"I'd better phone Hannis," I said, "so he won't be waiting at Flagstaff wondering what happened to us." To speed things along, Austin offered to preflight the plane. "That would be great," I said.
"Excuse me," said the mechanic as I turned for the phone. "Did you want additive put in with the oil? I forgot to ask."
"The chief mechanic has been encouraging me to use it," I replied. "Sure, go ahead and add some. And thanks for reminding me."
By the time I phoned Hannis and laid out our plans, Austin had finished inspecting the airplane.
"Find any problems?" I asked. Careful preflight is always important after maintenance, more so on this day since we'd now be flying home at night.
"We're good to go, Dad. Can I fly the leg up?"
"You bet," I replied. The young man being a rated pilot and meticulous, it seemed inappropriate to recheck behind him unless he had concerns. No sooner were we airborne than the sun settled colorfully behind the Bradshaw Mountains.
"Something educational," I observed to Austin, aiming the flashlight at the base of the windshield. "See that smattering of fluid? The same thing happened after the last oil change. Turns out it's solvent from cleaning the engine."
"That's good to know," said Austin. "I might have thought it was an oil leak."
We landed at Flagstaff just after nightfall. The ramp was so dark that had Hannis not met us at the tiedown, we would have been hard-pressed to find him.
"You guys are really late," he said, agitated.
"Sorry," I replied. "The oil change wasn't finished when we arrived at the airport. I guess the mechanics got busy during the afternoon."
"I understand, Dad, but let's get going. I'm supposed to hang out with friends back home tonight, and they won't wait for me."
I loaded Hannis's bags and did a quick walk-around. Soon we were climbing in blackness to 9,500 feet.
"Should we fly direct via the Verde River Canyon?" I asked Austin, "Or follow the freeway home?"
"Take the shortest way," interjected Hannis with urgency from the back seat. "I don't want to get stuck home alone on a Friday night."
"Mom and I will be there," I said.
"Seriously, Dad, let's go the fastest way."
"What do you think, Austin? It looks mighty dark up there, along the Verde."
"I agree, Dad. But on the other hand we've been flying the plane for over an hour and everything's working fine. Have you ever had a problem going home that way?"
"No," I replied. "But if the engine quit there on a dark night like this, we'd have no idea what we were landing on."
"How much time would it add, following the freeway?"
"Not much - maybe 10 minutes. Landing on the freeway at night would be no fun, but it'd sure beat descending blindly along the Verde. We could be heading straight into a mountainside and never know it. Might not be found for days, either."
"It's your call, Dad," said Austin, quoting my usual admonishment to him. "You're flying this leg."
"Tell Albuquerque Center we'll follow I-17 to Phoenix," I said. "Sorry about that, Hannis. I promise it won't cost us more than a few minutes."
Before long the glow of Phoenix changed to bright lights, and while Hannis snoozed in back Austin negotiated our descent with Phoenix Approach. Clearing higher terrain to the north, I cut corners across the Bradshaw foothills toward home.
Shutting down in darkness after landing, I stowed our flight gear while Austin pulled the car from the hangar. "I must admit that this beats driving," said Hannis as I unloaded his bags. "I'll still get home before the guys head out." We pushed the Flying Carpet into her stall.
Not until entering the light did Austin and I see it - engine oil coating the lower cowling and fuselage. We looked at each in horror. Even Hannis seemed alarmed.
"I'm surprised we didn't notice any oil at Flagstaff," said Austin.
"Me, too," I said. "But it was so dark there that I probably saw only what I specifically looked for with the flashlight. The oil being new and colorless wouldn't help, either. Seems like there are some mistakes to learn from tonight."
"What do you think happened, Dad?"
"Did you check the oil filler cap on your preflight?" I asked, reaching for a small access door atop the cowl.
"No," replied Austin, "just the oil level on the dipstick. I've never opened that other door on top." On this airplane the oil filler neck sits atop the engine, while the dipstick resides under a separate door forward of the pilot's window. I'd always added any oil myself, never considering that as a result my son might not think to check the filler door. (The dipstick and oil filler neck are combined on the Cessna 172 he normally flies.)
Motioning Austin over, I opened the oil filler door. The filler cap lay inside atop the engine, never having been replaced by the mechanic after installing the additive.
"Wow, Dad, I can't believe I didn't check that. Is the engine ruined?"
"I hope not, Austin, but that's definitely possible. Fortunately the oil still shows above minimum."
"I am so sorry."
"It was my mistake too, Austin. I should have double-checked it after the additive was put in."
The next day our mechanics would pronounce the engine healthy, but not before lots of soul-searching between Austin, the mechanic who had changed the oil, and me. Having learned a valuable lesson, we'd collectively agree never to make that particular mistake again. But in those first minutes after returning from Flagstaff, engine damage was not the most pressing thing on my mind.
"You know, guys," I said, increasingly shaken the more I thought about it, "what matters most is how fortunate we are this evening. We just flew two hours over mountains - more than half of it at night - while our engine oil blew slowly overboard. Had the crankcase emptied, our powerplant would have seized."
Consumed by images of engine failure over the rugged and uninhabited Verde River Canyon, I said no more about what might have been. Although Austin was likely plagued by similar visions, Hannis has never been one to dwell on such hypothetical concerns. Since that night, however, he's never again complained about investing an extra few minutes to follow the freeway home.
Greg Brown was the 2000 National Flight Instructor of the Year. His books include The Savvy Flight Instructor, The Turbine Pilot's Flight Manual, and Job Hunting for Pilots. Visit his Web site ( www.gregbrownflyingcarpet.com ).
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