So Much Work For Those Two Words - Instrument Airplane

Matt Whiting wrote:
I made my first flight in actual yesterday from ELM to BFD and back.
Shot the GPS to BFD and weather was below minimums so I got to shoot a
real missed approach in actual, something I'd never done before. We
didn't plan to land at BFD anyway, but it was fun to fly along at the
MDA and seeing next to nothing. My instructor did catch a glimpse of
the runway as I was climbing out, but we'd have never gotten down to it.

I may be reading more into that last statement than you intended (and if
I am, please correct me), but I'm wondering what you would have done if
you thought you could have gotten down to it?

Once you decide to go missed, all efforts to find the runway should stop
and your full attention paid to flying the airplane, getting it climbing
again and navigating the missed procedure. You never want to get into a
situation where you start the missed, catch a glimpse of the runway,
change your mind about the missed, and make an attempt to land.

With two pilots, the other pilot (in this case, your instructor) should
have been exercising a little CRM by monitoring your instruments to make
sure you've got positive rate of climb established, followed checklist
items like gear and flaps up, and are following the right track.
There's no value to his looking out the window to see if he can catch a
glimpse of the runway.

The next transmission came from a different voice, and a much less
grouchy one I might add, and cleared me direct ELM. Still not sure
what happened, but I think he was overloaded, forgot about us and
didn't hear the missed call.

Yeah, sounds like it. The only thing to do in this situation is
remember the "aviate, navigate, communicate" mantra. Sort out the
confusion with ATC, but make sure it doesn't distract you from your
primary task of flying the airplane.