Commercial Check Ride

The time came to once again attempt to pass my commercial check ride. Once again, it was scheduled for first thing in the morning, which meant I rolled out of bed around 4:30AM to collect weather and finish my cross country flight plan. This time however, the weather was fantastic.

The time finally arrived and I met the examiner. He found a mistake in my Form 8710, so I had to go back and fix it. The form is available online at the FAA web site, but I had already submitted it and my instructor had already signed it, so I had to start over from scratch. I raced to re-enter all the data as the examiner waited.

With the paperwork out of the way, we proceeded to the oral exam. I did pretty well, but had a few weak areas regarding the schedule of weather reports. I simply told him that I don't have them memorized because I always get the current weather before each flight. He wasn't happy with that answer, but moved on nonetheless.

Flying time came, but getting an Arrow to fly is always at challenge at FlightSafety. My plane was given to someone else, but I was able to get one, too. It was scheduled to be back in less than two hours, so I already began feeling time pressure.

While pre-flighting the plane, my pencil ran out of lead. Luckily I had a pen with me as well, so I was able to continue. The examiner asked a few questions about various systems on the plane.

With pre-flight complete, I began giving the briefing and going through the instrument checks. During this time, I again felt time pressure as the examiner's body language and comments expressed that he was in a hurry to get going. I tried to be complete, thorough, and quick with the remainder of the checklist, but I was certainly uncomfortable.

The time pressure continued as I taxied and did the run-up. Once in the air, I turned to my flight plan heading and noted the time. Everything was proceeding as planned, so no alterations were necessary. After a few miles, he asked me to divert to Ochachobee. I'd never been there before, so I found it on the chart, estimated the heading, distance, time, and fuel burn to the airport and headed straight for it. Then I found the airport diagram that I had previously ripped from the A/FD and determined the ASOS frequency, common traffic advisory frequency, runway headings, and traffic patterns.

Upon reaching the airport, the examiner told me to do a soft field landing. My approach was great, but I ballooned a little during the round out and the plane dropped hard to the runway. Strike one against me. I then was told to do a power-off 180 to landing. There was traffic in the pattern, so I had to do a right 360 degree turn for spacing. When I came around base to final, I realized that I was too high. I tried slipping, but still landed several hundred feet too long. Strike two against me. The examiner told me to try that one again, so again, I had to do a 360 degree turn for spacing, but this time, I brought it in perfectly, landing about 100 feet past my targeted landing spot.

Then we went out to do some maneuvers. I started with slow flight, which lead into a power off stall, followed by a power on stall. Then I did some lazy eights, but my altitude was off by more than 100 feet. Strike three against me. For steep spirals, the examiner picked a barn near a grass air strip. I spiraled down to it while he kept commenting about the bank angle not being steep enough. Strike four against me. And finally it was off to do eights on pylons. I was about to find my own pylons when the examiner picked two for me. I turned around them, but they were too far apart and I wasn't happy with the performance, but he seemed to be OK with it.

Finally it was back to Vero Beach. By now, I had little idea of my precise location and the pressure to get the plane back became overwhelming. I scanned the horizon from 1500 feet, saw an airport with a control tower, and flew toward it. That's when the examiner took the controls. Strike five against me, and this one was irreconcilable. I was flying to the wrong airport. He flew us back to the west and then told me to fly to Vero Beach this time. I got my bearings worked out and found the appropriate landmarks and flew back to Vero Beach.

Since that flight, I flew another 1.5 hours with my instructor and he tried to get me lost. He had me staring at my lap while he flew around then finally had me look up and figure out where I was. He also made a great point about lost procedures. Since the only troublesome airspace within 30 miles is Class D, a simple circle and climb to 2500+ feet will get you out of everyone's airspace, and provide better visibility for determining your position. I began a nice smooth turning climb and quickly determined that the inlet I was seeing was Stuart and the highway below me was the turnpike. From there, I had no problem getting back to Vero Beach.

Today, I got the chance to prove myself once again. I met the examiner again, but this time at 1:00PM and without the cross country planning ahead of time. After redoing the 8710, we went out to the plane, prepped it, and headed west once again. The examiner had me fly towards Ochachobee again. After digging out all the charts and information and setting the frequencies, he had me turn towards a smoke cloud near the coast. I told him that there was controlled airspace there and that I could not fly there at this altitude. He then told me to fly into Fort Pearce. I was getting close to their airspace, so I started a 360 degree turn while looking up the airport information. I called the tower and was told to enter left traffic for runway 27. The examiner told me to show him a soft field landing. I did, and this time it was a total greaser. We departed to the north back to Vero Beach.

There were no surprises on the way back. We entered the pattern behind a Seminole and followed it all the way to the runway. On the ground, the examiner made some comments and I thought that maybe I failed the check ride, but he was referring to our previous flight together. He went inside while I secured the plane.

Inside, he was busy doing some paperwork and preparing for his next victim. Finally, he asked me to give him my pilot's license. I thought, "Oh no, not only did I fail my checkride, I also lost my license!". Then he handed me a paper to sign. It was my new temporary license, which includes the commercial certificate. What a relief to have that one behind me.