Seems that my night dual time came even sooner than I thought- but hey, nothing wrong with flying two days in a row. I had originally thought I’d be busy Monday evening, and tentatively was considering Wednesday night instead, but it turned out that Monday was free after all. I was planning n asking Scott anyway when he sent me a text that sealed the deal- we’d both forgotten that he was going to Florida Wednesday, so any night dual this week would have to be on Monday. Since that was what I was thinking anyway, it worked out great.
I knocked off work a bit early and spent some time planning my flight. I decided to go with the same flight I’d planned for the previous night attempt- a hop out to Anderson, SC. (AND) Anderson is about 70 nm from LZU, plenty in excess of the 50-mile minimum for a cross-country. Another benefit is that there’s a VOR just a few miles from the airport, making navigation a snap. Selecting checkpoints was a bit more difficult. I tried to pick things that I thought would be easily visible at night- busy highways, well-lit towns, etc. Before long, I was packing up and heading out to LZU.
Out on the ramp, 546 only had about 3/4 of a tank, so we called for the fuel truck. Luckily- well, in a manner of speaking- I’d forgotten to bring my headset out, so we had to go up to the office. Waiting in there for the fuel was much warmer than waiting on the ramp. Back outside, I ran the preflight and we were ready to roll.
Taxiing was a bit of a challenge, particularly while turning- the taxi light on the DA-20 only illuminates a small area directly ahead, which isn’t much good for picking out the centerline if it’s not straight ahead. The edge light at least give a sense of boundary, but I still prefer to follow the centerline instead of trying to judge my position between the lights. Still, aside from coming close to turning early for the runup area and going in the grass, things were uneventful. With no traffic around but us, there was no wait at the runway, and I was in the air and turning to the east in no time.
Night flying offers a sort of quiet calm that’s not always present during the day. With far less traffic, the radio stays pretty quiet, and you’re treated to a view far different from what you’re used to. The slight downside is that flight by visual reference is more difficult; the horizon can be tough to pick out, and so judging pitch and bank attitude requires more instrument reference than usual. At altitude, I called up Atlanta Approach and got flight following- not that there was really any other traffic to worry about. The cruise seemed to go pretty quickly, and before long I was descending towards Anderson.
As I crossed the VOR and turned toward the airport, Scott keyed the mike and turned on the lights at AND, which made it a lot easier for me to judge my pattern entry. I deduced that at my descent rate, I’d still be a bit high at the airport, so I swung out to the south a bit to get down to pattern altitude. The only voices on the CTAF were Scott’s and mine. I crossed the runway at pattern altitude, made my downwind turn, and set about replicating my pattern knowledge in a decidedly unfamiliar environment.
The first bit of a hiccup came as I reduced power to start my descent. I’d already had to beat the urge early on to hold up my descent here during the day… at night, with no real visual altitude cues, it’s even tougher to let the plane go down. I rolled out on final high, chopped the power, and focused on getting on slope and controlling my speed. On short final, speed control became tougher, simply because the bright approach lights killed my night vision and made it difficult to glance in and see my airspeed. The landing, however, was one of my best yet… a nice smooth touchdown. I then taxied back to do it again. Meanwhile, Scott demonstrated how to control the intensity of the lights via radio; for subseqeunt landings, the medium setting was far more comfortable for me.
My requirements for night training include ten takeoffs and landings to a full-stop… no touch & goes here. But full-stop doesn’t mean taxiing back is required, even though we did it the first time. For the rest, since AND has a nice long runway, we simply did stop & goes- land, come to a stop, reconfigure the airplane, throttle up, do it again. All in all, I got in six landings at AND, all of which were among my best. Scott pointed out that this was a consequence of my good airspeed control. Perhaps the relative lack of scenery at night makes it easier to concentrate on the basics… not sure, but something was clicking.
Finally, we turned back towards LZU. For this approach, Scott had me do something a bit different- instead of the usual pattern entry and visual landing, he had me set up on the ILS and fly the needles, or at least try to. I’d done this, in a manner of speaking, before on FSX, but that sure ain’t real life. For one thing, I can’t switch off the wind in the real world… a few miles out, I transitioned back to flying visually and got in another great landing. Totals for the night: 2.4 hours and eight landings.
I still need another few tenths of an hour at night, plus two more landings, so another (albeit shorter) night session will be in order soon. I’m getting close to the end of my private training now; I’ve crossed the 30-hour mark, and besides the aforementioned night experience, the only other requirements left to meet are a few hours’ simulated instrument time and six hours of solo time, including my long cross-country. I anticipate taking the knowledge test in a few weeks, and probably the checkride not long after.
After a lot of waiting to get here, it’s almost within my grasp.
