falk@uiucuxc.CSO.UIUC.EDU (10/30/85)
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Your tale of a close call (water where there should have been avgas) and
the resulting lessons that you learned reminded me of some important lessons
that I learned on my first solo cross-country a number of years back. I was
going happily on my way to my second stop (the refueling stop) in a 3-stop
trip. It was a beautiful day and I was excited (I was really a pilot, I
was flying all this way on my own). I was using dead-reckoning and had checked
and rechecked my route before leaving, but, I got careless. Instead of flying
due north and following a parallel set of a road and railroad tracks, I flew
N-NE following a 2nd set of parallel road/RR tracks (I hadn't noticed that
there were TWO road/RR track pairs coming out of this small, northern Wiscon-
sin town, and I didn't pay close enough attention to my compass).
Anyway, when I got to where my airport should have been, it, of course, wasn't
there. I was very low on fuel and lost- I immediately began eyeing the terrain
(mostly cornfields) for a suitable emergency landing site. I circled the water-
tower to find out the name of the town I was at, and I couldn't locate it
immediately on the map, so I called the nearest, fairly large FBO at Appleton.
I did a few left turns on their instructions so they could locate me on their
radar, and they directed me into the Appleton airport.
As I got closer (airport in sight), I requested a straigt-in approach, downwind
(actually, wasn't much wind at all that day, but they were using the runway
from the other side). I recall very clearly telling them that I was "a little
low on fuel" and wasn't sure I could make the pattern. They cleared me and I
landed without problem. When I taxied up to the gas tanks, the guy said "top
off your tanks, m'am?" I said, "yes, top off the tanks". He later came back
and said, with a little astonishment, that he filled over 20gals (in an old
C-150 where usable fuel was just under 22gal- I had a little over a gallon of
usable fuel left when I landed!!).
I was very scared and didn't want to fly anymore that day, but I was over 100mi.from home and didn't have much choice (I actually considered renting a car and
driving home, but knew that would be the cowards way out and I would never get
my ticket that way). After regaining my composure, I took off, found the air-
port that I was supposed to have landed at(it wouldn't have counted for my
cross-country if I hadn't done that), and then completed the 3rd leg without
a hitch. Moral? One, don't get too overconfident, that's when you make mis-
takes. Two, keep a close eye on the compass as well as on your landmarks. I
really feel that having the close-call like that made me a better pilot, its
too bad that a CFI can't "schedule" one close-call for all students before
they get their ticket( :-) )
Connie Falk
(falk@uiucdcs!uiucuxc)dbp@dataioDataio.UUCP (Dave Pellerin) (11/01/85)
>> Blah, Blah > Re: Blah Blah Boy, Connie Falk's long cross country experience sounded just like mine... ... I took off from Boeing Field and flew south to Scappoose, OR for a T & G, then started up the gorge toward the Dalles VOR (I think, it's been a while). I found that the winds in that vicinity were stronger than expected, so my groundspeed was lower than planned. No problem, though, I figured I had plenty of gas. When I got to my next leg, a turn to the northeast to fly up to Yakima, I was about 10 minutes behind schedule. Still no problem, but when I got to where I figured the airport should be, there wasn't anything but rolling fields in sight. The landmarks I had planned on seemed to be there... and there... and over there too! Everything in eastern Washington looks the same! I flew around for about fifteen more minutes, then called up the tower (or was it a Unicom? I forget). They described a few more landmarks for me to follow and I found the airport tucked in between two of the hills nearby. When I pulled into McCallister Flying Service, old McCallister pumped in about 20 gallons and gave me a funny look! The rest of the flight was unneventful (and beaut- iful) over Snoqualmie Pass via Ellensburg and back to Boeing. Dave (not yet deserving of the title 'Deadstick') Pellerin