The First Thousand Hours

Jay Honeck wrote:
Except for the line about flying over the lake without a life
jacket, what about scary parts like icing encounter, electrical
failures, equipment malfunction, icy runways, extreme crosswinds,
severe turbulence, etc.?

Well, Hai, there have been a few of those.

- The time we lost the #2 cylinder coming out of Titusville, FL, thanks to
lead fouling. Had to come around and land with a very rough engine.
- The complete electrical failure in a clapped out rental Cherokee 140, at
night...
- The sudden encounter with icing while flying right seat with Mary as
PIC...
- The near-collision with a Stinson in the pattern over Iowa City...
- Landing, at night, on a 2300' x 30' wide strip, with mayonnaise-jar lights
on just one side of the runway, and snow drifts all around...
- The inadvertent retraction of flaps on take-off in a 172, and the near
collision with traffic as the plane settled back toward the earth...
- The severe turbulence coming into Oelwein, IA that very nearly convinced
Mary never to fly again...
- The time we drained over a quart of water from the tanks of a rental
plane...
- The time the throttle cable broke, thankfully while taxiing out to the
runway...(rentals, again)

Come to think of it, most of the scary stuff (other than the bills we
occasionally receive!) went away when we stopped renting. Some of the
rental fleet is pretty frightening!

:-)

I WAS going to suggest you go buy a lottery ticket but by the sound of
it you don't need it :-)
My 'scary' was a series of engine failures in a (again) rental
microlite........

Come to think of it, most of the scary stuff (other than the bills we
occasionally receive!) went away when we stopped renting. Some of the
rental fleet is pretty frightening!

You left out Mary's arrival at AirVenture 2005!

Come to think of it, most of the scary stuff (other than the bills we
occasionally receive!) went away when we stopped renting. Some of the
rental fleet is pretty frightening!

You left out Mary's arrival at AirVenture 2005!

Ooooo, you're *BAD*....

They DID throw everything they had at her, and it was an, um,
"interesting" arrival -- but we have been able to use the plane again
since, so I guess it couldn't have been *too* bad...

:-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote

They DID throw everything they had at her, and it was an, um,
"interesting" arrival -- but we have been able to use the plane again
since, so I guess it couldn't have been *too* bad...

I don't think I have heard that story. Care to share, while Mary is not
looking? g
--
Jim in NC

Jay Congratulations on the thousand hour milestone ..
And thanks again for another interesting post !
J.



"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:ajMjf.372824$084.192879@attbi_s22...
Life is full of little transitions and milestones. Back in 1995, when I
got my ticket, I privately vowed that I would fly 1000 hours in the next
ten years.

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:ajMjf.372824$084.192879@attbi_s22...
Life is full of little transitions and milestones. Back in 1995, when I
got my ticket, I privately vowed that I would fly 1000 hours in the next
ten years.


Snip

Jay H,

Outstanding! And also very interesting how you've managed to keep track of
all the small details from day one.

Jay B

PS ... While 1000 hrs in 10 years deserves a hearty "Huzzah!", would you
believe that when I was going through my training, there were two
20-somethings from Iceland who were flying 100 hours a *month* as part of an
Ab Initio program for Icelandic Air. They started about the same time I did
but racked up over 700+ hours in the time it took me to reach the 51 hours I
had when I took my checkride. Must have worked because according the one of
the owners at the FBO, they're now both wearing three stripes for their home
airline.

PS ... While 1000 hrs in 10 years deserves a hearty "Huzzah!", would you
believe that when I was going through my training, there were two
20-somethings from Iceland who were flying 100 hours a *month* as part of
an Ab Initio program for Icelandic Air. They started about the same time
I did but racked up over 700+ hours in the time it took me to reach the 51
hours I had when I took my checkride. Must have worked because according
the one of the owners at the FBO, they're now both wearing three stripes
for their home airline.

Holy cats! I presume Icelandic Air was picking up the tab?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:njDkf.620732$xm3.265619@attbi_s21...

Holy cats! I presume Icelandic Air was picking up the tab?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay H,

Near as I could figure out, it was a program similar to Lufthansa or SAS
where they recruit them, screen them heavily then ship the "best of the
best" to the desert SW where they do basically nothing but fly, fly, fly and
fly.

Lufthansa even bough their own airport at Mobile, AZ to accomodate their
intensive schedule.

Lately, it's begining to sound like I'm not flying in the US anymore with
all the foreign accents on the radio. Pretty good english spoken by all but
the Chinese...they're brutal and can tie up the freq pretty well trying to
make themselves understood to ATC.

Regards,

Jay B

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:ajMjf.372824$084.192879@attbi_s22...
Life is full of little transitions and milestones. Back in 1995, when I
got my ticket, I privately vowed that I would fly 1000 hours in the next
ten years.
- Number of landings noted as "perfect": 13

I'm sure you just missed this stat...

- Number of consecutive perfect landings: 0
- Number of number of Awful landings on flights after perfect landings: 13

- Number of consecutive perfect landings: 0
- Number of number of Awful landings on flights after perfect landings: 13

Actually, what I found is that -- over time -- my criterion for a "perfect"
landing is not static. As my skills have improved, I'm a much tougher
judge!

Early on, a "squeaker" was a perfect landing. Now, if I can feel any
vertical deceleration at all, it ain't perfect.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"