. Definitely very cool!

I felt comfortable talking with PDX approach and tower, and we were instructed to make right base for 10L.

Located on the Columbia River, PDX can be quite windy, and tonight was no exception. I knew I would be in for a small but gusty crosswind from about 40 degrees, so as I turned final I began to fumble around trying to figure out how to side slip (upwind wing down with aileron, and nose streight with the runway using opposite rudder). Suddenly it clicked, and I was doing what I needed to do to correct for the gusting crosswind as if it was natural (what a moment!!), clear down to the roll out.

I cleaned everything up for a touch and go and we were off for another. The pattern was pretty bumpy, and I briefly though about how just a few months ago, that amount of turbulence, in the dark, would have drove me to near panic. Downwind also required quite a crab angle.

Another steady crosswind correction on final to a landing on the centerline, and we were off again.

Some were in the pattern this time around, things suddenly became busy at PDX, and we were routed all over before being cleared to enter final for 10L. At this point I had a good feel for the communication, so my CFI took over the comm to help lighten my work load a bit.

On our fifth approach, I was instructed by the tower to go around just as we had passed the numbers, and decided that it was now getting busy to the point that it would no longer be very productive.

We were routed around and up north a bit, before being cleared to turn south for Twin Oaks, concluding my class C experience. And it was a great experience!

Back at Twin Oaks I made 5 more landings, this time with only a headwind, each being a good as any landings I've done in daylight. On the base leg for landing number 4, my instructor says "oh, too bad, your landing lights just shorted out", and turned them all off. Okay, this will be a little different! I actually did just fine, but it sure was dark.

As we taxied for another trip around, my instructor recommended landing somewhere larger and better lit if I were to ever lose the landing lights. Given how dark it is around Twin Oaks, I'm confident that it is good advice. So a great lesson, and a real boost after some of the struggles of lesson 26 earlier in the day.

A successful crosswind correction! Cool!

The orange zigzag in the last picture is actually the moon, and it looked very cool at the time. I need to remember the image stabilization next time.