SWRFI - 05, The Texas Flyin... LONG

Dave S wrote in
ink.net:



Jay Honeck wrote:


In all honesty, though, I must question the wisdom of a sub-100 hour
pilot flying into a fly-in like this. The airspace around these
things can be a real zoo, and your arrival experience is not
atypical. I personally am glad that I didn't fly into anything like
this until I had a few years of experience under my belt.

Well... couple things.. He's a good stick.. intelligent..
responsible... and I thought he'd be up for the task.. thats why I
invited him to fly with me. But the downside is I expected him to be
able to "throw the brakes" on without a problem.. and be able to slow
to 90 kts from 105 kts without a problem. 105 is what we were getting
for a top speed in the underpowered Tampico. If we'd been in a Mooney
or Tiger, he likely would have been PNF and I would have asked to be
on the stick going in (like I did for Osh with a very low time pilot).
Every other flight with him up to this point reinforced that he was up
to the task. 100 hours means something different to me, I guess, than
others. I was hot and heavy into instrument training at 100 hrs.. had
my PPL at about 48 hours.. and had quite a bit of real PIC at that
point... No, I didn't then nor now claim to know it all.. but I would
have felt ready for something like that. My buddy hadn't given me any
bad vibes that led me to believe this would be a problem.

He is a creature of habit, though.. when I told him about how the OSH
arrival works (over dinner a while back) without having to say a word
over the radio, he coulnt believe it, and thought it'd be much safer
"if the planes were talking to each other". Well, he just got his
first exposure to frequency congestion at a critical moment. I hope it
made my point from a few weeks back, that being on speed, on altitude,
in trail and QUIETLY following instructions works best for that sort
of event.

Honestly, I think I created more of a problem with my "overtaking"
call than if we had simply busted out and came back around (we weren't
to the IP on the arrival yet..). The ATC guys, being probably
unfamiliar with the Tampico and its performance, probably thought we
literally were running over the Glastar trying to keep it down to 90
kts.. Thats what I get for trying to salvage something.. fix one
problem and create two more. I was thinking if we salvaged the
situation before we got to the IP, we could just pull away from the
Glastar and everything would work out fine. In hindsight, we should
have broke out and come around, and done it right. That would have
reinforced that the procedure was there for a reason and would have
removed some of the uncertainty.

Dave


FYI one of the Gyro's crashed at the end of the ultralight runway, I
didn't see it happen, but saw the twisted metal after. I think everyone
was ok.




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