The Reason Why
Lately, I’ve been questioning why my wife and I have signed up for so much risk by owning an airplane. There’s not one aspect of ownership that doesn’t involve risk. Flying involves physical, legal, and financial risks; not flying also involves financial risks to the airplane, and not inconsequential ones. Our airplane is hitting mid-life on its current engine; we’re only 1000 flight hours away from having to rebuild it and incurring the ten to fifteen thousand dollar expense (in 2007 dollars). That assumes, of course, that the engine makes it to its advertised TBO (Time Between Overhauls). Because of the poor cooling associated with the standard AA5X cowling, I understand it’s not usual to make it to TBO with performing a TOP overhaul in the interim. My mechanic quoted a TOP overhaul last year as $1500 per cylinder, making overhauling all four a $6000 project. I don’t have any more vehicles to sell to cover an expense like that, which is what I did to cover our first annual’s $6500 cost. If we have to do something like that again soon, I’m not sure how we'd cover it.
It also seems lately I’ve seen a fair share of engine problems out at our airfield, though at least one of them can be chalked up to pilot error. My buddy Jim’s Cessna 120’s engine failed to partial power not long after takeoff (when he was in the I crosswind) but he managed to get it back to the runway with good skill, favorable winds, and by chasing everyone out of the pattern to land downwind. Another Cherokee at the field lost power when it ran out of gas due to a crew taking off with adequate gas to perform their training mission but with a leaking underwing drain cock that failed to seat and bled down their gas in flight. Good piloting saved that one, though some of us are still scratching our heads wondering if the leak got worse after takeoff or the crew simply was complacent about the leak. No matter. I take the attitude that except for the grace of God, there go I. (You can bet us pilots who know of the incident are paying attention to whether our fuel drains are seating properly during the preflight.) Add to all this the fact that about fourteen months ago, when I was flying a Cessna 172 in a flying club, the flight immediately after mine was aborted in the air after the engine swallowed a valve; and that my own Cheetah's engine “burped” during a flight back from Missouri last month (cause unknown), and you can understand why I’m a bit sensitive to the risk of an engine failure right at this moment. Sometimes I just gotta wonder why I slap my butt into the frail airframe of a single engine airplane, push the throttle forward, and leap into the sky.
Never mind doing that at night, like I did last night. I hadn’t flown at night for a few weeks, and even that entailed only about a half hour of exposure to the dark at the end of a Missouri return. (I learned how easy it is to lose your bearings in the dark even with an area one knows, but that’s a story for another time.) On this night, I had decided to take care of my required "three take-off’s and landings to a full stop" that allows me to carry passengers in the dark for the next ninety days.
I drove out to the airport about six thirty p.m., not quite an hour after the sun had gone down, after stopping at McDonald’s to get a Quarter Pounder with Cheese and no pickles. Sitting out in the car, I ate my burger and drank a small Sprite-that-was-supposed-to-be-a-Diet-Coke as I studied the airplane’s teardrop and winged form, glowing small and ghostly white from a full moon already hanging overhead.
Once finished and out of the car, I walked through the clean, cold air over to her, sitting my flight bag down on the black no-slip tab on her wing. Stepping up on the wing, I unlocked the canopy and slid it back, letting myself step into the cockpit and lower into the pilot’s seat. I removed the various locks that protect the airplane from wind and theft and then proceeded to set up the cockpit for flight. Headset, Push-to-talk switch, Checklist, VFR Terminal Area Chart, and my kneeboard conspired to make me ready. Fetching a small flashlight and my gas checker out of the flight bag, I stepped out of the cockpit and walked around the back side of the left wing to continue slowly around her, my flashlight illuminating this and that, my hands opening and closing panels as needed to complete a preflight. Noting I had full fuel tanks and had found nothing askew, I walked in front of the airplane and, grabbing the propeller blades at their hubs, pulled the airplane to the edge of the small “driveway” out of my “carport”, the covered tie-down that serves as my airplane’s hangar. After stopping her, I hopped back into the cockpit, strapped in, and started down the Before Start Checklist.
Mags to Left, three shots of primer, hit and hold the Start button, and the engine chugged but didn’t start. I worked the throttle as I cracked it again to help it out, but nothing happened...until the exact instant I released the Start button to give the starter a rest. To my surprise, the engine fired and started. I switched the Mags to Both and gave it just a touch of throttle to help it out,and turned on lights inside and out. My airplane was now alive! I closed the canopy to cut the noise and shield myself from the cold air blowing with a wind chill that is equates to eighteen degree weather.
The automated voice that belays the airport weather over the radio reported the winds, which had been out of the north all day, as calm. I set the altimeter to 30.22 as it also dictated and checked that the altimeter reading matched the sea level elevation of the airport. Turning the landing light on, I pushed the throttle forward, feeling the airplane both roll and slide across the muddy, water-logged grass. A pop on the right brake twisted the airplane right onto an asphalt taxiway, another left straightened it out again, and I make my way up onto the airport ramp.
Two shadowy figures crossed just slightly to my right as I taxied forward passing hangars and heading toward two lines of facing aircraft. They were pilots who had just landed on runway 32, and they were walking slowly toward the flying club’s clubhouse. The winds were calm, and the "no-wind" runway is 14, so I followed the yellow line that turned left, splitting two lanes of parked airplanes. My airplane is the only one awake, loping past its sleeping compatriots like a horse out of the barn. We were creeping into the night to run away. Past the airplanes, the gas pump, and the Terminal building we went, no one there but us. The radio was dead silent, making me key the mike to see if the damn thing is working. I hear a small click telling me the transmitter turned on, so I’m content to call the radio "on" and relieve my paranoia.
Pulling into a small ramp at the south end of the Terminal area, I stopped the Cheetah and ran her though her Pre-TakeOff Checklist. Running the engine up, I checked the mags. The drops were fine but the left one sputterd a bit, so I ran the engine up to 2000 RPM, leaned the mixture until I see the RPM begin to drop and then enrichened it a little while holding the brakes tight for about twenty seconds while the engine ran, burning fire inside its heart. Dropping the engine RPM down to 1800, moved the Mixture to Full Rich and checked the mags again. They were good and smooth. The rest of the checks went smoothly; and once I was done, I turned on my landing light to show me the Yellow Brick Road to the end of runway 14. Oz. As I puttered along, I couldn't resist turning the landing light off for a second to see what it would be like to taxi without it. I could still see pretty well, but I turned the light back on and continued on down.
At the end of the taxiway, on the radio I called other pilots who might be coming in that I’m departing as I pushed the throttle forward and eased past the white stripes marking the near end of the runway. I turned the airplane toward the runway’s center as I pushed the throttle in all the way. The engine roared, and we accelerated, my feet working back and forth to hold us on centerline as the airspeed indicator makes it to 60. I pulled gently back on the yoke, the nose rotated up, and suddenly we lifted away, climbing into the night sky.
The radio is still quiet, making me wonder if I am the only small plane and pilot in the sky. To my left, the multi-colored lights of the homes and businesses of Friendswood scattered out and dropped very slowly away. Banking the airplane slightly left, I called “departing southeast” on the radio as my eyes began to see the beauty of the cities, cars, sky and ground below. Almost everything has some definition in the pale moonlight, and the lights down there make it seem like Christmas is still here, even though I know it has come and gone. Climbing to fifteen hundred feet, I leveled out. To my left was the flashing beacon and empty space that is Ellington Field. Ahead of the nose, I could see the homes marking and making League City, the moving lights of individual cars carrying their human somewhere, and beyond, the moonlight streaking the water of Galveston Bay. The air was smooth and cold and clear. I was riding a winged and magic carpet, and I could see tens of miles in every direction, more than the mortal humans on the ground could comprehend. And, for an instant, I understood. This was why we take the risks, why we endure the financial and physical and even emotional hardships that flying and aircraft ownership impose.
There is only one way to experience the peace and beauty one can find in the air.
You must be there.
It also seems lately I’ve seen a fair share of engine problems out at our airfield, though at least one of them can be chalked up to pilot error. My buddy Jim’s Cessna 120’s engine failed to partial power not long after takeoff (when he was in the I crosswind) but he managed to get it back to the runway with good skill, favorable winds, and by chasing everyone out of the pattern to land downwind. Another Cherokee at the field lost power when it ran out of gas due to a crew taking off with adequate gas to perform their training mission but with a leaking underwing drain cock that failed to seat and bled down their gas in flight. Good piloting saved that one, though some of us are still scratching our heads wondering if the leak got worse after takeoff or the crew simply was complacent about the leak. No matter. I take the attitude that except for the grace of God, there go I. (You can bet us pilots who know of the incident are paying attention to whether our fuel drains are seating properly during the preflight.) Add to all this the fact that about fourteen months ago, when I was flying a Cessna 172 in a flying club, the flight immediately after mine was aborted in the air after the engine swallowed a valve; and that my own Cheetah's engine “burped” during a flight back from Missouri last month (cause unknown), and you can understand why I’m a bit sensitive to the risk of an engine failure right at this moment. Sometimes I just gotta wonder why I slap my butt into the frail airframe of a single engine airplane, push the throttle forward, and leap into the sky.
Never mind doing that at night, like I did last night. I hadn’t flown at night for a few weeks, and even that entailed only about a half hour of exposure to the dark at the end of a Missouri return. (I learned how easy it is to lose your bearings in the dark even with an area one knows, but that’s a story for another time.) On this night, I had decided to take care of my required "three take-off’s and landings to a full stop" that allows me to carry passengers in the dark for the next ninety days.
I drove out to the airport about six thirty p.m., not quite an hour after the sun had gone down, after stopping at McDonald’s to get a Quarter Pounder with Cheese and no pickles. Sitting out in the car, I ate my burger and drank a small Sprite-that-was-supposed-to-be-a-Diet-Coke as I studied the airplane’s teardrop and winged form, glowing small and ghostly white from a full moon already hanging overhead.
Once finished and out of the car, I walked through the clean, cold air over to her, sitting my flight bag down on the black no-slip tab on her wing. Stepping up on the wing, I unlocked the canopy and slid it back, letting myself step into the cockpit and lower into the pilot’s seat. I removed the various locks that protect the airplane from wind and theft and then proceeded to set up the cockpit for flight. Headset, Push-to-talk switch, Checklist, VFR Terminal Area Chart, and my kneeboard conspired to make me ready. Fetching a small flashlight and my gas checker out of the flight bag, I stepped out of the cockpit and walked around the back side of the left wing to continue slowly around her, my flashlight illuminating this and that, my hands opening and closing panels as needed to complete a preflight. Noting I had full fuel tanks and had found nothing askew, I walked in front of the airplane and, grabbing the propeller blades at their hubs, pulled the airplane to the edge of the small “driveway” out of my “carport”, the covered tie-down that serves as my airplane’s hangar. After stopping her, I hopped back into the cockpit, strapped in, and started down the Before Start Checklist.
Mags to Left, three shots of primer, hit and hold the Start button, and the engine chugged but didn’t start. I worked the throttle as I cracked it again to help it out, but nothing happened...until the exact instant I released the Start button to give the starter a rest. To my surprise, the engine fired and started. I switched the Mags to Both and gave it just a touch of throttle to help it out,and turned on lights inside and out. My airplane was now alive! I closed the canopy to cut the noise and shield myself from the cold air blowing with a wind chill that is equates to eighteen degree weather.
The automated voice that belays the airport weather over the radio reported the winds, which had been out of the north all day, as calm. I set the altimeter to 30.22 as it also dictated and checked that the altimeter reading matched the sea level elevation of the airport. Turning the landing light on, I pushed the throttle forward, feeling the airplane both roll and slide across the muddy, water-logged grass. A pop on the right brake twisted the airplane right onto an asphalt taxiway, another left straightened it out again, and I make my way up onto the airport ramp.
Two shadowy figures crossed just slightly to my right as I taxied forward passing hangars and heading toward two lines of facing aircraft. They were pilots who had just landed on runway 32, and they were walking slowly toward the flying club’s clubhouse. The winds were calm, and the "no-wind" runway is 14, so I followed the yellow line that turned left, splitting two lanes of parked airplanes. My airplane is the only one awake, loping past its sleeping compatriots like a horse out of the barn. We were creeping into the night to run away. Past the airplanes, the gas pump, and the Terminal building we went, no one there but us. The radio was dead silent, making me key the mike to see if the damn thing is working. I hear a small click telling me the transmitter turned on, so I’m content to call the radio "on" and relieve my paranoia.
Pulling into a small ramp at the south end of the Terminal area, I stopped the Cheetah and ran her though her Pre-TakeOff Checklist. Running the engine up, I checked the mags. The drops were fine but the left one sputterd a bit, so I ran the engine up to 2000 RPM, leaned the mixture until I see the RPM begin to drop and then enrichened it a little while holding the brakes tight for about twenty seconds while the engine ran, burning fire inside its heart. Dropping the engine RPM down to 1800, moved the Mixture to Full Rich and checked the mags again. They were good and smooth. The rest of the checks went smoothly; and once I was done, I turned on my landing light to show me the Yellow Brick Road to the end of runway 14. Oz. As I puttered along, I couldn't resist turning the landing light off for a second to see what it would be like to taxi without it. I could still see pretty well, but I turned the light back on and continued on down.
At the end of the taxiway, on the radio I called other pilots who might be coming in that I’m departing as I pushed the throttle forward and eased past the white stripes marking the near end of the runway. I turned the airplane toward the runway’s center as I pushed the throttle in all the way. The engine roared, and we accelerated, my feet working back and forth to hold us on centerline as the airspeed indicator makes it to 60. I pulled gently back on the yoke, the nose rotated up, and suddenly we lifted away, climbing into the night sky.
The radio is still quiet, making me wonder if I am the only small plane and pilot in the sky. To my left, the multi-colored lights of the homes and businesses of Friendswood scattered out and dropped very slowly away. Banking the airplane slightly left, I called “departing southeast” on the radio as my eyes began to see the beauty of the cities, cars, sky and ground below. Almost everything has some definition in the pale moonlight, and the lights down there make it seem like Christmas is still here, even though I know it has come and gone. Climbing to fifteen hundred feet, I leveled out. To my left was the flashing beacon and empty space that is Ellington Field. Ahead of the nose, I could see the homes marking and making League City, the moving lights of individual cars carrying their human somewhere, and beyond, the moonlight streaking the water of Galveston Bay. The air was smooth and cold and clear. I was riding a winged and magic carpet, and I could see tens of miles in every direction, more than the mortal humans on the ground could comprehend. And, for an instant, I understood. This was why we take the risks, why we endure the financial and physical and even emotional hardships that flying and aircraft ownership impose.
There is only one way to experience the peace and beauty one can find in the air.
You must be there.
posted by Andy Foster at 8:16 PM
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