Was taking my mother up for a sight seeing tour, in Montreal (the "Ville
Marie Circuit" for those in the know), shortly after getting my private.
Did a route around downtown and the 'Big O', and was heading back West...
typically routed well South of Dorval (now "Pierre Elliot Trudeau" - YUL)
airport, the big class C (class B to you Americans) in the area. On my way
West this time, they had me flying pretty much right over the field. I
actually had a controller at YUL contact me to say that traffic was light,
and asked if I wanted to do a touch and go. I was in a 152... at a huge
international airport... with 11,000 ft runways. Hell... even with low
hours, I probably could'a landed crossways to the runway. He had to ask me
twice... I don't think I believed it the first time. Needless to say, I was
now pretty much right over the runway, and needed to get down quick. I
turned to my mother and said, "OK. I'm going to do a manouver now that makes
the plane turn a little sideways, and it will feel funny, but it is all on
purpose. There is no need to worry." ... and I slipped that little 152 down
hard to a greaser.

I had a new respect for controllers after that. That guy could have just
let me go on and clear the area easily. I think he must have been a pilot.

(BTW... my mother was OK with the slip, and was quite impressed with the
landing. This should not be considered a brag on my piloting skills... I've
effed up many before and since... I just got lucky that time!)



"Jeff" wrote in message
...
Years back, I was flying with my Dad and they wanted to get some pictures
of a relatives house. The problem was that their house is under the Class
C of Nashville (BNA) and directly under one of the approaches. It was a
slower time of the day for BNA, but by telling them what we were doing and
how long we would be doing it, ATC accomodated and we were able to make
several orbits of the house and take quite a few pics. Got REAL close and
personal with a landing MD80 in the process, but they saw us, we saw them
and ATC was involved the whole way.

Was my first experience in learning that ATC doesn't have to respond to
every request with the same phrase

jf