Never again on PE - share your mistakes

[JMieras]

Hello, Switched freq without hand off while under radar control during the CAT6. Failed on the spot. Controller unimpressed.

Task saturation is a real thing.

PE is inappropriate time to figure out how a GTN750 works.

Generally speaking, flying over mountains works better than THRU them.

JMieras, CAT5...edit to remove double negitive

[frantzy]

Over 1000 RW hours and 10,000 sim hours but I just committed a bad pilot deviation in my second week on PE.

Cleared KSEA visual 34R in a 737. Selected in the FMS but for some reason neglected to select the LOC course as backup for the visual. Mistake number 1.

Got the runway in sight but had a bit too much speed and slightly overshot the runway extended center line. Mistake number 2.

Tracked back to align to runway but had hardware issue with gear handle that took a few moments to resolve, leaving me with excess speed to bleed off. Mistake number 3.

Got everything sorted or so I thought until the controller pointed out I was about to land on 34C, the wrong runway.

I locked in on the first runway I saw from 10 miles out but it was the wrong one the whole time.
Really embarrassing mistake.

Mike F.

[wrs2]

Having been flying for many years in tower controlled fields I felt rather comfortable to give the Cat-3 pattern work a run as someone new to PE environment. However, this day ATC was very busy throughout SoCal. On each of my three departures was told to report mid-field downwind. However, each time the control had many calling and I could not really reach tower till and chose to extended downwind. This prompted a failure. The AIM says on towered controlled fields the pilot does not report each leg only a leg requested. As such I should fly the standard traffic pattern even if I cannot reach tower. Tower will advise of other traffic departing, in the pattern or arriving and provide a position number and cleared to land. My actual experience for many years even at very busy class C airports was that tower would always be free enough to provide guidance after a mid field reporting. The PE system is great but having a controller handling so much airspace you can have situations arise that are not often seen in real flying. Nonetheless the AIM provides guidance. Fly the pattern at a controlled field and if not cleared to land by final go around.

[Keith Smith]

wrs2, we were able to review your specific case. The controller advised you a couple of times not to extend the downwind in instances where you couldn't do the midfield check-in, however, it appears that you continued to extend the downwind leg in instances where you hadn't been able to make a call. That was the reason for the grade, not because you didn't report midfield. The controller was aware that the radio was tied up as you were passing midfield. You should fly a regular pattern and then go-around if you don't have a landing clearance. And yes, I agree, this happens on PE considerably more often than it would happen in real life because of the traffic level and staffing situation.

[PhillipR]

Howdy folks - thought I'd resurrect this thread with an intro and a set of "never agains."

Me:
Just finished my PPL (July) but have some obvious gaps that didn't come up on the checkride; I also bought a plane and am in the middle of the transition training required by insurance. Then it'll be on to IR and hopefully CPL.

Never Agains:

* First flight with PE I figured I'd try IR, because how hard can it be, and I'm about 80% of the way through the material for the written test. Got my clearance, taxiied to the runway, then realized I was saturated just looking at the DP for KBFI. Told controller I had a radio issue and taxiied back to parking to go do some more reading

* Second flight - OK, I've got this IFR thing, let's go. KPAE to KBFI, PAINE6 DP, ILS 14R @ BFI. Needless to say, it did not go well. Thought I was following instrutions, but misunderstood a vector as clearance to the approach, and put myself on the approach. Controller gave me an EPIC chew-out, and I was shaky IRL. Glad it didn't happen for real, because that would've been my ticket. Followed up it with ANOTHER misunderstanding about cleared for the visual. Listen to my folly for your enjoyment; I've got a lot to learn, still.

Audio at http://audio.pilotedge.net/2020/9/2020- ... _14010.mp3, starting at about 11 minutes.

* Third flight: most of my experience is at controlled fields, so I wanted to practice uncontrolled and do my CAT2. Took off from L88 and did about 7 touch-and-goes to practice the radio calls. Landed, filed a VFR flight plan for CAT2, took off - and my entire radio panel went dead. I still have no idea what happened. I don't think I have failures on in my simulator, and (correct me if I'm wrong?) I didn't think PE could push failures. But it was real enough to cause me to panic a bit, so I flew a wide pattern and landed without issue. Did OK overall, but consistently overflew on base and had to correct wildly for final.

* Fourth flight. Trying CAT2 for real. Took off, thought I understood the briefed flight, realized about 15 nm from KBSP that I didn't understand the runway layout or the pattern. Studied the plate while I did 360s (about 7 of them) and then headed to the airport. Trial PE membership expired, so I got kicked out. Subscribe (PE is awesome, so far), call in to tower and start my approach. 3NM from airport I realize I'm about 2500 feet above pattern altitude and have to make a wild dive (with speed brakes, Mooney M20) to make pattern altitude, call ATC for midfield report, then do an ugly base and final and use up almost the entire runway to stop. Not pretty. Enough to pass, but embarassing for an actual PPL. Time to practice that one again.

Cheers, hope you enjoyed my story.

I'll be out flying or in FS2020 flying if you see N4922T.

[Keith Smith]

Thanks for posting. Definitely work through the I-Ratings and consider going through the IFR portion of the free workshops. Hopping into the plane and just giving it a whirl, hoping to know it all before you have your actual rating goes about as well as you'd think it would The I-1 would be a good start, then build up from there. That training progression has helped a lot of ppl.

[dhplane]

This message is for Marcus...

Hi Marcus,

I just wanted to say for the record that your instructions for the departure procedure out of Spokane today were VERY CLEAR... THE MISTAKE WAS MINE... sorry about that.

See you next time.

Regards,

Joey
King Air N4139Q

[MOD NOTE: moved to the Share your Mistakes thread]

[PhillipR]

New lessons; Centurylink is having some sort of intermittent internet outage, and my connection to the client has dropping on the frequency of every minute to every 20 minutes for the last two days.

Yesterday, attempting CAT-10, I noticed it must've dropped because I was on flight-following on approach frequencies, and heard nothing for almost 5 minutes. It triggered my mind into realizing I was NORDO, and when I checked the client, sure enough, nothing. I was on CAT-10, but near a Delta, so I circled the tower a half-dozen times with 7600 and then came in for a standard-pattern landing (no lights in PE yet ).

Completed CAT-10 later with working internet, and went on to CAT-11 today. Same thing happened about 30nm from KSAN. As I tried to debug my internet connection, the PE client, the flight-tracking client I use to feed data to my iPad and Foreflight, I kept heading towards KSAN. Right at that moment, my connection came back alive and I tried to reach Approach, but realized I was in the Bravo without a clearance; instant CAT-11 failure, but a great real-life lesson about radio failures. I should've focused on 'aviate' and orbited outside the Bravo while I diagnosed, instead of letting the plane fly ahead of me (and into heavily-controlled airspace) while I diagnosed.

[virtualDon]

When I did my CAT-1 I thought I'd just use some pilotage from Oceano to New Cuyama. I did have DME from MQO as a reference so I knew I was close but just couldn't find the field. I saw some pavement and put it down - turns out it was a street in a nearby neighborhood! I thought, damn! if this was X-Plane I could have picked it out easily but in MSF2020 all the scenery looked the same! Once the cars and trucks got out of the way I turned it around in someone's back yard and got airborne again and finally found the airstrip. I thought about just awarding myself the CAT-1 for creativity but did it a second time with GPS for a more successful flight

[RogerW]

Don't forget to fill out an "incident report"