Day 18: Stage Check

     I took the final stage check yesterday, which is the last lesson before the test. I met up with Sophie, the instructor who was conducting the stage check. We began with the oral portion, which consisted of a bunch of questions on anything from procedures to aeromedical factors and just about everything in between. This lasted about an hour and a half, and after completing it, Sophie sent me out to preflight the plane.
     Sporty's is usually pretty busy on Saturdays because they grill free hotdogs on the ramp. As I was walking around the aircraft, I heard a kid say, "But I don't want to."
     Another voice which must have been his mother replied, "Oh for crying out loud, just ask him!"
     I continued the walk-around, and soon these two approached the wing I was examining. I walked over toward them, and the mother said, "He wants to know if you're going to take off. We've been watching the planes land for a while, but he wants to see one take off."
     "Yup," I replied. "I'll be taking off in about ten minutes."
     "Thank you! We'll sit over here and watch."
     It reminded me of of my younger self, when I had a lot of questions about airplanes but was too shy to ask a pilot. I would have loved to tell him to hop in the back seat and ride along, but I do not have the certification to do that yet. I am really looking forward to the time when I will be able to take passengers.
     After starting up, we were taxiing to the runway when an airship made a low pass over the runway. It was really big and slow, and it was cool to see one up close like that.
     We made a short field takeoff and flew over to Lunken, where we made a soft field touch-and-go. Following that, we proceeded on the planned flight to Charleston, West Virginia. After passing several waypoints, Sophie said, "Ok the weather all of a sudden turned really bad. We've got weather ahead of us, weather over there, and weather behind us. We have to divert to Georgetown."
     I marked our location on the map and began plotting a course to Brown County airport in Georgetown. It was only 7 nautical miles away, and I was not even finished by the time I saw the field ahead. I asked if I needed to continue calculating the course if I already had the field in sight, and she said it was not necessary. I entered the traffic pattern and set up for a short field landing. As I got close to the runway, I realized I was too high to touch down in the touchdown zone, so I initiated a go-around. After a lap around the pattern, I managed to set it down in the touchdown zone. "Setting it down" might not be the best choice of words. I guess it was more like "slamming it down," but apparently it was good enough to pass. As Chuck Yeager put it, "If you can walk away from a landing, it's a good landing. If you use the airplane the next day, it's an outstanding landing."
     We departed Brown County and did some slow flight, stalls, instrument flying, and steep turns in the practice area. As we completed the last maneuver, Sophie pulled the throttle to idle and told me we just lost the engine. I did just as I had practiced and set up for a landing in a nearby field. It was a hard decision to choose the field, because I could see Clermont County airport in the distance, and I might have been able to glide over there, but if I did not make it, there were many houses around the airport. I decided it would be better to make a safe landing in the field than to risk crashing into a house, if it was a real engine failure.
     Upon seeing we would be able to safely make the field, Sophie told me to climb back up to pattern altitude and land at Clermont County. It was still very busy, and I had to deviate from the pattern twice to avoid other traffic. We followed CAP3024, a Civil Air Patrol flight, and made a no-flap landing. After tying down the aircraft, we went inside for debriefing.
     Sophie thought I did very well, and I got a good score. I had to chuckle inside when she said I did well with using checklists, like I had been flying for the airlines. I blame that on Flight Simulator.
     Today's flying added 1.7 hours and 4 landings to the logbook, which brings the totals to 44.3 hours and 132 landings.