Episode 85
SPC#85 - Expanding Your Minimums | Suck Less at Flying
In Episode 85, we join Bill and Kent as they talk about how to expand the envelope of your flying. In other words, how to fly good and not suck...or at least get better and reduce your personal minimums.
Links:
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Transcript
Hi, welcome back to another student pilot cast, and specifically a
Speaker:beyond the check ride segment.
Speaker:So, as usual, I'm here with Kent.
Speaker:How you doing, Kent?
Speaker:Excellent.
Speaker:How are you doing?
Speaker:I'm doing great.
Speaker:Aren't you gonna say something about being able to talk about
Speaker:flying or something like that?
Speaker:Oh, I can't even remember what the line was.
Speaker:It's been so long since we recorded.
Speaker:So, excellent.
Speaker:Glad to have you with us, and so we're gonna be talking today about.
Speaker:What we do beyond our check ride to continue to expand our capabilities or
Speaker:expand our personal personal minimums.
Speaker:So a pretty good topic.
Speaker:We can go a lot of places with it.
Speaker:How do you wanna start the discussion?
Speaker:Well, I think a lot of people, You know, they've just gone through
Speaker:all their private pilot training.
Speaker:they've had all kinds of documentation that tells them exactly what they need to
Speaker:do in that airplane to reach their goal.
Speaker:and sadly, when I, before I was even a pilot, I was a lineman and I would see all
Speaker:these people come and they would train, train, train, train, train and get their
Speaker:private and you would never see 'em again.
Speaker:and that's kind of sad 'cause.
Speaker:I know that for both of us, aviation has done wonderful things in our lives and
Speaker:so it's something that you definitely should try to continue with if you can.
Speaker:there are so many opportunities in aviation to do more things.
Speaker:you know, there's really nobody that has done everything and so, I think.
Speaker:Maybe the first step should be to get out there and find out what to do next.
Speaker:find out what your niche in aviation is gonna be.
Speaker:I think a lot of people think about becoming an airline pilot
Speaker:because that's what aviation is to an awful lot of people.
Speaker:They just simply don't know, the breadth of opportunities that there
Speaker:are in aviation for both fun and work.
Speaker:So there, there are a ton of, of other opportunities out there.
Speaker:And so, the next thing after your private is just kind of figuring
Speaker:out where you're gonna go next.
Speaker:The other thing about that is when someone's getting their private
Speaker:certificate, for example, all the time about aeronautical decision making, and
Speaker:part of ADM is defining writing down and knowing what your personal minimums are.
Speaker:That is something that is meant to be expanded as you gain more experience,
Speaker:do more things, get better at some of the skills that have to do with
Speaker:flying the airplane, things like that.
Speaker:And a lot of times what we don't talk about is how do we
Speaker:expand those personal minimums?
Speaker:How do we go beyond the check ride and start to do that?
Speaker:And so I think it'd be great if we covered that today as well.
Speaker:Excellent.
Speaker:yeah, it's all about expanding your flying skills safely.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:it safely.
Speaker:So
Speaker:yeah, you're right.
Speaker:When, when you, uh, like the day before your check ride, you have those
Speaker:personal minimums are kind of written out for you by your flight instructor
Speaker:as your solo minimums, and you're allowed to Do, you know, what, what
Speaker:solo minimums do you give people?
Speaker:generally some of the basic ones would be never flying in more than, you know,
Speaker:15 knots of wind and never flying in more than, say, an eight knot cross wind until
Speaker:you get better and better at it As far
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:goes, of course then there's minimums around.
Speaker:This is actually a funny one to talk about.
Speaker:there's minimums around visibility and things like that too because as we know
Speaker:in most of the air spaces we fly in, three miles of visibility is pretty
Speaker:much legal, with a few exceptions and three miles of visibility for somebody
Speaker:who's learned to fly in Arizona.
Speaker:might as well be hard IMC because we generally out here
Speaker:have unlimited visibility, 80, a hundred miles, even in the summer.
Speaker:the only times it gets a little bit lower is from smog or maybe dust blowing
Speaker:around in the, in the atmosphere.
Speaker:But it's amazing when it does get lower here.
Speaker:gets down to 10, or heaven forbid, you know, seven, six miles of visibility.
Speaker:You notice it, right?
Speaker:And so I wouldn't, uh, ever want one of my students to fly in anything less than, say
Speaker:six or seven miles of visibility because they've really had no experience doing it.
Speaker:And finding an airport and of understanding where you're at when you
Speaker:can only see straight down, at least compared to the way we normally can
Speaker:see out here, with all of the terrain we have around us and all of those
Speaker:sorts of things it can be a big deal.
Speaker:Now you talk to somebody who flies in the Midwest like you do a lot, Kent, seven,
Speaker:eight miles of visibility in the summer.
Speaker:That's just, you know, a Tuesday, know, so,
Speaker:um,
Speaker:It's usually 10, but it's usually not that much more, you know, the,
Speaker:right,
Speaker:automated weather observing systems and the ATIS are never
Speaker:going to tell you more than 10.
Speaker:I, I guess I shouldn't say never.
Speaker:I have heard, of higher numbers than that, but that's pretty rare.
Speaker:point
Speaker:and you know, I, I remember that first flight where it
Speaker:was only four or five miles of visibility after I got my private.
Speaker:and these days, like if it was four miles visibility, I'm
Speaker:going, IFR, you know, there's,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:it's really not very much.
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:that distance, especially, if you're talking about traffic
Speaker:opposite direction, that closing distance is gonna happen real fast.
Speaker:So,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:that, type of thing.
Speaker:It's kind of funny because of where we fly, is a little bit different.
Speaker:Of course, you've flown in all sorts of places all over the US but but
Speaker:where we live is sort of different.
Speaker:And so those, those are going to affect your personal minimums, of course.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:And you know, here in Wisconsin it is different depending on the time of year.
Speaker:in the summer when it's really humid, you're not gonna get a whole lot
Speaker:more than 10 miles, in the winter.
Speaker:I can take off and see a hundred, 150 miles,
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:right?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It gets really dry in the winter and so that that dry air gives
Speaker:you really good visibility.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:speaking of which, I was on a, um, tell, I'm going on a story tangent.
Speaker:I was on a training flight with one of my students a couple of months ago.
Speaker:And, speaking of increasing your personal mini minimums or expanding that envelope.
Speaker:went out specifically because it was a very windy day and, um, we
Speaker:were gonna work on, her ground reference maneuvers because, it
Speaker:was gonna be pretty challenging.
Speaker:And so we both thought, Hey, this is a good opportunity.
Speaker:To do something that's gonna be very challenging so that when you do it
Speaker:on your check ride or you know, um, in, in less undesirable conditions,
Speaker:it's gonna feel real easy, you know?
Speaker:so we went out and did that, turned around to head back towards the airport,
Speaker:and we realized that the whole east part of the valley had been kind of
Speaker:engulfed in dust because of all the.
Speaker:'cause of all the wind.
Speaker:And so again, our visibility probably, you know, it wasn't even close to
Speaker:marginal VFR, it was probably about six, eight miles, something like that.
Speaker:But for us, you know, out here, and for this private student who
Speaker:had never flown in conditions like that, she just immediately went.
Speaker:I have no idea where the airport is.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:that I normally use, I can't see.
Speaker:And uh, so we kinda came back and, asked for a low approach so that we could
Speaker:get our bearings, because that's how.
Speaker:That's how different it is when you can normally see 80 miles or
Speaker:basically un unlimited now all of a sudden you can't see much.
Speaker:So we came in, did a low approach.
Speaker:Of course, nobody was flying anymore, so there wasn't a lot of traffic.
Speaker:And they were like, sure, go ahead.
Speaker:No problem.
Speaker:Whatever you need.
Speaker:So we did a low approach, stayed in the pattern, and then came back down to land.
Speaker:And that was a great experience for her.
Speaker:not only for the ground reference, but to get, to see in a safe way, you
Speaker:know, with an instructor on board, what it's like when your visibility
Speaker:starts to go to crap, you know?
Speaker:so that's kind of what we're talking about, right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:so, so it's really about, you know, pushing that envelope,
Speaker:but doing it in a safe way.
Speaker:So I know with all your experience, Kent, what does it mean to be able to
Speaker:push the envelope but do it safely?
Speaker:Well, the way I always like to say it is.
Speaker:To become a better pilot, you have to push your envelope and you
Speaker:have to expand your envelope, but only do it one corner at a time.
Speaker:so something like you are doing with your student there.
Speaker:You know, being in the local area and working with the same controllers you've
Speaker:got normally and flying the same airplane, you know, you still had a situation
Speaker:that if she hadn't been with you could have been potentially dangerous for her.
Speaker:Um, I. Now imagine if she had already had her private, was not up with an
Speaker:instructor, was maybe, you know, maybe had traveled somewhere and was flying
Speaker:an unfamiliar airplane and talking with different controllers and all of those
Speaker:things kind of contribute to, potentially overwhelming the pilot and, and getting
Speaker:'em into an even more unsafe situation.
Speaker:one example, uh, that I thought of is, you know, I went out to the west
Speaker:coast, this quite a while ago, but, I just had a situation where I had the
Speaker:luxury of both time and money at the same time, which is incredibly rare.
Speaker:And, uh, there was a family reunion happening out in Oregon and I had
Speaker:decided I was going to fly out to it.
Speaker:and it was just kind of a, an epic adventure.
Speaker:but I did it in an airplane that I. It was one of those few
Speaker:airplanes that I don't fly, I wear,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:you know, an airplane that feels so natural to me that
Speaker:it's like it's part of my body.
Speaker:and I think really, I've only had two airplanes that I've
Speaker:gotten to that point with.
Speaker:I did take a mountain flying course on the way out there as well, so, uh, we'll
Speaker:definitely talk about that a little bit.
Speaker:but, you know, to, some extent I was trying to minimize those variables.
Speaker:Uh, it was also, I took the trip in a 182 and I was solo.
Speaker:So even though it was.
Speaker:Late summer and hot, you know, high density altitude in some places.
Speaker:I had performance to spare because I was still several hundred pounds under gross.
Speaker:I not long after that, somebody I know was going to take a similar trip from the
Speaker:Midwest to the West coast in a light sport aircraft they had never flown before.
Speaker:Uh, you know, one that allowed them enough useful load to maybe pack
Speaker:a toothbrush to take with them.
Speaker:You know, something that.
Speaker:Didn't carry a whole heck of a lot of fuel.
Speaker:You know, there's, there's a lot of, uh, lot of space between
Speaker:all the airports out there.
Speaker:And, I was just thinking, man, that's, that's too much.
Speaker:and I also thought that they might have been somewhat inspired
Speaker:by the trip I took and I called up and said, dude, don't do it.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:I feel like you're, you're biting off too many new things at once, being in a new
Speaker:airplane with limited performance in a new environment, going through the mountains,
Speaker:et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker:and luckily he said, yeah, I kind of figured that out myself already.
Speaker:So I've, I've already made the decision not to do it.
Speaker:kinda what you
Speaker:now.
Speaker:pushing one corner of the envelope at a time, right?
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:off
Speaker:right.
Speaker:that are gonna be different, or pushing your personal minimums rather
Speaker:than doing a whole bunch at once.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:and you know, you can, uh, if you're bored with flying right now,
Speaker:pick something to get better at.
Speaker:sometimes we don't think of just going out and practicing something.
Speaker:I know a guy though that kind of kicked me in the butt a little bit.
Speaker:I was in the pattern at an airport where he was based and just kind
Speaker:of trying out a new airplane.
Speaker:And there he is on the Crosswind Runway in his Cessna 140.
Speaker:You know, doing, uh, doing crosswinds practice just to get better at
Speaker:it and to keep his skills up.
Speaker:I went, huh, I should probably do that more often.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:but, you know, same sort of thing
Speaker:A lot of times we kind of stop training when we get our certificate and start
Speaker:going is, you know what we talked about in one of our previous episodes.
Speaker:wants to go somewhere and that's awesome and you learn a ton when you
Speaker:do that, but sometimes should just go up and practice some things, right,
Speaker:like you did when you were a student.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:you know, I'm the kind of person who, when it snows here, I go out for a drive.
Speaker:so I'm, I'm a little bit.
Speaker:Mixed up in the head already, I suppose, but, if there's good
Speaker:flyable IMC, I'm gonna go fly.
Speaker:Um, you know, there's no substitute for actual, in fact, when you were
Speaker:talking about Arizona flight conditions, there's an awful lot of people up in
Speaker:this part of the world who think it is absolutely crazy that it's possible to
Speaker:get an instrument rating without ever having seen the inside of a cloud.
Speaker:yes,
Speaker:Um, but you guys don't see clouds at all very much down there, so,
Speaker:Well, well, and when we do it's, you know, towering Cumulonimbus and you
Speaker:don't want to be anywhere near it anyway.
Speaker:but every once in a while we do get layers.
Speaker:A lot of times it is cumulus of some sort, but we, you know, it's
Speaker:mild enough that we can get it.
Speaker:And so, yes.
Speaker:We do the same thing be especially because it's so difficult to find
Speaker:flyable IMC, that when it happens, you see a lot of people heading up into it.
Speaker:So that's a good thing.
Speaker:That's a good thing.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:so when you see conditions that are closer to the edges of your envelope, that's
Speaker:the time to go fly and to go practice.
Speaker:And, you know, let's say you have decided that your personal minimum
Speaker:for crosswinds is, you know, no more than 10 knots across wind.
Speaker:And maybe there's 12 today.
Speaker:Well, when's the last time you flew in 10.
Speaker:was it last week, last month, or was it two years ago?
Speaker:And so that should tell you whether that's okay to, to push
Speaker:that corner of your envelope.
Speaker:you know, I think I'm to the point where, I've had a crosswind, direct
Speaker:crosswind gusting to 35 knots.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:Would I go out and do that today?
Speaker:Yeah, maybe not because, you know, I'm, it's, it's been a little while
Speaker:since I got a really good crosswind.
Speaker:I know I've done it in the past, but I haven't done it recently.
Speaker:So,
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I. You definitely want to at least think about that, you know, you
Speaker:don't necessarily have to have done it last week, but be proficient,
Speaker:in something before you push it.
Speaker:So pushing just a little bit, especially when you're by yourself.
Speaker:But if you feel like it's, you know, maybe your proficiency isn't where it
Speaker:needs to be to expand your envelope to 12 or 15 knots of crosswind.
Speaker:Or maybe there's too many things going.
Speaker:Maybe the visibility is a little low and the crosswind, that's when
Speaker:you, you know, text your instructor.
Speaker:And say, Hey, you got some time to go up.
Speaker:This looks like pretty good practice conditions, and if the
Speaker:instructor's available, they're gonna want to go do it too.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:yeah, get somebody
Speaker:I am reminded of a time that there were some really horrendous winds and
Speaker:somebody had a lesson scheduled and they were sure they could handle it, and,
Speaker:uh, it's a good thing they were with their instructor because, yeah, it was,
Speaker:it was far enough beyond what they were actually proficient at that the instructor
Speaker:had to get 'em back on the ground.
Speaker:But, you know, those are are great opportunities as well.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:even with private students who aren't beyond the check ride yet, those
Speaker:types of opportunities are pure gold.
Speaker:And I just had this experience last week with a post solo, uh, student
Speaker:of mine we were going up to help her get familiar with the practice area.
Speaker:'cause next he's gonna be soloing to the practice area we had a dual lesson
Speaker:planned and it got really windy.
Speaker:It was, you know, direct crosswind, gusting about 20 But we weren't really
Speaker:spending a ton of time in the pattern.
Speaker:we were going to the practice area, and so it was fine.
Speaker:She did great.
Speaker:but when we were coming back in, she had never, she had never
Speaker:landed in conditions like that.
Speaker:And I told her, Hey, this is gonna be challenging.
Speaker:I'm gonna be on the controls with you.
Speaker:I, and I'm going to, you know, show you how.
Speaker:Easy.
Speaker:This is to put the thing on the thing if you know how to control the airplane,
Speaker:if you've got experience doing it.
Speaker:And, her response after we touched down was, wow.
Speaker:I had no, I idea that it would be like being kind of in a side slip.
Speaker:So, down one wheel way before the other, then the, the other wheel and then the
Speaker:nose wheel, and lots of cross control and.
Speaker:she was doing great on her landings when there's minimal wind, it was a
Speaker:testament to me that, I mean, these, these opportunities to expand your experience
Speaker:with somebody more experienced on board to help make it safe, man, that is just
Speaker:absolute learning gold right there.
Speaker:Definitely.
Speaker:and I've heard of, I've heard of people saying things like, oh, I couldn't land in
Speaker:a 15 knot cross 'cause I ran outta rudder.
Speaker:Uh, I call bs.
Speaker:Um, I didn't run outta rudder with a 35 knot crosswinds, so obviously some
Speaker:aircraft types are better than others, but, especially Cessna, you know, they,
Speaker:they build airplanes that you can, I.
Speaker:Beat the living hell out of.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:so I, I would guess that I could probably, you know, if, if I had the
Speaker:proficiency that if I was landing a 182 and a 45 not cross wind, I might
Speaker:start to hit the stops on the rudder.
Speaker:But, you know, the planes, the planes generally going to be
Speaker:better than you are as a pilot.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:It mostly comes down to your proficiency for sure.
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:So I alluded to it a little bit ago, but there are also times where you don't
Speaker:want to call your own flight instructor.
Speaker:You want to go and get somebody who's a specialist in something.
Speaker:and
Speaker:totally agree.
Speaker:that I mentioned was a mountain flying course that honestly, to this day.
Speaker:That was some of the best learning flying and some of the most
Speaker:fun I've had in an airplane.
Speaker:I, uh, I do have to give props here.
Speaker:It was, uh, Lori McCall's team up at Mountain Canyon flying in McCall, Idaho.
Speaker:a lot of people are aware of the, uh, Colorado Pilots Association
Speaker:courses as well, which, um, I think those happen like three times a year.
Speaker:and it's a, it's a big deal.
Speaker:They have a whole lot of instructors and a whole lot of people learning, uh, whereas.
Speaker:Mountain Canyon flying is one that, you know, it's a, a company
Speaker:that does it all the time.
Speaker:but one of the things that I really appreciated about that course up
Speaker:in McCall is they have a, an area up there called the Frank Church
Speaker:River of No Return Wilderness Area.
Speaker:And there are a ton of these cool little Forest Service strips
Speaker:around there that are just.
Speaker:Really, really cool.
Speaker:check out Johnson Creek if you get a chance.
Speaker:I think it's 3U2, really great little place where you can camp and, the
Speaker:mountains around there are just beautiful and you really do have to
Speaker:fly right around them to get in there.
Speaker:but there's some really, really neat stuff that you can get to in the back
Speaker:country and, uh, so that that course up there, being able to actually fly
Speaker:into the mountains as well as just around them was just super cool.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:So that's one example of getting specialist instruction.
Speaker:definitely.
Speaker:specialty instruction right there.
Speaker:You want somebody who's, really adept at teaching that.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:aerobatics, of course, is another one,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:where these are things that are maybe more obvious than some others, but
Speaker:going and getting some specialty flight instruction, is just a, a great way to
Speaker:have some fun and to learn a whole lot about flying in a short period of time.
Speaker:and doing these things makes you a better pilot.
Speaker:Overall as well.
Speaker:you know, with a mountain flying course, you learn a lot about not only density
Speaker:altitude, but just how air currents fly around objects and that sort of thing.
Speaker:you know, I can probably better predict now when it's gonna be turbulent near
Speaker:downtown Chicago because I learned about what causes turbulence in the
Speaker:mountains, mountain skyscrapers, whatever.
Speaker:The air doesn't know the difference, so.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Kent, I don't even think I've had a chance to tell you this, but at the
Speaker:beginning of this year, I actually took an aerobatics, lesson, which was pretty
Speaker:cool.
Speaker:extra, extra 300.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Nice.
Speaker:yes, I have a friend who had an extra 300, and that's what I, that's what I
Speaker:did as well as I went up with, with him.
Speaker:And, uh, I mean, boy, I wish extras weren't so expensive, but
Speaker:they are awfully fun airplanes.
Speaker:you know, we started with spins and he demonstrated the first spin and I was
Speaker:like, oh my gosh, that was really scary.
Speaker:Let's do it again.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And yeah, I learned how to do loops and rolls and hammerheads and and
Speaker:you know, you can watch an awful lot of air shows, but the first
Speaker:time you try and do it for yourself, it's like, oh, that isn't at all.
Speaker:Like, it looks like,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:you know, something like a hammer head or a tail slide looks
Speaker:really simple, but you know.
Speaker:Airplanes have three axes and they all affect each other.
Speaker:Um, and so you learn some things that are, that are really
Speaker:interesting, by doing that.
Speaker:So what did you learn in the aerobatics course that helps your everyday flying?
Speaker:I.
Speaker:Well, for one, so the airplanes I fly on a day-to-day basis are so much more stable
Speaker:than an extra 300 by design, that you would think there wouldn't be a lot of.
Speaker:transfer.
Speaker:And in some ways, you know, there aren't, but what you get is this ability to
Speaker:experience a truly maneuverable airplane and to see what, to see what's capable
Speaker:with the three primary flight controls.
Speaker:being able to, Manipulate an airplane around those axes in a way that,
Speaker:and, and at a speed that you've just never experienced before.
Speaker:And what it does is it, what it did for me is it sort of sped
Speaker:up my flying clock a little bit.
Speaker:And so just that little bit of experience, and it would happen even more and
Speaker:more if I did it more and more if it wasn't so dang expensive like you said.
Speaker:It sort of speeds up your clock a little bit so that when you start to
Speaker:see things get outta whack in a more stable training airplane, you, you
Speaker:recognize it earlier you're able to correct it earlier in a smoother manner.
Speaker:I'm telling my students this all the time, like I. Catching something early is key
Speaker:because then the correction doesn't even feel like a correction to your passenger.
Speaker:You know, it's, it's just a slight change, and I think that's one of the things that
Speaker:the aerobatic training did for me, along with it just being an absolute blast.
Speaker:I. Of
Speaker:being able to tumble around in an airplane, but, um, being in a high
Speaker:performance airplane, that's just faster.
Speaker:I think that is part of expanding your envelope a little bit and, seeing that
Speaker:if things are gonna happen that fast, I'm gonna speed up my clock a little
Speaker:bit so that I can catch things earlier.
Speaker:So that's one of the things I noticed.
Speaker:Yeah, that's a great point.
Speaker:And you don't need an aerobatics course to do that.
Speaker:You know, go get yourself a high performance checkout
Speaker:or complex or something.
Speaker:Just get into a faster airplane, and
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:I. I mean, honestly, what made the Mooney a relatively easy transition for me was
Speaker:that I wasn't flying trainers before that.
Speaker:I was flying stuff like the 182 and the DA 40.
Speaker:So I was used to the a hundred and thirty five, a hundred forty
Speaker:knot speed range by that point.
Speaker:and so jumping up to 170 was not that big of a deal, whereas if I was coming
Speaker:from something like a 1 72, eh, it might have been more of a big deal.
Speaker:So, yeah, that, that definitely helps.
Speaker:and honestly, I think there's, you get to a point where, you know, I
Speaker:didn't necessarily feel like the TBM was even that much faster.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:You know, if you think about it in terms of percentages, yeah, it's faster
Speaker:at cruise, but once you get down into the approach regime, it's not that
Speaker:much faster than the Mooney even.
Speaker:And so I feel like once you, once you speed that clock up, even in something
Speaker:that's 170 knots, well that gets you used to thinking in the right way.
Speaker:That when you jump into something that's 300 knots, it's not as big
Speaker:of a deal as it otherwise would be.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, if you can, if you can stay well ahead of 170 knot airplane, you can
Speaker:probably stay with a 300 knot airplane.
Speaker:and then work your way up from there.
Speaker:Um,
Speaker:when you figure out descent calculations.
Speaker:That's the important one on those things.
Speaker:right.
Speaker:That's the big thing.
Speaker:And you know, when you're flying a fast airplane in the flight levels, well,
Speaker:you just have to plan your descent.
Speaker:you know.
Speaker:You're the number of miles out you are when you start your
Speaker:descent is gonna be a lot higher,
Speaker:Sometimes
Speaker:the descent lasts a lot longer.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:you know, coming back into Milwaukee here, you know, you always cross a fix
Speaker:southwest of Chicago at 24,000 feet.
Speaker:So if you start at 31, you know you're somewhere down in central
Speaker:Illinois when you start your descent.
Speaker:And honestly, I started figuring out how to plan descents when I was flying the 182
Speaker:Oh
Speaker:know, it's not quite like a 1 72 where it's like, oh, there's the
Speaker:airport, let me pull the throttle and it'll just go right down, you know?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:so yeah, there's, there's so many different opportunities to, to expand
Speaker:your envelope in, in many different ways and, and they're all fun.
Speaker:of those, yeah, they're all fun.
Speaker:It's all flying, right?
Speaker:It's all great experience.
Speaker:And one of the things we talk about all the time in flying, risk management,
Speaker:right, is having an out, you have to be able to anticipate what are the risks and
Speaker:what are the ways that I'm going to either avoid those risks or mitigate them or.
Speaker:Handle them if they turn into an issue, right?
Speaker:So, um, one of those ways we've talked about, well several of them we've
Speaker:talked about like taking a specialty instructor, doing a course, um, taking
Speaker:your instructor with you when you're slightly expanding those envelopes.
Speaker:But, you know, we can do these things ourselves as solo.
Speaker:when we're on cross countries, we're gonna be expanding some
Speaker:of our envelopes because.
Speaker:like we've talked about before, you, you're gonna run into situations
Speaker:where you haven't specifically trained for that situation.
Speaker:And so you're gonna have to use some judgment and you're gonna have to handle
Speaker:the situation as pilot in command.
Speaker:And in doing so, you've just added to your quiver, an arrow that.
Speaker:You know how to handle that in the future, or you might learn from handling it
Speaker:badly the first time you did it right.
Speaker:But while we're doing that, always try and have these outs so we
Speaker:can do that anytime we're flying.
Speaker:Push the envelope just a little bit, like you said, one corner at a time.
Speaker:Just make sure you have an out, you know what the risk is and you know
Speaker:how you're gonna handle that risk.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:You know, if you're doing crosswind practice at a single runway airport
Speaker:and it's at or above your current personal minimums and you're trying
Speaker:to expand that part of your envelope.
Speaker:Don't make yourself force it there.
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:ready to, you know, land at that airport across town that has a
Speaker:runway in a different orientation that's more into the wind.
Speaker:and doing stuff like that has made a lot easier if you already have a plan
Speaker:in place for, okay, if I have to do that, who's gonna give me a ride home?
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So there's, there's a lot of, uh, pre-planning that you can
Speaker:do that makes tougher decisions easier once you're in the air.
Speaker:in fact, when I know that I'm going to get into a tough situation
Speaker:in the air, I try and make all the decisions well beforehand.
Speaker:So being able to make some of the tougher decisions beforehand, and.
Speaker:Putting hard limits on them that you force yourself to stick to, uh, is
Speaker:important and it helps you to make a better decision, once you're in the air.
Speaker:so don't let yourself fall into that.
Speaker:Get-There-Itis trap of, well, it's only two knots more
Speaker:than I said it was gonna be.
Speaker:it's only this, it's only that.
Speaker:You know, we talked about that a little bit in the last episode, and
Speaker:in fact, now I'm thinking of another instance and it's back to fuel again.
Speaker:where I had flown down for a pumpkin bombing session with a couple of friends
Speaker:and we were flying back late at night.
Speaker:And, you know, luckily we were flying in an airplane that told
Speaker:us what our reserve would be.
Speaker:and I pretty much never go with less than an hour reserve.
Speaker:and I basically said on the way back, okay, well we're, we're kind
Speaker:of getting to where we might only land with an hour reserve, so.
Speaker:You know, if that number there goes below 10 gallons, we're
Speaker:just gonna stop for fuel.
Speaker:Even though we would be fine, even though we would have 59 minutes
Speaker:reserve when we get there, you know, if that number goes below 10
Speaker:gallons, we're gonna stop for fuel.
Speaker:Um,
Speaker:Requirement.
Speaker:right.
Speaker:there are so many people who have run out of fuel because of that last minute.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:So that's one of those things where it's, it's real easy to
Speaker:make the decision beforehand.
Speaker:It's not so easy to make the decision in the moment.
Speaker:it's real easy to talk yourself into, well, I'm tired and
Speaker:I want to get home quicker.
Speaker:And, you know, I don't really need the full hour reserve.
Speaker:You know, 45 minutes is okay according to the FAA, and so I'm not gonna, I'm not
Speaker:gonna bother landing for fuel now, but.
Speaker:Then who knows what's gonna happen.
Speaker:You know, reserves are there for a reason.
Speaker:And, uh, the margins that we build in for safety, fuel,
Speaker:and otherwise in our personal minimums, those are all important.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:those decisions made in advance as far easier to deal with in the moment.
Speaker:Right, which is the, the beauty of personal minimums anyway,
Speaker:as long as you stick to them.
Speaker:so it may seem like we're contradicting ourselves a little bit.
Speaker:So we're gonna dive into this, these personal minimums that we.
Speaker:That we all try and have super important and sticking to them is super important.
Speaker:Of course, today's topic is about expanding those, and I
Speaker:just wanna make a distinction.
Speaker:Some of our personal minimums have to do with safety margins and some of our
Speaker:personal minimums have to do with our skills, our proficiency as a pilot.
Speaker:it's the, the proficiency or skills as a pilot that we're wanting to expand.
Speaker:We want to expand our flying abilities, which will expand our safety margins,
Speaker:which will allow us to make flights and do flights that are really fun.
Speaker:And sometimes we could make a landing because we've expanded our skills that
Speaker:we wouldn't have been able to before we expanded our personal minimums.
Speaker:So all of these things are good, we're talking about safety margins,
Speaker:like for instance, fuel and things like that, we wanna make sure we're
Speaker:sticking to these personal minimums, because that's what they're there for.
Speaker:They're there to help us not make a bad decision in the moment.
Speaker:when, when we talk about.
Speaker:you know, expanding the envelope.
Speaker:That's not where, what we're really talking about.
Speaker:We're talking about expanding your capabilities as a pilot and your
Speaker:proficiency and things like that.
Speaker:So I just wanted to make that distinction 'cause it almost sounds like we're
Speaker:contradicting ourselves a little bit.
Speaker:Do you have any comments on that, Kent?
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, I think, To some extent, you know, to, to expand your
Speaker:personal minimums, you're going to have to get into a situation where.
Speaker:You are going beyond what they used to be.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:like we said before, one thing at a time, you know, if I am expanding
Speaker:my personal minimums for crosswinds, I'm going to go do that on a day
Speaker:where I can just go do it by myself.
Speaker:I'm not necessarily gonna do it when I'm, you know, a thousand miles away from
Speaker:home with my family on board, you know?
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:all of these things, uh, and.
Speaker:You know, let's talk a little bit more about personal minimums, because I think
Speaker:a lot of people, you know, a lot of the Type A personalities that we sometimes
Speaker:get in aviation are averse to having such things because it seems like it's
Speaker:a weakness or something like that.
Speaker:and it's also really easy to say, well, it's not that far beyond
Speaker:my personal minimums, right?
Speaker:I will say that I think that there is thumb room for, Going beyond, of course,
Speaker:like we've been talking about in the, quest to make yourself a better pilot.
Speaker:But again, like we were talking about earlier, one thing at a time.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:so one way that, some air carriers and the civil air patrol and
Speaker:some private pilots will do this.
Speaker:is they'll use what's called a flight risk assessment tool, and
Speaker:that assigns a certain number of points to each little thing that
Speaker:might cause a little bit of risk.
Speaker:And so there may be things that are within all of your personal minimums,
Speaker:but they're within all of your personal minimums at once, if you know what I mean.
Speaker:you know, you might have a flight that's, well, it's six miles of visibility.
Speaker:That's okay.
Speaker:And I'm gonna have a crosswind that's right up against my limits.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:And there's gonna be a ceiling that's only 500 feet above my
Speaker:cruising altitude and this and that.
Speaker:Even if it checks all the boxes for your personal minimums,
Speaker:that's not a good flight to take.
Speaker:so if you want to get into a formal flight risk assessment tool, I think
Speaker:the, the Civil Air Patrol one might be available publicly on the web.
Speaker:I'm not sure about that.
Speaker:There's a
Speaker:don't know if you're aware of any that are out there.
Speaker:Yeah, there's, there's a few of them out there.
Speaker:You can look them up.
Speaker:Um, some of them are apps on your phone, some of them are spreadsheets,
Speaker:some of them are websites.
Speaker:So, yeah, there, there's different ways to do that, but however you do it.
Speaker:you're talking about is risk assessment, which is what we have been entrusted to
Speaker:do as pilots in command of an aircraft figuring out there's, there's too
Speaker:many risks to mitigate all at once.
Speaker:And that's a no-go decision, right?
Speaker:And we have to be willing to
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:about that at length in our last episode about probably the biggest safety tool
Speaker:we have for CrossCountry airplanes.
Speaker:CrossCountry flying, I should say, is, flexibility.
Speaker:in our schedule, flexibility, being willing to divert, being
Speaker:willing to, call a no go.
Speaker:so, that's the same thing when, when we're assessing any flight is, you know, if
Speaker:there's too many things that are close to the edge of the envelope, really have to
Speaker:assess, can I mitigate all of this risk?
Speaker:All at once.
Speaker:And that's, that's one of the responsibilities that we have as pilots
Speaker:in command that we should never forget.
Speaker:That's a big, big responsibility.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:And you know, several minutes ago, bill stopped me because I started
Speaker:to tell a story that I had told on a different episode and forgotten about.
Speaker:and I was just thinking, if we ever get repetitive on the show
Speaker:here, there's a reason for that.
Speaker:Those are the lessons that we have learned that have really stuck.
Speaker:true.
Speaker:you know, and so those are the, the most important things.
Speaker:To listen to are those things that keep coming up again and again when we're
Speaker:talking about safety is, you know, they come up many times for many reasons.
Speaker:and those are the things that are really important.
Speaker:That's
Speaker:and you know what?
Speaker:If you hear Bill say something and then I say it, and then some
Speaker:flight instructor at your airport says it, there's a reason for that.
Speaker:so
Speaker:is true.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:of the bottom line here, is we, we need to find safe ways to
Speaker:expose ourselves situations that are beyond our comfort level or
Speaker:beyond our, our, current minimums.
Speaker:as we get exposed to those situations in a safe manner where we have our outs.
Speaker:we have our risk mitigation in place, then they're gonna become less risky for us.
Speaker:They're gonna become less dangerous and and less scary.
Speaker:And that's what we want to do as we expand our envelope, as
Speaker:we expand our capabilities and become more and more proficient.
Speaker:And so what we've talked about today is, is.
Speaker:Just a few ways that you can do that, and I'm sure you can think of dozens of
Speaker:other ways that you can do that as well.
Speaker:It, it's funny, I've had a couple of students who started flight training
Speaker:and, and realized that they were really susceptible air sickness.
Speaker:And so it, it was disappointing to them to realize that, Hey, I really
Speaker:want to do this thing that I've always wanted to do and here I am suffering.
Speaker:My body is not happy with me doing it.
Speaker:I've told them, because I've seen it happen multiple times,
Speaker:I've told them, Hey, the only way to get through it is exposure.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:if you want to get over this, you probably can.
Speaker:There might be a few people who can't, but, most people can.
Speaker:And it's really about being exposed to this thing your body doesn't want
Speaker:you doing until it accepts the fact that, hey, this is my new normal.
Speaker:And that's really what we're talking.
Speaker:And it, and it works.
Speaker:It's worked every time so far with my students.
Speaker:and it works for other things too.
Speaker:You just expose yourself.
Speaker:This is exposure therapy to, situations in flying that could be
Speaker:potentially risky or dangerous until we get proficient at handling them.
Speaker:And then we can move on to things that go even further.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:And one more thing I wanted to mention, and you may have some others, Kent,
Speaker:but one more thing I wanted to mention because I, I think it's a cool program.
Speaker:but there's the, the WINGS program from the FAA.
Speaker:but one of the things I like about it is that these are experiences.
Speaker:Everybody knows we have to do a, a flight review every 24 calendar months, right?
Speaker:but that's the bare minimum.
Speaker:And what we've been talking about today is use opportunities to go practice,
Speaker:use opportunities to take a flight instructor, take a course, get an
Speaker:additional, rating, whatever it takes to expose yourself to more experiences.
Speaker:More opportunities to learn.
Speaker:And one of the things that does that is the WINGS program because There are
Speaker:different levels, that, or phases they call them, that you can participate in.
Speaker:And as you do them, it, it gives you opportunities to expose yourself,
Speaker:not only to classroom learning, which is part of the program, but
Speaker:also getting out with an instructor and doing some practice together.
Speaker:And those are great opportunities to expand, push that envelope
Speaker:one corner at a time.
Speaker:I really like.
Speaker:Kent's, analogy there, you're pushing one corner at a time and things that
Speaker:you do as part of these phases in wings, believe they only last for a year.
Speaker:I. It's half the time that we have to do our flight reviews, right?
Speaker:And so I just love this idea of continual learning, continually pushing
Speaker:one corner of the envelope at a time and expanding our abilities, expanding
Speaker:our Our capabilities, in flying.
Speaker:So that's one thing I wanted to mention is that the WINGS program can be a
Speaker:good way beyond the check ride to continually learn and take care of
Speaker:your, your flight reviews at the same time, but do them over time instead
Speaker:of doing them once every two years.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Um,
Speaker:this
Speaker:can't be overly current.
Speaker:Yes, exactly.
Speaker:Or overly proficient
Speaker:okay to get an instrument proficiency check every six months.
Speaker:I know a lot of people who do that.
Speaker:you know, you'll get more out of it than you will just going up
Speaker:with a safety pilot or whatever.
Speaker:Uh, you know, so I, I have never had a situation where I learned something
Speaker:new about flying and didn't enjoy it.
Speaker:Um.
Speaker:You know, sometimes things like
Speaker:that
Speaker:going to a wing seminar or, you know, doing an instrument proficiency
Speaker:check or something like that, they, they don't necessarily sound fun,
Speaker:but you're learning about flying.
Speaker:You're going flying.
Speaker:It's good stuff.
Speaker:So get out there and do it.
Speaker:Yeah, I love, I love what you said there.
Speaker:It's like you've never learned something.
Speaker:I. About flying and gone.
Speaker:Boy, I wish I wouldn't have learned that.
Speaker:You know, it's always fun.
Speaker:It always turns out fun.
Speaker:Well, Kent, that was a great topic.
Speaker:Thanks for bringing that to us today.
Speaker:I think we all need to remember that we need to expand our capabilities like
Speaker:we've been talking about, and find really fun and, and great ways to do that.
Speaker:And I think we've covered most of them today.
Speaker:Anything else you wanted to to say before we close it up?
Speaker:I think that's it.
Speaker:Get out there and fly.
Speaker:Get out there and fly.
Speaker:I love it.
Speaker:Well, thanks again and we'll talk soon.
Speaker:All right, we'll see ya.
