No big deal

The current generation of student pilots have tools and resources that were at one time unimaginable. Electronic flight bags, lightweight noise-canceling headsets, glass panels, and autopilots make learning to fly much easier than it was back in the day. And back then, old pilots complained that my generation had it too easy with DME, digital radios, and ILS approaches. One thing that never seems to change, though, is that with youth comes a combination of ignorance, arrogance, and a sense of invincibility.

When I earned my instrument ticket in my early twenties, I was cautioned not to brazenly fly approaches to minimums and to keep myself in calm conditions until I had more experience flying in clouds. I was determined to follow this advice, and I did. Until I didn’t.

During training, the NDB approach was my nemesis. Never has a more apt name been given to a process, as ND stands for “nondirectional.” In theory, it was an AM radio receiver in the airplane with a needle that would point to the station, but the needle often swung wildly back and forth, like an angry golfer looking for a lost ball in the leaves. It was only when close to the station that it would consistently show an accurate bearing. However, some mental gymnastics were involved in making sure you flew a straight line versus getting blown off course by the wind and “homing,” a term I’m not sure is used in aviation anymore. Accurately tracking a bearing was a learned art, and in any kind of wind or rain, it was hard, especially with the quality of equipment in the typical trainer at that time.

One advantage of the NDB approach was that you could fly almost any approach over almost any AM radio antenna (conditions permitting). In college, my CFII would have me practice different approaches over the DeLand/Tomok NDB to force me to do the math in my head accounting for winds and to prevent me from flying an approach by memory, or worse, by guess and by golly. When I finished school, I was still working on my rating, and when I went home, one airport nearby had an NDB approach. I essentially memorized it and flew it “successfully.” In this case, successfully means I flew the memorized headings, turns, and times in calm weather conditions. When it got windy, the corrections were always the same, so I memorized those as well and convinced myself that I was pretty good at this.

I wasn’t. I flew the same approach on my IFR checkride and bombed it. It was a humbling realization that I had to start over, that my academic understanding of the processes and procedures was in no way a match for what reality would require. It turned out to be one of the best things that happened to me. My non-DeLand CFII and I spent hours both on the ground and in the airplane repeatedly going over the mistakes I made. He made me teach the NDB approach to him, which forced me to really understand it. At some point, it clicked. I redid my NDB approach for the examiner, and I nailed it.

Fast forward several months. I decided to rent an airplane in DeLand and fly down to the southern part of the state to visit my old roommate and his wife. The flight down was at night—calm, peaceful, VFR—just what a cocky kid needs to reinforce his inflated sense of self. When I returned, it was a typical Florida morning in the fall. Low-lying fog was hugging the ground, slow to burn off as the sun seemed to take its time. I wasn’t in a hurry yet, but I could tell that time would become a factor. I had to get to DeLand to return the airplane. The fog was denser than forecast, but I could legally go. Legally. The visibility on takeoff was less than stellar, but I was on top of the clouds and in the clear in less than 100 feet.

The ride north was smooth as glass, and I set up and studied the NDB approach I had flown many times. I also set up for an ILS into Daytona as my back-up if I couldn’t get into DeLand. It began to hit me that this was the real deal: I would be making my first instrument approach as a rated IFR pilot down to minimums using the most difficult approach there is to fly. It’s called a nonprecision approach, but it requires some of the most precise flying one can do.

It was a humbling realization that I had to start over, that my academic understanding of the processes and procedures was in no way a match for what reality would require.I remember beginning the descent. My hands were clammy and my knees shaky. The tops of the clouds hadn’t moved much, but they had moved, which was a good sign. The ceiling and visibility were reported to be right at the published minimums. I extended the flaps and slowed early. I locked the ADF needle right on the inbound course. The Morse code was playing clearly in my ear. Around me, as I entered the clouds, it got bright, then dark. My eyes moved between the attitude indicator, airspeed, altimeter, and ADF card. There was no bug on the altimeter that I could set, so I had to constantly remind myself when a miss would be necessary. As I descended toward the minimum descent altitude, the ground became visible outside the door window, but not in front of me. With only a few feet to go, I got a glimpse of the runway lights. I had to blink a few times to convince myself they were real.

A final look at the ADF card verified my relative position, and I recognized a few of the now-visible landmarks. Dew from the clouds began to run back on the windshield, but I’d found the correct runway and airport. I landed and taxied to the ramp. As I turned in the keys and paid my bill, I acted like the whole thing was no big deal. But the truth is that it was a huge deal, that I had gotten lucky, that busting my IFR checkride had probably saved my life. My hands were sweaty, my ears were ringing, and my stomach was in knots. I replayed that approach in the eye of my mind for weeks, and I flew it on a desktop simulator several times after just to reinforce that I had done everything correctly.

I had not shown great decision making in flying that morning; I had lived in Florida for four years and knew the risk of such thick ground fog in the fall, and I had put all my eggs in one basket regarding my flight home. Even getting into Daytona with an ILS that morning would have been a challenge. On the way home, I was both giddy with accomplishment and chastising myself for doing what I said I wouldn’t do. There was no FlightAware to check my work, and probably just as well. The FAA never called, and the FBO kept renting me airplanes. But I was much more deliberate about my decision making going forward. In many ways, the memory of that approach continues to drive much of my risk analysis today.

Chip Wright is an airline pilot and frequent contributor to AOPA publications.