Flight Training - April 2013 - 34

Not anymore. The call is yours now,
and the four-seat cruiser that you have
stepped up to flying is preflighted and
ready. You are pleased, and a little surprised, at the calm confidence with which
you find yourself preparing to take on
the day’s mission.
Confidence, but not cockiness. There
is still a lot to learn, as there always
will be. But the nice thing about having
learned how to think in three axes is
that your piloting has become a smooth
affair, free of the constant, fatiguing
error-and-correction sequences. With
new skills and self-assuredness, getting
in just a little over your head no longer
produces anxiety—even a sense of
guilt—as it did when your flight instructor was responsible for setting your
flying limitations.
The perennial hazards—instrument
meteorological conditions, thunderstorms, freezing rain—will still demand
just as much respect and avoidance
as ever. But if the winds come up on
a nice day, or the weather begins to
trend downhill, you will be on top of
the situation and respond as necessary. If forecast light turbulence at your
planned cruise altitude progresses to
moderate, you won’t just sit there and
suffer (or turn back in discouragement).
Using a combination of winds-aloft
information, pilot reports, and your
grasp of the big picture, you will try to
find an altitude that’s more comfortable, especially for any passengers. If
there’s no help there, rerouting over
smoother terrain might help. Sometimes you just have to tighten up that
seatbelt and shoulder harness, slow to
turbulence penetration speed (maneuvering speed), and tough it out. So
here’s the question: If your skills have
taken you beyond the limitations governing ceilings, visibility, and wind that
were inscribed in your logbook before
you earned your pilot certificate, what
limits should replace them?
You can compose a new set of finite
limits, or you can ask the advice of more
experienced pilots whose experience
you value. But it all boils down to this:
Provided that you comply with regula34 /

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tions and any limitations on the use of your aircraft (such as a rental
agreement or FBO policy), the decision is up to you.
Consider today’s conditions. Those broken clouds at 2,500 feet are
forecast to dissipate as a frontal system departs the area, taking the
gusty surface winds with them. Your planned flight is toward improving weather, so it should not be jeopardized. However, you will keep an
eye on the weather trends to avoid being taken by surprise. If you had
planned a flight toward the departing low pressure—with its lingering
showery precip, turbulence, and occasional mountain obscuration—your
plan would have seemed dicey. So there’s one new element of a personal
minimum definition: Stronger winds and lower ceilings are acceptable
when flying toward an area of improving weather.
The destination also presents a new set of piloting considerations. It’s
an airport with a single 1,800-foot grass runway that has trees on one
end, power lines on the other, and no on-field weather reports. Challenging. But you landed there several times during training. The experience

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Flight Training - April 2013

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