CPL Cross Countries

As usual it's been a while, so a few things have happened since my last post - I've received my PPL in the mail and have got ratings in the PA28- 161 (Warrior), 181 (Archer) and -200R (Arrow). I fly the Arrow on dual cross countries (and the odd solo) while generally flying Warriors on solos. This can vary however due to aircraft availability etc meaning I have flown solo cross countries in an Archer, a Cherokee 140 and even the Arrow while I have yet to take a Warrior on one - every day I have been booked in a Warrior the weather hasn't been good enough to go flying.

I've completed two dual cross countries in the Arrow, both to the West Coast meaning I got to fly to exotic destinations like Westport, Hokitika and Karamea. The extra speed of the Arrow (it cruises at around 140kts TAS) means that I can fly further in a morning booking. For example, the last dual I flew was over 600km yet we did the whole thing in about 3.4 hours flying time. Here are a few pics I've taken on the two duals I've done:

Heading to Westport at 9500' in Arrow ZK-DUY:

On descent into Westport, with a decent descent rate and resulting groundspeed:

The Arrow on the ground at Westport:

 I'll upload some more pics from solos once I've done a few more. The weather has been pretty bad recently meaning I've been doing one or two flights a week so here's hoping it improves soon.

PPL Cross Countries

Since sitting my PPL I've been cruising around Canterbury getting my PPL Cross Countries done- it's been awesome weather so I've got them all done in about a week. I did 5 in total - 2 duals and 3 solos which have taken to a few not-so-exotic places, going as far north as Parnassus and as far south as Timaru. All but one I did in the Cherokee 140s, the other being in ZK-LJF, a fairly new Piper Warrior with an Avidyne glass cockpit. I flew LJF so I could take a couple of mates along for the ride, but it worked out well as I'll be doing a type rating in the glass Warriors for CPL cross countries as they're a bit more comfortable for longer journeys. Here are a few pics I've snapped along the way, once again not in great quality thanks to my iPod camera.

Flying over NZCH before landing:



ZK-LJF at Ashburton



The modern glass cockpit in LJF



Holding short of the seal runway at NZCH



Methven with Mt Hutt in the background after a fresh coating of snow the night before



Heading up through the mountains in a Cherokee 140



The mouth of the Rangitata River



Not bad considering we plan for a 90kt cruise in the 140s!

PPL Flight Test

Haven't been on in a while, been pretty busy this last week- had two exams - IFR Navigation and IFR Law (which I both passed, luckily) and finally got my PPL Flight Test done.

As soon as I found out who I was testing with I was pretty excited. I had Charlie Elliott, a rather famous flight tester from Canterbury. Charlie's been a flight tester for a few years- he also did my Dad's PPL flight test back in 1976!

The weather was perfect for a test, with light variable winds even up at 2000ft, and Nil Significant Cloud. We took off on Grass 02 at Christchurch in Cherokee 140 ZK-DUP on a West Junction Departure, tracking towards West Junction then on towards Kirwee and Darfield before reaching the Darfield North training area. Once there we went over the majority of what I had been taught in PPL lessons, including steep turns, stalls, slow flight, a forced landing without power, slow flight and low flying. Once that was completed we headed back towards the Aero Club's private airfield at West Melton. We performed a standard overhead join, followed by a flapless landing, touch and go, a precision landing and then another touch and go. Once the West Melton circuits were completed I called Christchurch Tower to request a rejoin and got cleared straight to base leg for Grass 02, where we did another Precision Landing to finish off. I was fairly confident that I hadn't screwed things up too badly but it was still a huge relief to hear Charlie tell me that I'd passed.

Now that all my PPL training is complete I'll be off on PPL Cross Countries this week, heading to exotic places like Timaru and Ashburton. Once they're out of the way it will be time for CPL Cross Countries which is where the real fun starts.

Here's a map of where I flew on my Flight Test:



View PPL Flight Test in a larger map

Sorry for the lack of pics, all I have at the moment is an iPod camera so I'm trying to sort something out. In the meantime here are a couple from Ben Wynn which show the sick views we get to see every day :

PPL Revision

The last couple of weeks have been pretty slow for me flying wise- in the last three and a half weeks I've logged 6 flights. Before my PPL flight test I have to complete at least 2 hours of Mountain Flying as part of the required 5 hours 'Terrain Awareness' that is compulsory as of July 1st. I've been booked a number of times but due to a number of reasons (mostly weather) I haven't yet done it. Conditions today were perfect but as luck would have it there were no qualified instructors available.

Because of this, I ended up flying out to the West training area for some solo revision for my test. I used the Darfield North training area, which is stretches as far as Darfield to the south, Sheffield to the north and the Waimakariri River to the east.

First Post

After reading a bunch of flying blogs I've decided to start one myself - partly so I'll have something to look back on one day and partly because someone, somewhere might actually be interested in what I have to say.

For those who don't know me, I'm currently 19 and am part-way through my pilot training in Christchurch, New Zealand. As of today I have ~50 hours logged and will hopefully be sitting my Private Pilot Licence flight test soon. I've grown up surrounded by aviation as my parents have been involved in the industry since before I was born - my Dad has been a Commercial pilot his whole life and has flown aircraft such as the Boeing 737 and British Aerospace 146 in years gone by. As cheesy as it sounds, it's my dream to one day follow in his footsteps and become an airline captain.


I don't want to spend too long going over my previous flying experience, so I'll try to keep this brief.

I had my first logged flight in Feb 2007 at the Wellington Flight Centre in a Beech 77 Skipper, ZK-ESC - the one pictured below:

I went on to fly about 15 hours in ESC in the next couple of years, including my first solo at Wellington in August 2010 when I was 18.

I left home and moved to Christchurch in April 2011 to participate in a student loan funded course, which should hopefully see me with my Private and Commercial Pilot Licences and a Multi-Engine Instrument Rating by July 2012.

My first flight in Christchurch was in a Piper Cherokee 140, ZK-EBV in May 2011. Pictured below are some of the 8 Cherokee 140s that the International Aviation Academy operates (one of which, ZK-EBP, was flown by my Dad back in the 1970s as he progressed through his pilot training. EBP now has ~22,000 airframe hours!):

The Academy has a fleet of 38 aircraft, including:

9x Piper PA38 Tomahawks;
8x Piper PA-28-140s;
4x Piper PA28-161 (Warriors) - 3 have Avidyne Glass Cockpits, 1 has traditional steam gauges;
5x Piper PA28-181 (Archers) - 2 Avidyne, 3 traditional;
1x Piper PA28-200R (Arrow)
2x Cessna 172s
1x Piper Cub (1950s taildragger)
5x Alpha A160s;
1x Robin R2160;
3x Partenavia P68s;
and a single Piper PA-34 Seneca.

I'll hopefully log time in most, if not all these aircraft over the next few months, but for now I'm stuck in the old Cherokee 140s.

That pretty much covers it today, I've passed all my PPL exams (and some of my CPLs as well) so hopefully it shouldn't be too long until my flight test.