On this Sunday, rather than flying straight home, we opted for a small diversion. We'd stop for an early dinner at Harris Ranch, the massive wayside restaurant complex located quite absurdly in the middle of the golden agricultural vastness of California's San Joaquin Valley.
Descending from the north over the huge Harris Ranch feed lot, we turned base over Interstate 5 for a crosswind landing on the ranch's 30-foot-wide strip. It was a safe if not especially picturesque landing. We tied down and wandered off to the restaurant.
A hamburger and a plate of pot roast later, we ventured back through the glaring valley sun to the tiny airport ramp. Time for a gas-up at the self-service pump, then back into the sky for our home-run leg, 128 nautical miles to Santa Paula in coastal Ventura County.
We pulled the Cessna Skyhawk to the self-serve, only to find the pumping area occupied by a Beech Bonanza. The pilot and passenger were milling around on the ramp, killing time - decidedly not in pumping mode. I strolled over to assess the situation.
The credit card reader on the pump was inoperative, I learned. Starting the pump required a hike across the restaurant parking lot to the car gas station. As we waited for the pump to be activated, we chatted idly about destinations and the price of avgas. In the meantime, I sent my wife on the gas station expedition, credit card in hand. We'd be next, so there was no point in wasting time.
While the Bonanza was fueling, another Skyhawk rolled up behind mine. The pilot ambled over to inquire, just as I had a few minutes earlier. After the Bonanza taxied away, one of her two passengers helped me push my airplane into fueling position.
With the cast of characters refreshed by new faces, we milled and chatted as we waited for the pump to restart. I attached the static line and climbed the ladder, nozzle at the ready. And we waited. Pressing the "pump" button repeatedly did not bring the system to life.
Then my assistants had another idea - maybe we needed to press this button on the pump, the one next to the faded, illegible placard. Well, OK....
The hose yanked back forcefully, curling around my body like an angry black python. I spun off the ladder to the pavement as a dribble of 100-octane low-lead sprayed across my face. Remarkably, I came down on my feet, fuel nozzle still in hand. With the intention of helping, they had innocently pressed the hose-reel retract button.
The pilot and her passengers rushed over, issuing profuse apologies and expressing concern over my condition. I was OK, if a bit stunned.
After we begged for service over the intercom, an employee finally arrived on the scene and started the pump. I gassed up, dipped my tanks, and walked around the airplane one last time. When my wife returned, I told her about my little misadventure, assuming that would be the end of it. Pushing the airplane clear of the pumps, I realized I was still a little shaken, but otherwise good to go.
Harris Ranch has no taxiway, so I ran up holding short of the departure end and back-taxied when we were ready to roll. I pushed the throttle home, and we rumbled down the runway.
The airspeed indicator bumped lazily toward 40 miles per hour. Did I just see 50? No...back to 40. Where the heck is my 60-mph rotation airspeed? Midfield on the 2,600-foot runway, I pulled the power and aborted the takeoff, braking hard to a stop. My wife was goggle-eyed. So was I.
The pilot who'd been behind me at the gas pumps was now awaiting takeoff. I radioed her to go ahead - I didn't like my airspeed on the takeoff roll. She thanked me and back-taxied for takeoff. The wait gave me time to work a mental checklist.
Density altitude? Couldn't be - it was hot, but not that hot, and we were at least 350 pounds under gross. Both mags on? Yes. I rechecked my parking brake - it was released. I jiggled it just to make sure. All systems appeared to be green.
As the other Skyhawk climbed out, the pilot radioed, "You shouldn't have any problem - we're heavier than you."
At that point I was feeling somewhat less than charitable about unsolicited assistance, but I thanked her anyway and wished her a safe flight. And besides, she was right - at least in principle.
So I gritted my teeth, determined to try once more - this time carrying 10 degrees of flaps, an optional short-field technique for an older Skyhawk like mine. I back-taxied again, turned around, and held the brakes hard as I poured on the throttle.
We bounced down the centerline at what seemed like a very respectable groundspeed, but still the airspeed indicator refused to show the minimum airspeed for rotation. Then, just when a second aborted takeoff seemed assured, we were airborne - and climbing smartly, without even the merest prompting from the pilot. But now the airspeed indicator was resting motionless on the bottom peg!
I retracted the flaps, trimmed for a positive but conservative rate of climb, and began my situation assessment.
One quick glance to my left settled the issue. The pitot tube on my Skyhawk has a tiny hinged cover. It remains shut when the airplane is at rest, but a flap on the top catches the relative wind in motion, flipping the cover open. The flap was bent over parallel to the tube - I'd apparently bumped it during my swan dive from the fueling ladder. For the first time in my short flying career, I was experiencing real partial-panel work, and at low altitude, no less.
Options rapidly crowded into my head, elbowing each other for attention.
But one piece of sage flying advice instantly trumped all the others: Fly the airplane. With that in mind, I maintained our modest climb rate; one I knew from experience would keep us well above stall speed.
We'd need to land pretty soon, but where? One option was immediately rejected - I wasn't going to go back to that skinny little necktie of asphalt at Harris Ranch. I knew Coalinga Airport was just a few miles away, but that would still be terra incognito.
If I had to land the airplane anywhere without benefit of an airspeed indicator, I decided it might as well be at a known place. The runway at Santa Paula airport is precisely the same length as the strip at Harris Ranch, and very little wider, but it was home. I also knew I could divert to either of two much larger, towered airports nearby.
So I pointed the spinner south and continued our climb to 7,500 feet. The air was smooth, the sky was blue, and the visibility at least 25 miles - a stupendous day for flying. The comatose airspeed indicator seemed to show an impossible 200 miles per hour, though my yoke-mounted GPS reported a more realistic 105-110 knots of groundspeed, a modest tail wind.
As the sepia of the San Joaquin Valley merged into the rugged pine-speckled backcountry of Ventura County, I considered my options.
I was trying not to think about a stall/spin on the base-to-final turn, an accident that I knew from my reading occurred with depressing frequency, even in airplanes with functioning airspeed indicators. But this was my central problem - I had to think seriously about how to avoid inadvertently dumping lift in the pattern.
I'd been mainly flying the tachometer up to then, but I didn't expect much help from that instrument while decelerating in tight pattern turns at low speed. But I also had the groundspeed readout on the GPS. Ah, the GPS!
If I knew the approximate wind speed, I could calculate rough airspeeds for the base and final legs, though I'd also need to convert from knots to miles per hour. Wind conditions I could obtain, preferably from someone on the ground at Santa Paula, the windsocks, or from the ATIS at nearby Camarillo Airport.
Climbing over the last mountain ridge 20 miles out, the beaches of Ventura County spread out in front of us, a lovely sight I could only half appreciate. I pulled back from the airport and initiated a standard rate of descent. The ATIS at Camarillo reported winds 260 at niner.
I explained the plan to my wife. Ever since the aborted takeoff at Harris Ranch, she'd been completely calm - a real trouper. Probably because I'd tried to maintain a placid exterior, she did not pick up on my concern. She got her first inkling when I checked the fit of her harness.
I'd settled on a number for the turn to final - a minimum of 60 kt of groundspeed would give me 70 to 75 mph of airspeed, a reasonable margin of error, without coming in unmanageably hot. I'd also listen intently for the stall warning horn, which had always given me a staccato chirp whenever I'd teased the lower limits.
As I entered the pattern on an extended downwind leg, pulling back gradually on the power and trimming, I announced on the unicom and explained my situation, requesting advisories. But the pattern was deserted - an unusual condition for a summer afternoon at Santa Paula. Just as well - I was prepared to ask everyone to clear out and give me a wide berth.
As I pulled abeam the departure numbers, I suddenly realized I'd left one figure out of my calculation. How would I know when I was slow enough to extend flaps? The tachometer suggested I was, and the GPS read just under 90 kt. Assuming a minimal 5-kt tail wind, I'd be just in the white arc.
The entire operation beyond that point was anticlimacticb - just an ordinary landing. In fact, it was the smoothest touchdown I'd made all weekend, an observation that was freely volunteered from the right seat.
We pushed the airplane back into our tiedown, secured it, and loaded our bags into the car.
Before we drove off, I felt the need to spend a few moments on the ramp, thinking - reflecting on the bizarre chain of events that led to the loss of a critical flight instrument at a critical moment. It all began with that faulty credit-card reader.
Most aviation accidents are the result of not a single factor or error, but a chain of events or errors - or so I've often heard. I broke this chain by keeping a cool head and remembering my training. But in the course of self-congratulations, I must also remind myself that I could have shattered that chain earlier by preflighting the airplane again thoroughly after my tumble from the ladder. I also could have recognized the source of the airspeed indicator error on the first takeoff attempt. By doing neither, I inadvertently forged links in a potentially disastrous chain.
Errors and lapses of judgment are inevitable in flying or any other human endeavor. This margin between success and failure, I've learned now by first-hand experience, is defined by our abilities to catch our mistakes and to make appropriate corrections before the chain leads somewhere we don't want to go.
It's a lesson that I hope someday will win me a seat closer to the front of the class.
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