It's getting hard here.

Need to keep pushing.

Settling

It's been a few weeks, but things are coming together here in Meridian. I have an apartment, and now, after a month-long delay by the moving company, my things are here. That makes me happy. Also awesome are the abilities to cook and have a place to sit in my apartment (it's the little things!).

Flight school is going okay. It's tough, and I am putting in extremely long hours.

Jets!

Following a very exciting form solo, I waited for a whole week.

This morning, my commander came into the flight room and told my roommate and I, both of us complete in the naval program, what our next aircraft would be. He got helicopters for the Marines, I got Navy jets.

This is a big thrill. Can't wait to fly the plane, really excited for that.

In the mean time - try to perfect formation in a T-6.

Now We Wait...

I may have flown my last time in a T-6.

The formation solo marks the end of the road for Navy folks who don't select/track Tactical Aviation. To quote an instructor, "it's the most fun, scariest time you will ever have in an airplane." So true. I flew across from my roommate, JT Morgan, for 75 minutes, most of that time positioning our aircraft within 10 feet of each other. Crazy! It's wild that they let us do that.

To make things even more insane, I was the only person in my plane.

The flight was awesome. The most smooth and controlled I have felt in a long time, in the plane. Really exciting to do all those maneuvers, even a loop, with another airplane in trail.

One of those days, I would have flown for free.

The Wichita That Never Happened...

Instrument check today.

We ended up in northwestern Arkansas, since Kansas was a living, breathing tornado that day. Between formation flight to the airport, and a night instrument flight to Fort Smith, those were my favorite times so far in an airplane.

Wichita

An adventure starts shortly. My roommate and I are flying to Wichita this evening, accomplishing three flights before returning to Enid on Friday, midday.

We'll fly formation out there - which should be outstanding.

Night instruments in the Wichita area, maybe even a bit of tooling around the area - Salina, Kansas, anybody?

Formation back to Vance AFB. Sounds fun.

Recent Recap

Things of late...

Started formation flying (aka "flying dangerously close to other aircraft...and doing so on purpose"). The first flight scared me a good deal, and I didn't even fly that much of it...but the second felt a lot better. Looking forward to my next shot in the formation medium.

Finished cross country. Great fun! Changed the itinerary a bit.

We went to Omaha first, looking for a specific type of instrument approach that has proven beguilingly difficult to find nowadays. The one at Offutt AFB in town was broken, like so many, so we opted for a quick landing and some Jimmy John's.

Off to Duluth, Minnesota, through frozen rain and nighttime at 29,000 feet. Pretty high up!

In Duluth, spent a good deal of time enjoying Sammy's pizza, cruising along the lake shore (by airplane, by foot), drinking coffee, and admiring planes - saw a Canadian jet on the ramp at the airport, and got the pleasure of seeing a sweet airplane factory, Cirrus. Woot!

On the way back, flew low and slow over the southern edge of Lake Superior. Found some sweet islands to admire. Flew into the weather a bit, though, so we recovered by instruments to LaCrosse, WI. No problem, we thought, we'll be off to Lincoln, Nebraska before we can say "cheesehead." Well, a major aircraft accident at Vance, my home base, changed that (everyone was okay, no worries there).

So we spent a good deal of time in LaCrosse, home of the world's most bars-per-capita. Saw the Harlem Globetrotters, walked the Mississippi River, had Cajun food, enjoyed beer.

The flight back, we finally got those beguiling approaches in a little airport in northwestern Missouri. I'll be eternally grateful to St. Joseph, and their awesome PAR controllers. Much love.

Back to Woodring airport in Enid, where I got my first double-clicked landing (that's a good thing!).

Cross Country

Omaha - Madison - Lincoln - Topeka - Vance

Back in the Saddle

Well, today I did it. I landed the airplane again.

Whatever demon tormented me on Friday afternoon, was exorcised by today. I greased two landings and didn't hit to hard on the third. What a relief!

Now, on to a cross-country flight this weekend.

Defeated

It's been a really rough couple of weeks. I accidentally over-g'ed the airplane by .03 on an area solo. Forgot to call my strap-in on a flight. To top it all, I failed a check ride yesterday because of an inability to land the plane; with nasty winds and a bit of rust, I couldn't get it on the ground.

Halfway Home

It's been a quick ride through pilot training here in Oklahoma. I have completed about half of my hours in the T-6, and the second half will roll even quicker than the first half has done.

So far, I have flown a number of contact flights. These flights taught aircraft control, stalls, aerobatics, emergency management, and landing from a variety of positions (straight-in, circling, and overhead patterns). I have done well in the first half, working hard to get down the basics of flying. It's come quickly, with at least one class/simulator/flight/test every day - and often several events a day. That workload has kept me pretty occupied.

The next phase will get more interesting. We'll focus on instrument flying - how to get around when the weather/lack of daylight prevents you from using the ground as your baseline. It's a very different set of skills, much more precision-based than the previous segment of training. Integral to this phase is a cross-country trip, in which I'll fly seven flights to different airports far away from the comfort zone of Enid. I hope to traverse Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas, but my instructor's guidance (and preference) may shape where we go.

I'll finish up with a bit of formation flying. The Air Force takes formation pretty seriously, so we'll get some great experience doing that.

Looking forward to the challenges ahead.

Back to Flying

It's been a week without flying. I was sick, with some bad sinus problems, for a while, so I did a whole heap of nothing.

Feeling better, so I expect I'll be flying a lot to catch up with our schedule.

It's a fun, complicated time in training. We are completing Contact (aerobatics) flying, Instrument simulators, Navigation and Formation classes, and some pretty meaty studying for check rides.

These checks are performed by special instructors, whose sole job it is to evaluate students at certain points in the program. The process is shrouded in mystery. They work in a secret lair, where students cannot enter. Though one hears of others' check rides, one has very little idea what to expect for his own. It's the best that I can do to study and pray - those ought to be enough to battle the check ride forces, right?

As you might guess, I'm coming up on my first check ride this week.

SOLO

Well, I made it. Last friday was a pretty big day, with a sim in the morning and my first T-6 solo flight in the afternoon.

To avert any doubts, I survived.

San Fran Fog

my first solo flight was scheduled for this past week. Had only two rides until I went up, alone, in the traffic pattern above Vance AFB. In a week, should be no problem to fit those in.

Then the fog rolled in.

It was the freezing, soupy, nasty stuff, keeping planes from taking off and us from doing much of anything. Attitudes took a nose-dive. The flight room became pretty stagnant. There's only so many hours that you can read the same books, in the same place, all day long. Not the best of weeks.

More of the same, weather-wise, is expected for the next week.

Up in the Air

I'm seven flights into the program here. It's been very quick so far, but I'm learning tons each time I go.

Just got back from a ski trip this weekend. Hard to believe that I was on the slopes just recently, but in the air today. Crazy fast life!

That's about it for tonight. Sleepy time.

First Flight

Doing it tomorrow - nerves are raw :(

The Phase One Roll

I'm flying...well, sorta.

We've done four simulators to this point. Each has built on the last - going from checklists to flying to emergencies to patterns flown over an airport. They put us in these nifty rooms with mock-up cockpits (all the switches work), and we look at simulated scenes on large screens that surround us as we fly around and over the Enid area. It's pretty neat to apply all that we've learned to this point.

On top of that, the class thing has started heating up. Several tests each week. This week, it's Contact (basic flying maneuvers, including some stalls and spins) as well as Weather. That second one's a recap of Pensacola's weather, so shouldn't be too tough. I hope.

Trying to keep up with other things in life (friends, running, etc) has proven a bit more difficult with the increased work-load. But I've done okay with that.

Class has started - let the grind begin!

It's a good grind, though - like coffee :)

Out in Oklahoma

I've been in my new house for a week, and the boxes are unpacked.

This place has been great, so far. Our kitchen is awesome, filled with bunches of food! The family room has a fireplace, and my TV sits on the fireplace mantel. My room is to the back right of the house. It's a bit tight, but I am enjoying the shuffling of things to make it work.

Enid has been mediocre. The town has little to offer - it's not very scenic, and there's not much to do. On top of that, the rain and cold have kept me off the golf courses since getting here. Bummer!

Because of Enid's low-caliber entertainment value, I have been traveling a bit. Went to Oklahoma City for the Zac Brown Band concert. Out to Tulsa to visit a friend. Back to OKC for a night of sushi and fellowship with the Navy folks from Enid. Even squeezed in a date while down there.

Training starts in a few weeks. Until then, I'll be running lots and preventing my brain from rotting with plenty of Sporcle quizzes.

Helo Dunker

Underwater Disney World. Easily the most fun you can have while being drowned. That was my Friday.

When helicopters go down, the world becomes a mess for those inside. The aircraft quickly inverts, and it falls to the ocean floor with great haste. We can't change those facts, but we can prepare for them. Hence the training.

Through progressive steps, the swimmers prepared us for various exit procedures from helicopters. Operate these door handles, some don't work. Find a reference point. Use your hands (not your eyes) to guide yourself towards the exit. It's a great bit of fun, but scary too - knowing that so many have been through this training and needed to use it.

It culminated in the full-on dunker. They have a simulated helicopter on a cable. Six of us climbed in, strapped in. Then, they made the water more than a distant friend. Within seconds, we were upside-down, under water, in relative darkness. Let those straps go. Hand over hand, and exit that sucker. Live to fight another day.

I enjoyed it lots, and the thing definitely made me more comfortable with helicopters. Still not my first pick, but they have some perks.