Concentrate on the changing priorities
I'm a student pilot (35 hours) who just had a cross-country stage check go bad because of my inability to keep up with all the basic responsibilities of flying, navigating, and communicating. In flight, my brain is fully saturated with basic flying tasks such as maintaining attitude, altitude, heading, and traffic scan. That leaves little to no excess processing power for anything else. It's hard to think about strategy when tactics are the priority.
Fifteen years of driving race cars taught me that if you lose your concentration for one full second, you could die. During a race, I would be so completely saturated by immediate needs that I would not form a thought for the full race length of up to 45 minutes. After the tires were fully warmed up, I had no clue if I had run two laps or 20.
Through my first four or five flight lessons, I was amazed by the degree of multitasking required. I felt like I had to stay on top of about 15 things at the same time. With more experience, that number dropped to something more like four or five, but the continuous management of multiple tasks still takes a big percentage of my processing power. Just diverting my attention long enough to write down a checkpoint time on my flight log takes real effort. Do you have any recommendations?
Thank you,
Mr. T
Greetings Mr. T:
You speak like a student who is in a race from takeoff to landing. If your instructor wore a checkered shirt you might even stop your pattern circuits and declare victory. I do, however, understand why you're flummoxed here. As I see it, racing requires serious concentration because of your proximity to other fast fast-moving (and some unmovable stationary) objects. There are very few instances in
aviation where a little altitude gain here, some heading change there, and/or a second's loss of concentration will catapult you into the afterlife. On the other hand, instead of having many things on which to concentrate for every aspect of flying, there are actually only one or two that are most important for any given condition of flight. When you know what these are, you'll find flying a lot more relaxing.
For instance, during the takeoff roll, your main focus should be on runway alignment and engine performance. You don't need to worry about much else here given the obvious priority of monitoring the airplane's acceleration, direction, and fitness to fly. When the airplane is ready to fly, your focus changes to establishing a climb pitch attitude and maintaining runway centerline alignment. During climbout, you've trimmed the airplane to maintain the proper pitch attitude, and now your main focus is on watching for traffic that's entering or leaving the pattern. And the list goes on. Your instructor should easily be able to identify the focus points for all aspects of flying.
It also sounds as though you're working way too hard at physically flying the airplane, which makes it difficult for you to have time to handle other airborne chores. For instance, if you're not using the elevator trim properly, then you must constantly manipulate the control yoke. That's why learning how to trim is essential for relaxed flying. If you have to take your hands off the controls to work your chart or your flight computer, then you should be able to steer the airplane with the rudder pedals only. If it is trimmed properly, the airplane will eventually stabilize at a level flight attitude. The airplane is kept straight with your feet, nothing else. You need to let the airplane do most of the flying if you're going to have time to do other things, such as look for traffic, navigate, and so on.
Keep off the controls
Dear Rod:
I'm having a problem with my 50-percent co-owner. He is a private pilot with an instrument rating, and we fly a Cessna 172. I have more than 1,000 hours in type, and he has about 160.
He has a tendency to put his hand(s) on the yoke, sitting in the right seat, when I am pilot in command (PIC). I don't know if it is an unconscious act or deliberate. It unnerves me, yet I say nothing. Yesterday, we were flying together and, on my third landing, we got into a wind gust at about 100 feet over the numbers that dropped the right wing about 30 degrees. I was able to recover in time but made a thud landing. We didn't discuss it at the time.
This morning, he called to say he felt he should have responded and taken "control" of the situation. This bothers me, as I think I would have been angry with him if he had. He doesn't see it that way. His only regret was at his hesitation to act. I pointed out to him that I recovered and did not lose control and did make a safe (albeit a thud) landing, not my normal greaser landing.
Should I say anything to him about keeping his hands off the controls when I am PIC? When I fly right seat, I do not touch the controls unless the PIC requests it.
Thanks,
Tammy
Greetings Tammy:
First things first. You are the PIC of your airplane, and I want you to act like it. When you're acting as PIC, no one, and I do mean no one should touch your controls without your permission. If someone does, then you should inform that person that you won't tolerate such behavior.
If they don't feel they can fly with you under those conditions then they shouldn't fly with you at all. As far as I'm concerned, there is no flexibility on this matter unless you clearly become physically incapacitated. Remember, if someone takes over during your landing and you lose control, you're the one that the FAA is going to look at, because you're the PIC. I suggest that you make this point very clear to your partner.
That said, it's not unusual for any right-seat pilot to reach for the controls if he or she perceives the airplane behaving abnormally. But "reaching for" and "taking over" are two different things. As you stated, you reacted to the gust appropriately, recovered, and landed with a thud. Fine. There's nothing wrong with landing in a "thud" in that situation. In fact, if the wind is gusty over the runway, it's often unreasonable to try making a smooth landing. Your objective here isn't to grease your landing in gusty conditions. Instead, it's to degrease the landing and get the airplane on the ground safely.
Rod Machado is a flight instructor, author, educator, and speaker. A pilot since 1970 and a CFI since 1973, he has flown more than 8,000 hours and is part owner of a Cessna P210. Visit his Web site.
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