Flying in Gusty wind…

January 17th, 2006, 8:46 am Josh Houghtelin Flying

Yesterday I flew a little bit. It was exciting & a little crazy. We had a pretty good gusting crosswind. The very first time I took off I wasn’t adequately prepared for what was to come. I almost let the plane touch it’s right wing on the runway as Leroy quickly helped me correct while instructing me as to what he was doing and why. I figured it out quickly after that. Leroy did something realy cool that helped me understand what was going on. He put down nearly all the flaps and took off. He hovered just a few feet over the runway and let me see what the wind was doing to the plane and how he was correcting for it. It realy helped me get a good feel for takeoffs in gusting crosswinds. There is nothing I can compare to the sinking feeling you get when the plane jumps and bounces when your taking off.

Landings were even more interesting. I totaly botched the first landing and leroy helped me bring it down. I was focusing on balooning to touch down when the crosswinds put us in a harry situation. We ended up landing very soft with Leroys help. A few more attempts and I was doing a decent job. I botched my landing and saved it once which led into a couple smooth landings before we called it a day. I realy enjoy learning to fly in harry situations. It kindof makes me feel like I’m not as good as I thought I was but that only makes me try harder. I realy admire Leroys ability to fly a plane and make it look like second hand as he talks through his demonstration. I want to be able to fly with that level of confidence and skill.

Practice. Practice. Practice.

.. one last thing .. I got to fly above the haze for the first time. It’s like the clouds become your new horizon and the ground disapears. It’s an eerie feeling not being able to clearly see the ground but it made for exciting stall practice. =)