On 9 Dec 2006 10:40:50 -0800, wrote:

I have about 150 total hours now, but my only night flights were during
my training as required for certification.

I fly in the Bay Area, CA I would love to see the beautiful scenery of
the city lights that night flying offers.

How long does it take to comfortabley fly at night and how do those of
you that fly at night navigate in the dark?

That depends on the individual and their comfort factor.
Whether VFR or IFR I navigate just like I do in the day time...VF R
it's looking out the windows and IFR...is self explanatory.


Or I guess a better question is what techniques do you use at night to
navigate that are different then how you navigate during the day?

If in a populated area with lots of lights it's just like flying in
the day time. You know where the horizon goes in the windshield, based
on the lights, put it there. OTOH I'd not recommend night VFR in
sparsely populated areas. In these cases there is no visual horizon
unless there is a bright moon.

My Deb has very poor panel lighting so I wear a little Head band (head
light consisting of a dim red LED, a dim white LED, and a set of very
bright white LEDs (don't switch the last one on at night in the cabin
or it gets very dark outside) I also carry several spare flashlights
of various sizes including at least one very bright one for survival.
On one night instrument flight I had problems with all of the
flashlights except the big, *bright* (very bright) 3 cell. I used it
by placing my hand over the lens and letting the light leak through my
fingers. That was through, not between!


Do you just fly the altitudes that you fly during the day time to stay
safely from getting too close to anything?

I pretty much fly the same at night as I do in the day. Landings a
bit different, but you learn to use the landing light properly and
otherwise judge distances. BTW your daylight distance judging will be
shot at night and that probably takes longer than anything else to get
used to.

Unless you are close enough to suitable landing terrain and know where
it is located there is little use in flying higher as you can't see
where you are going to land any way, but that depends on the terrain,
visibility, and availability of nearby airports.


I know the easy answer is to go up with an instructor, and I plan too,
but I wanted to hear from you all first and see what you do differently
at night versus the day and how many of you actually take advantage of
night flying.

Night flying is beautiful in populated areas or on nights with a full
moon. Using High speed film I've even taken some night shots that
came out quite well.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com