Starry night, scary night
Gremlin — A small gnome held to be responsible for malfunction of equipment especially in aircraft. — Webster's Dictionary
October brings more than frosty weather and Halloween: The clock falls back an hour in most states, producing instant night for pilots accustomed to late summer evening flights. Night flying, in turn, brings forth the gremlins not seen in daytime flying. Gremlins of the dark drool at the sight of non-night-current pilots lifting off an hour after sunset.
Meeting night currency requirements for carrying passengers is simple — too simple, some would say; three takeoffs and three landings to a full stop every 90 days, and you're done. There's no dual instruction required, no demonstration of handling emergencies, and no cross-country navigation. While the gremlins' specialty is burning out landing lights, they are also expert at creating foul weather and promoting poor decision making — "designer" gremlins, you might call them. Lack of currency can turn a starry night into a scary one.
That's not to say all night flying is fright flying. Far from it. Properly done, and well-planned, night flying offers the finest of all the privileges granted by a pilot's certificate. A night flight along Florida's east coast several years ago from Titusville to Melbourne comes to mind. Conditions were perfect: fogless, cloudless, windless. Cities sparkled along the shore of the Indian River like Christmas decorations; Highway 1 was transformed into a flowing rope of car lights. There were few aircraft in the pattern at Titusville, so the tower cleared me to land while still 12 miles out. The landing in those smooth conditions — aided by the training I was then receiving — was like sitting down in an easy chair.
But that was then — when I was training for a commercial pilot certificate with the Florida Institute of Technology flight school in Melbourne. My logbook now tells a different story; only four night flights in 1994, all of them beginning in daylight. While there were three night landings in the logbook, there were no takeoffs.
Rather than buzz around the pattern alone for 30 minutes to become legal — as the regulations allow — I decided to take my first dual night instruction since 1972. The "Night Flying" chapter of the FAA's Flight Training Handbook offered excellent preparation for the flight, as does the AOPA Air Safety Foundation's Night Flying booklet, available free by calling 800/638-3101.
Gremlins were waiting in ambush on and above the airport as I arrived on the ramp at Frederick (Maryland) Municipal Airport. Most were created by instructor Rob Hackman, who noted with a wry smile, "An awful lot of airplane systems can fail at night." By the time the flight ended, he had turned off the panel lights (I foiled that one by carrying a flashlight), turned off the landing light for two landings, and simulated an engine-out emergency to a landing after first arranging for me to lose sight of the airport. For good measure, he added steep turns.
I brought a gremlin or two of my own to the flight by deciding to rent a model of an aircraft I had not flown in years, and by deciding to conduct the flight in only 5 miles of visibility. The "unfamiliar airplane" problem manifested itself when it came time to switch tanks. The flashlight was required to find and operate the fuel selector. Five miles of visibility looked like far less on this hazy night, forcing greater reliance on the instruments and on electronic navigation aids than is normal for night flights. Since I had never flown this particular airplane before, there was no way to know whether the instruments were reliable.
An earlier plan, canceled due to weather, was to fly north to York, Pennsylvania, where an approaching cold front was due at 3 a.m. Between 9 p.m. and 3 a.m., there was a "possibility" of moderate rainshowers near the route.
Although engine failure at night is the main concern for most pilots, accident statistics from the AOPA Air Safety Foundation show the greater cause is continued VFR flight into instrument conditions. The latest Joseph T. Nall General Aviation Safety Report from ASF rates the risk of a serious accident during night instrument weather conditions as "very high."
"Continued night VFR flight into instrument conditions is as close to suicide as you can get," says ASF Executive Director Bruce Landsberg. There was a total of 64 accidents during night instrument conditions in 1994. That may not seem like a high number, but it is spread over relatively few night flying hours, Landsberg said.
Hackman decided to combine the poor visibility with an engine-out emergency, and reduced the throttle to idle while directly over the airport, where the beacon is less visible. The airport had to be right there — somewhere in the haze — but where? Runway lights were barely visible. It became necessary to use the Frederick VOR, located on the airport below, to find the runway. The most difficult airport to find, Night Flying indicates, is one located next to a small city with a dark "black hole" approach (no lights, as is also the case with an approach over water). Those conditions fit Frederick to a tee, where the approach is over a dark farm field.
Faced with loss of visual cues, such as objects on the ground, most night flying beginners approach too high and too fast. I have used a technique found in the book Making Perfect Landings, by Ron Fowler, as an aid in daylight approaches; it is also a great help at night. Fowler suggests setting a target altitude on final of 400 feet above ground level when one-half mile from the runway. You'll soon discover, if there is a glideslope aid such as a VASI or PAPI at the airport, that the procedure puts you right on the glidepath. You many even want to choose airports at night that have such aids.
Obviously, pilots should not descend until they are sure they are clear of all terrain and man-made objects. If the airport is surrounded by ridges or mountains, the Flight Training Handbook suggests climbing and descending in the pattern, with runway lights in sight. If any of them suddenly disappear, watch out! They may have gone behind a cloud, tree, or hill. What size should the traffic pattern be? A normal one: You don't want to experiment with a new approach at night.
Aside from engine failure, the next greatest concern for most pilots is the touchdown: When do you round out the approach path and flare? The Flight Training Handbook suggests waiting until you see skid marks or runway markings, even cracks in the pavement, before rounding out. This rule of thumb generally works for smaller trainer aircraft; pilots of larger aircraft may need to round out higher. It is common for pilots to focus on what they can see in the beam of the landing light to judge descent rate, but that is not where the action is: It's on down the runway, where looking at runway lights ahead can help with depth perception. If there is a crosswind, let the airplane settle to the ground, rather than risk drifting during a long, floating flare in an effort to land softly and impress the passengers.
In case the engine quits, what then? As Richard D. Gless notes in ASF's Night Flying, "If you have planned your flight to be within gliding distance of a lighted airport, you are in fat city." If not, troubleshoot the engine problem; hopefully you have already memorized the first few critical steps of the emergency check list. Other obvious steps are to squawk 7700 on the transponder and contact air traffic control on the frequency you have been using for flight following or IFR flight, or call on the emergency frequency of 121.5. If you are familiar enough with the aircraft, you will be able to estimate whether you can glide to the airport ATC suggests. Obviously, cruising at a higher altitude gives you more time to restart the engine and more options in choosing an airport.
If there is no airport, what then? Both lighted areas — usually built up — and dark areas may have obstacles or unsuitable terrain. Hackman, who learned to fly in Kansas, said the advantages there include cities that are well defined at night, not run together as they are on the West Coast and East Coast, and separated by great expanses of flat unobstructed terrain. Roads offer natural runways but may be obstructed by wires. Wherever you land, slow the aircraft to 5 knots above stall speed, keep the aircraft under control, and be ready to turn off the master switch, Gless advises.
Preparation is the key to night flying. After all, the gremlins may just decide to test that planning.
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