Flight Training - March/April 2023 - 45

For example, the flight school in Seattle
where I instruct has two simulators. You
can connect ForeFlight to the Wi-Fi signal
broadcast by each trainer, which sends
position, altitude, speed, and other information
to your tablet. As far as ForeFlight
is concerned, you're flying.
Just as in the airplane-provided your
EFB can receive GPS signals-you have a
workable 2D navigation solution. If you
can keep your blue airplane tracking along
the lines on a georeferenced approach
chart, you'll follow the intended path.
What you don't get, however, is any type of
vertical guidance. It's up to you to establish
and maintain a steady descent that keeps
you as close as possible to an ILS glideslope
or a GPS glidepath for an approach
to a decision altitude, or to the profile for
a nonprecision approach to a minimum
descent altitude.
Flying an approach like this successfully
requires mastery of fundamental
instrument skills. You must understand and
be able to apply the control-performance
method of instrument flying-establishing
the appropriate attitude, setting power and
configuration, monitoring your progress,
and making constant, smooth adjustments
as you proceed.
For example, in a Cessna 172 at the final
approach fix, I extend 10 degrees of flaps
and set up my standard ILS descent profile.
Power at 1,900 to 2,100 rpm with a pitch
attitude about 2.5 degrees below the horizon
line consistently delivers a 500-fpm descent
at 90 KIAS. From this point, I fly the target
pitch attitude and make small heading
adjustments with shallow banks to stay
on the line that marks the final approach
course until I emerge from the clouds.
If you fly an approach with only lateral
guidance to an MDA, you can still establish
a steady descent, but you must be prepared
to level off (smoothly adding about 300
rpm typically works well) until the runway
environment comes into view.
Some EFB apps offer synthetic vision
and the ability to overlay an approach
chart on the map. That's another setup
to practice in a training device or in your
airplane under VFR. I prefer displaying
just the approach chart, provided the basic
flight instruments are still available. But
if I were having a truly bad IFR day, and
the panel was completely dark, synthetic
vision would be an excellent resource. FT
BRUCE WILLIAMS is a flight instructor in Seattle,
Washington.
FLIGHT TRAINING MARCH/APRIL 2023
45
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Flight Training - March/April 2023

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