Commercial Lesson - Day 28

Summary

Scheduled Time: 8:00AM - 12:00AM (Actual flight time: 1:30PM - 5:30PM)
Actual Hours Ground: 2.0
Actual Hours Flight: 2.2

Total Hours Flight: 21.0

Finally, I can say with confidence that today was my last commercial lesson, but it was almost canceled. When I arrived at 7:30AM, there was no Arrow available. The best guess for availability was 1:00PM, so I went back home, ate breakfast, and reviewed my memory items a few more times.

Back at the airport, an Arrow appeared on the line and I grabbed the keys. After our briefing, it was off to the flightline. For this lesson, we decided to have the fuel truck remove fuel down to the 25 gallon tabs. While they removed fuel, I prepared the plane for flight.

For this lesson, I made a plan that included every commercial maneuver in the practical test standard. We started with a short field take-off, then headed for the practice area at 1,500 feet. The air was bumpy, so I climbed up to 2,500 feet. Unfortunately, it was no smoother at that altitude.

Once to the practice area, we did slow flight and stalls, steep turns, chandelles, and lazy eights. Then, for the first time since starting at FlightSafety, we did steep spirals. We had some disagreement on how to enter the manuever, but we worked it out and proceeded. Three full turns took me from 4,000 feet to 1,500 feet. Then I did turns on pylons before heading to Sebastian for soft field landings and power off 180's. Of the three power off 180's, one was high (slipping down almost worked out, but we floated past the standard distance), the second was too short and required a go-around. The third was looking like it might be a bit short, but turned out perfect in the end.

Finally, we headed back to Vero Beach. I demonstrated the short field landing here and easily stopped before the first taxiway.