Chandler Air Service, South Western USA, Arizona
Well, here is to an undoubtedly, invaluable experience which has defined both of our flying skills and qualities to date. Flying in the South West of the USA offers many challenges that in my opinion are essential for anyone aspiring to become a commercial pilot! You could say it is an Adrenaline Seekers Paradise! Temperatures reaching 120 Degrees F / 49 Degrees C at the surface, 35 Degrees C in the cruise was not uncommon! Terrain including The Rocky Mountains to the North East, the vast amounts of desert travelling North to the 'Silver State' Nevada, the peaks of San Jacinto separating Palm Springs from the West Coast California, Big Bear City reaching almost 12 000ft above Sea Level, the endless National Parks and Wilderness parks, including the Grand Canyon with a vast amount of restricted airspace lying above, the Lake Mead/Hoover Dam area with constant aerial tours to contend with. Convective storms that are normal to build up from late afternoon on-wards, producing astonishing electrical storms amongst the black canvas of the desert, the Marine Layer which is a fundamental characteristic of West Coast California, Punctuality where opening and closing flight plans is concerned, navigating controlled airspace, for example the Class B that surrounds Phoenix Sky Harbour International or that of Las Vegas, the significance of airmanship when flying to uncontrolled airports that are a main attraction to General Aviation, for example, Lake Havasu City and Big Bear.
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| London Bridge, purchased by McCulloch, Lake Havasu, Arizona |
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| Shallow Climb out of BIG BEAR, California |
On the 20th April, 2013, after finishing an intense 7 month Airline Transport Pilot Licence Course at CATS, Luton, consisting of 14 various ATPL examinations, Myself and a great friend, Pas, with just as much commitment to the industry decided to pioneer a successful route for our hour building. Having 28 first time passes in all ATPL subjects with an average grade of 90%, our confidence in each other was more than an existence! We had only known each other for the last stage of the course (approximately 2 months), and to find a great guy with similar interests other than flying and with just as much passion for aviation was an unquestionable decision that I made to share our hour building experience together out in the USA. Just like Orville and Wilbur back in 1903, our decision and planning has shown to us nothing but success.......
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| Me and Pas advertising the RayBans on route to Vegas! |
Just short of a month ago, I had a total of 123 hours 30 minutes, of which 30 hours 55 minutes were 'in command' (the hours that are significant when moving onto commercial licences). Now, I have a total of 168 hours 50 minutes, of which 81 hours 5 minutes are 'in command'. Not only have I built 50 hours 10 minutes (Pas similar hours) in less than 3 weeks, but we carried out our flying together giving us a total of 100 hours flying experience, which you will be amazed just how much you can learn and appreciate being an 'unofficial co-pilot'. Tasks that are usually unobtainable whilst flying for example, calculating point of no returns, point of safe returns, working out True Altitudes based on non-standard conditions, working out the base of clouds from the lapse rates, obtaining a detailed in-flight weather service whilst the other person is flying to keep ahead of any weather deterioration/conditions, amending flight plans with more accurate times of arrival and re-routes, getting to grips with learning Morse code, accurate fuel planning, appreciating the sounds and indications of leaning the mixture in far more detail than when flying by yourself, looking in the Pilot operating handbook to see whether a Carbon Monoxide detector is part of the Minimum equipment list etc..... so for those who think we both had 50 hours of sightseeing as a non-paying passenger, think again!
We have visited around 18 airports, ranging from International airports to just a single piece of concrete with only a self serve fuel facility available. We have flown into airports such as Big Bear and Sedona with elevations of 6800ft and 4800ft respectively, in temperatures reaching 49 degrees, making density altitudes of 9500ft a challenge! We both have completed our cross country flights, myself into San Diego, taking 4 hours 30 calling in at Palm Springs, Pas to Las Vegas, Henderson, taking again 4 hours approximately. Unfortunately, i have not kept record on what distance we have covered but my guess would be enough air miles to get us a free flight to New York! We have flown PA28 Warrior and Cherokee aircraft that were built during the Cold War, N291HA being built in 1966 and having to be rebuilt in the current 2013 with the itinerary that Myself and Pas had, it just couldn't keep up with our expectations! Burning 4 quarts of oil in just under 3 hours and having to make it a standard check that we had tankered oil in the back to top up when down route was certainly interesting as was the morning when one of the 4 cylinders decided to go back to bed on Pas at Take-off requiring exceptional skill to return the aircraft back onto the runway!
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| Las Vegas, Staying in the Luxor inc 'The Sphynx' in the background |
We have climbed to heights of 10500ft/1.5 mile high, taking us sometimes 25 minutes for the privilege of reaching 21 degrees! Cruised at groundspeeds of 65 knots, and 148 knots, encountered moderate turbulence initiating us to file a PIREP (pilot report), even moderate is quite daunting in an aircraft weighing less than 2200LBS/1000KG, using all what we learnt from our mixture leaning/mountain checkouts to achieve climb rates of less than 100 feet per minute climbing out of Big Bear, but despite what has been personally for me without a doubt, the most exhilarating, thrilling and terrifying flying experience to date, the scenery we have witnessed outside of 'the sweatbox' has been unimaginable. Following just part of the 1450 mile Colorado River with its associated dams, North to Lake Havasu, then onto Lake Mead, the Hoover Dam area, with the Grand Canyon off to the East, The Red Rock Valley of Sadona, the boneyards containing over 4000 aircraft in storage at Tuscon, Las Vegas Strip for the night, San Diego Bay area, including Coronado Beach, Mission Beach, Imperial Beach and watching the city lights appear after sunset, Flying into Palm Springs International, flying back for 2 hours 30 minutes on just 1 fuel tank as we had a potential blockage of fuel on the right tank after someone (cant quite remember who) dropped the fuel cap into the tank), just to add loosing communications with Albuquerque Center whilst flying through an extremely active Bagdad MOA (Military operations Area) with aircraft doing aerobatics around us making us diverge from our track towards a mountain have all been very memorable moments which will crop up sooner or later whilst I keep updating this blog.
The people we have met have all played a huge part in making our mission a great success and we are hugely grateful to everyone at Chandler Air Service as well as everyone else who was part of our epic journey!
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| Las Vegas, Nevada, Famous Fountains outside The Belagio |
'In Aviation, Never Can Never Be Reached'
I think we have proven this statement to be 100% accurate.
By PianoPilot
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