Flying

Use of 126.7

I’m not sure where, but I seem to recall reading an article or blog about improper use of the aviation frequency 126.7. Maybe it was TC’s Aviation Safety Letter or COPA’s Flight. I actually thought it was one of Michael Oxner’s entries on his Controller’s Corner blog but I couldn’t find anything there or on any of the archives of my regularly read blogs either.

Not that it matters. The gist of the article was about improper use of the 126.7 frequency, which is commonly known as the enroute frequency, and is used to both contact FSS and to blindly broadcast position reports as you cruise towards your destination. My policy is to broadcast as often as possible and when nearby another airport of some sorts, to broadcast on that frequency also. And, at the same time, unless flying IFR or under flight following, I will listen to both frequencies at all times for fear of missing someone’s transmission while on the other frequency. And if only every had a similar policy, it may be that accidents such as the one near Brandon may not have happened.

The interesting thing for me about the article I mentioned at the start is that the article talked about how the frequency shouldn’t be used for idle chit-chat or anything other than position reports. I found it rather odd that such an article would exist. I had never in all my cross country flying time heard anything on 126.7 other than position reports or updates from FSS. And due to my military background, where we never spent more than a few seconds talking on the radio if at all, I would never think of having a ‘conversation’ using the radio on a frequency that is clearly to be used otherwise.

But that changed on my recent trip from Springbank (CYBW) to Prince George (CYXS). On the return flight just south east of Grande Prairie, I switched from monitoring the mandatory frequency (MF) to monitoring 126.7. Actually, I switched the talk frequency to 126.7 while maintaining a listening watch still on the Grande Prairie MF just in case. I quickly broadcast a position report and waited for any replies. There was nothing on the frequency until I was approaching Smokey River. I didn’t actually notice the river but there was a position report given for the Grande Prairie area as ”over the Smokey river” so I grabbed my VFR map off the dash and scanned for the river. As it happens, V301 crosses over that river on it’s way to Whitecourt and since I wasn’t clear as to where the reporting traffic was, I figured I’d give an updated report of my own and hopefully figure out where the other traffic was.

That plan, however, was short lived as someone immediately came over the radio with ”Is that you, John? What are you up to today?” or words to that effect. It was bizarre to hear two people talking as if they were in a neighbourhood pub about how thing were going. But what was unnerving was the fact that as they blabbered on, leaving me unable to get my position report in, I was rapidly approaching the Smokey River area. And as by the time these two jokers were done their conversation, I was past the Smokey River and hadn’t been able to pick either of the two aircraft. While the sky is big and open, the chance of mid-air collisions does exist and I think in this case, my choice of following a Victor airway at a proper eastern altitude of 7500 feet (5000 feet above the ground) probably avoided any potential conflicts. For me, it was just another reason to ensure that (a) I fly high enough to avoid the laisez-faire pilots; (b) I get flight following; or (c) I fly under IFR (which I soon hope to have).

Another intersting side note; I had always thought that everyone was familiar with Victor airways. Last year when I flew to Dauphin, MB, I followed airways most of the trip and at one point actually flew 1000 under another VFR aircraft flying the same airway in the opposite direction. But on this trip to Prince George, I actually had someone ask me over the radio what ’Victor 301’ was as he wasn’t familiar with this landmark. Perhaps the pilot was a rotory pilot and they aren’t taught the same things? I dunno. But regardless, between that and the clowns chit-chats, I was appreciative the good training given to me a decade ago when I was doing my private licence and my good sense to follow most of it.
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Got Time For A Comment?

I was going to include this as part of my entry about my third IFR country flight, but it’s not really related to my IFR training per so I think it deserves it’s own post.

I filed the plan for today’s IFR flight from Springbank to Red Deer to Calgary and back to Springbank. It was the first flight plan I’d filed and I was very precise when explaining the route and the hold/approach requests to the FSS so as to ensure I was able to get as much out of the flight as possible. After being passed from Calgary Terminal over to Edmonton Centre, the Edmonton Centre controller gave us our hold clearance for over the Red Deer beacon. I copied the clearance down as fast as the controller spoke it and managed to read back the clearance word for word (which was a first).

Then a garbled transmission came over the air that started with ”X-ray Hotel Oscar”. Normally I am able to catch most, if not all of, any garbled transmissions based on the context of the flight. But I looked at instructor Jason only to find that his faced showed that he hadn’t recognized the transmission either.

”Say again for X-ray Hotel Oscar.”
”X-ray Hotel Oscar, do you have time for a comment?”

For whatever reason (no it wasn’t anyone clobbering the first), the second time the transmission came through just fine.

”Go ahead for X-ray Hotel Oscar.”
”X-ray Hotel Oscar, Edmonton Centre. I just wanted to say that as you know in this area [Red Deer] we get a lot of training type requests and that’s our specialty. And I just wanted to let you know that your flight plan is very clear as to what you want to do and that’s much appreciated.”

Of course my instructor Jason took the reply and said that it was no problem, which I heckled him about since it was I who had filed the plan. I really wanted to let the controller know that it was me, the student, who had filed that plan, but I let it go. I know, as does anyone who’s now read this entry, that it was me. And for that, I gloated the remainder of the flight. That said, thanks must be extended to the flight service specialist who obviously copied my request verbatim into the NavCanada system.

I’m not sure who the Edmonton Centre controller was, and I’m not sure I’d recognize his voice again, but if he reads this entry, he’ll know I’m talking about him. And if you do read this Mr. Edmonton Centre Controller, your comment about my flight plan was as much appreciated as my actual flight plan was to you.
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IFR Lesson #27

The club’s Cessna 182 is still missing a working ADF. As such, NDB approaches are out if we use that aircraft, so today’s lesson will be in the IFR Warrior, C-GXHO, again. Although that means everything will happen at a slower speed, the worst part of doing IFR flights in XHO is that XHO only has a single VOR as the second one is slaved to the GPS, though that slaving seems to be broken anyway. The 182 was my preferred aircraft to do the IFR flight test in; it has an HSI slaved to an external compass, a second VOR and, when it works, an ADF. Two VORs make testing easy, makes it possible to triangulate your position and makes it easy to follow Victor airways which aren’t straight. And two VORs also makes it easier to anticipate the interception of a specific radial. So, two VORs is good, one is much less good. The IFR Warrior has a moving map GPS instead of a second VOR, though the GPS is not approved for IFR use. So it’s basically useless in this case.

So I have decided that as a result, I will most probably do my flight test in the Warrior. All told, that may work out for the best anyway. I have tewn times as much time in the Warrior as I do in the Cessna 182 so that will mean that I will likely be far more at ease in the Warrior than in the 182. Though, since I want to fly the 182 more in the future, I will plan on taking future tests in the 182 (if I haven’t convinced myself to buy my own plane by that point). And the Warrior isn’t all that bad; it’s just a different aircraft for IFR than the 182.

After preflighting XHO, I gave my flight plan to instructor Jason who looked it over briefly and then told me to go file it. For the first two flights, Jason had filed the plan with FSS so this would be my first time filing an IFR flight plan. The results were good, as I’ve noted in this separate entry.

The flight path was pretty much the same as the previous IFR flight, with a hold over the Red Deer NDB followed by an approach. At the MDA, I took off the hood and saw runway 34 at CYQF and as per Jason’s instructions did a touch and go, which resulted in a rather steep short final given our height relative to the distance to the threshold. I then climbed out and followed the missed approach instructions, and calling up Edmonton Centre on the way back to the beacon. The plan was to then head to the Calgary VOR, where we wanted to do another approach.

Edmonton Centre cleared us to the Calgary VOR, at which point I told the controller that we’d like to do an approach at Calgary International after which we would cancel IFR and proceed to back to Springbank VFR. That seemed good enough for Centre and luckily Calgary Terminal was feeling nice (it seemed to be a good karma evening all around) and upon reaching Calgary Terminal space, we were vectored west and then cleared to intercept the localizer for ILS 16.

Once again, I kept our approach speed on the high end (around 95 kts) to help Terminal manager the other around us, which I think they appreciated. At one point, when we were number one for landing but still perhaps eight miles or so from touchdown, there were two commercial flights behind us, who were given their sequence numbers of two and three right after each other. I think the number two jet had noticed that they had flown through the localizer already and knew we were a training flight because he asked the terminal controller in a snide tone, ”Any idea when you are going to turn us?” The controller, without missing a beat, replied in a friendly, yet somewhat cheeky manner ”In just a few more miles… it’s for traffic.”. Jason and I looked at each other and snickered.

The rest of the ILS 16 approach was good except that we got a late clearance for the actual approach and I had to drop quite rapidly to keep the glideslope from going full down deflection. But everything worked out and when I looked up at the decision height runway 16 was right in front of me.

For those who are curious, you can see my flight on FlightAware.

Flight time: 2.5 hrs
Instrument time: 1.9 hrs (hood)
Approaches: 2

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Why We Fly - Reason #127

If you’re looking for the other 126 reasons we fly, they haven’t been written yet. They exist, but I haven’t written them down. And of course the reasons will be different for everyone. And there’s most likely more than 127 reasons too. But I didn’t want to start at number one and since I’ve always liked the number (*warning* geek talk) 2^7-1 I decided to start there at number one hundred and twenty-seven.

Once again I was catching up on my RSS feeds (for those not in the know, I’ll likely never catch up), and read Yet Another Aerobatic Video and from there I ended up watching a video posted by Frank which, at this point, is probably the best home made aviation video I’ve seen to date. You can watch the video, titled Climb through the clouds into the sunrise! on YouTube. The video has terrific footage, a great soundtrack and includes some radio communications. You can also check out Frank’s other videos on YouTube or over at his website www.160knots.com. Frank owns a Bellanca Super Viking (tail number N4201B) and has lots of great info and links relating to the Super Viking and flying in Southern California.

In any case, I highly recommend that you check out his climb through the clouds at 5:45am because that is reason #127 why I fly. Now, if only I can find the time to finish up my instrument rating I too can experience such beauty.
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IFR Lesson #26

The ADF in the club’s Cessna 182 is confirmed now as completely non-functional, so today’s cross country flight was done in the IFR-certified Warrior, C-GXHO. As per normal, I preflighted the aircraft on my way from the CFC parking lot, ensuring that all IFR-required instruments functioned along with all lights and the pitot heat. Then I headed inside to give instructor Jason my flight plan so he could file the IFR flight plan. Today’s flight would be CYBW direct QF (Red Deer NDB) direct YYC (Calgary VOR) direct CYBW, with a hold over QF and approaches at Red Deer and Calgary International. But our entire plan depended on us getting into the air as soon as possible as Jason needed to be back in 2.5 hours to teach ground school.

After receiving our clearance and doing the run-up, I experienced multi-pilot cooperation for the first time. Normally, Jason acts as a typical instructor/mentor; I do everything and he watches over everything and makes sure to point out my good/bad points. But today, due to our need to ensure a speedy takeoff, Jason took control after the run up, doing the talking and taxiing to position at runway 16 while I completed the last of of the pre-takeoff checks and worked all the avionics. I am able to do a little of this when flying with Ali, as she is confident enough now to hear something on the radio and change frequencies, transponder codes or altimeter settings. But because I am still the only trained pilot per se, and thus PIC, I always end up double checking all her actions. But in today’s flight, cooperation between Jason and I was fluid and instead of a potential five minute delay we were able to sneak a expedited takeoff before another aircraft turning short final.

Since we didn’t need to cross Calgary Terminal’s airspace to get to our destination (unlike my last flight), getting airborne and getting pointed in the right direction was much faster and easier since we could skirt the western edge of Terminal’s space. Then it was direct to the Red Deer NDB for a ten minute hold, which went okay. Then I shuttled down from 8,000 to start an approach, which was less than stellar but on a good note I learned how truly important it is to be stablized on an NDB approach before reaching the FAF. In my case, due to winds, I was well off the published inbound track such that a 30 degree or so turn was required at the FAF in order to line up with the runway. Add to that the fact that I was still struggling to get down to the proper height, the approach was a great example of how not to execute a proper NDB approach.

After going missed on the approach we tried to get an approach in at Calgary International, but Edmonton Centre informed us that Calgary was too busy to bother with us so we cut the flight short, cancelled IFR and headed direct Springbank. And Jason made it to his class with minutes to spare.

Flight time: 2.1 hrs
Instrument time: 1.8 hrs (1.5 hrs hood; 0.3 hrs actual)
Approaches: 1

[…]

IFR Lesson #25

Today’s lesson was my first cross country IFR flight. It has always been my plan to do my flight test in the club’s Cessna 182; partially because it has better instruments (an HSI), partially because it flies faster and mostly because I plan to spend more time renting the 182. It’s faster, has a better useful load and is a great airplane. So, as such, today’s flight was in the 182.

I preflighted the plane as per normal, though I did a quick check of all the instruments we were going to need, tuning in the VOR and ADF to ensure their functionality. I didn’t see any reason to discover a problem with them after starting up and taxiing to the run-up area. Then I headed inside to give my plan to instructor Jason, since he would be the one filing the flight plan. Our planned route today was CYBW direct YC (Calgary NDB) direct 5V (Drumheller NDB) direct YYC (Calgary VOR) direct CYBW. We would be doing a hold over 5V and approaches at Drumheller and Calgary International.

The flight started out with a 10 minute delay as Springbank Tower waited for Calgary Terminal to slot us into their plan. ”Welcome to the world of IFR,” commented Jason. After takeoff however, our time in Calgary’s airspace was uneventful, with us being vectored around, which was no big deal as that is pretty standard when doing any flying around the Calgary area. The only difference was that this time I had the hood [of shame] on to keep me from peeking out the window. We were cleared direct to the Calgary NDB, which we did and after giving a position report (which although wasn’t required since we were RADAR IDENTIFIED was done for practice), we were cleared direct Drumheller [NDB]. And that’s when things went wrong.

I tuned, identified and tested the ADF for Drumheller and took up a heading that the ADF pointed to. Except that the heading seemed about 20 degrees too much to the north. And when the Calgary Terminal controller cleared us again to go “…direct Drumheller now” I was pretty sure that the ADF was steering us off course. A quick check of the VFR-only GPS confirmed what we suspected; the ADF was not functioning properly. At all. But since we weren’t sure if it was just a distance thing or what, we decided to continue on to Drumheller to see if we could still get in a hold and an approach.

Unfortunately, the ADF continued to act up and upon our arrival at Drumheller, we simply turned around and requested a clearance back to the Calgary VOR. In hindsight, Jason should have asked the Centre controller for a DME hold using the Calgary VOR. That said, I did get some instrument practice and I was able to fly through some cloud, all be it for perhaps 15 seconds, for which I was able to remove the hood. It was very cool to look out of the aircraft and see nothing but white. Very cool indeed.

Upon our return to the Calgary Terminal area, we were cleared to intercept the localizer for runway 16 and cleared for the ILS 16 approach. I intercepted the localizer perfectly, and kept the speed up until the FAF, but overall the approach was erratic in terms of speed and course. But at the decision height when I pulled off the hood, the runway was within limits for a safe landing. So, overall, I would say that it was a good first effort, especially since I can only get better with practice. We then went missed on the approach, cancelled IFR and flew back to Springbank. Overall, a great first IFR flight.

Flight time: 2.0 hrs
Instrument time: 1.3 hrs (hood)
Approaches: 1

[…]

Oilers PIREP

I tried calling the Calgary Flying Club this evening and there was no answer. Twice. Usually this means that either the club is really busy or it’s reasonably close to closing time and the weather is so crappy that they’ve sent everyone home. So I went to the Nav Canada flight planning site to check the Calgary/Springbank weather. Not great. But I was delighted to see that several of the PIREPs coming out of Edmonton FSS were cheering the Oilers on as such:

UACN10 CYEG 142106
EG UA /OV CYEG 090010 /TM 2106 /FL032 /TP C172 /RM SHWRS VCNTY BEAUMONT AND EZ3. ***GO OILERS GO***

Of course, I’m a Flames fan myself but since Edmonton is our neighbour to the north and because we have friends up there, I’m cheering for the Oilers also. Go Oilers!
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IFR INRAT Exam

I wrote my INRAT exam this morning at the Transport Canada offices, which are located at Calgary’s Airport Corporate Centre. It’s a nice building but with no parking specifically for the building’s visitors (that I could find) I was forced to park in the airport parkade at a cost of $18.00 for the morning. To me, that seems like a deterant to anyone wishing to setup shop in the building, no matter how nice it is. Of course, it’s not like TC cares how much I have to pay to come visit them. Though, CFC is in the process of getting set up so that all TC exams can be written at the club instead; as of this blog entry you can do your private and commercial but not the INRAT (yet).

I considered taking the actual AeroCourse class but decided against it as I could not justify the cost (I’m a frugal kind of guy). And I figured since I was spreading my training out over many months, I’d have sufficient time to do all the required reading and study. Instead, I opted to purchase the AeroCourse workbook, which contains hundreds of sample questions broken out into various categories. I did most of the questions late last year after doing all the reading and then spent the majority of my time studying the areas that I was weak in. Then I redid most of the questions again last week in preparation for writing the INRAT.

A friend of mine who recently finished up his instrument rating bought the Instrument Rating 2005 books authored by Michael Culhane The texts have a Notice to Users which is very specific in what users, flying schools, clubs and instructors can do with the books but I’ve always felt that, other than copying, you should be free to do with a book as you see fit after you’ve bought it. That aside, I realize that this isn’t like a fiction novel in that the texts only really appeal to the people who decide each year to start their instrument rating in Canada. And given that there are an average of 2500 people issued Canadian pilot licences each year and only 14,400 pilots with instrument ratings, I suspect that there are not more than a few hundred people who start their instrument rating each year. That’s a relatively small market. So I can understand where Mr. Culhane is coming from.

There were several errors in the 2005 version of the Ground School Course book and although updates are available online, neither my friend nor I realized that until afterwards. That said, there was only one posted correction for 2005. There was also very little current information on GNSS and GPS approaches and overlays, which is a pity since both my friend and I ended up with six and four questions respectively on the exam dealing with GPS. Most of the sample approach templates were more than a few years old, which would be okay if the CAP style hadn’t changed. But the look of the CAP has changed, and if you are going to pay a premium for a book like this, I think the book should be as current as possible in all respects, and for me, that means that the sample approach plates should look exactly like the actual CAP plates. Since I read the Air Command Weather Manual and the Instrument Procedures manual first, I found the information in the ground course text to be basically an ultra condensed version of those two texts, plus the AIM. So if you are looking for a Cole’s Notes way to study then you can try the Culhane book. But my suggestion is to go out and buy the AeroCourse workbook (and no, I don’t have any relation whatsoever to AeroCourse), especially if you are the learn on your own type, and do the reading from the actual sources (IPM, ACWM and AIM). It’ll take more time, but I think you’ll find that you’ll learn more and get far more detail. Plus your goal should not be to simply pass the test but instead to learn the material such that you can safely act as PIC under IMC, and at the same time, pass the INRAT.

On a semi-related side note, here’s an interesting press release from ATP, whom Culhane tried to sue over some free exam questions that ATP had made available online. And there seem to be a lot of people with strong feelings on Culhane and his books.

This was the first real exam I’ve written since I graduated from University of Calgary in 1997. And like all the exams I had to write there, I was incredibly nervous despite all the studying. But, yes, I passed.

Update: In a message from Mr. Culhane, I’m told that the 2006 version of the Instrument Rating books have been re-written and have more current information. I can’t vouch for that, however, as I haven’t seen them but go and check it out for yourself. My comments above are based on the 2005 version of the texts only, not the latest, now available, 2006 version. And for anyone who might criticize me for using a 2005 book part way through 2006, yes I realize that I was using an older book. But when I started studying, it was 2005. I read the Instrument Rating 2005 books in 2005. And last time I checked, there were GPS (now GNSS) approaches in 2005. In fact, there were GPS approaches in 2004, since I have an older CAP 3 from 2004 with GPS templates in it.
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Hotel Coffee

Thanks to a link in Sam’s blog, Blogging At FL250, I discovered a really great podcast last week titled ’Hotel Coffee.’ The host, Dan O’Leary, is a pilot for Horizon Air and has a very raw podcast. But I say raw in the good sense of the word. As I mentioned in a recent email to Dan, podcasts where there is very little editing as more in tune with what I think podcasting should be: very much like a live radio show. So many podcasts these days try to be these highly polished, commercial quality shows and the end result, while refined, seems contrived and often times, fake. If you listen to Dan’s podcast #35, you’ll hear him mention me and quote those very words.

It’s the same thing with official company blogs: the companies are simply using the hype of blogs to turn press release type articles into ‘blog entries’. But I don’t fall for that, and I suspect that after a while neither will anyone else. People want their blogs raw; they want to hear people’s thoughts and feelings, not a ‘story’ written and rewritten by some media relations intern.

So check out Dan’s podcast for a true podcast, in the original spirit of what a podcast should be. It took me the better part of a week to catch up and listen to all his podcasts, but it was time well spent; truly enjoyable, full of cool stories about life as a first officer for a regional airline and, most importantly, raw.
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