crazyscot

At long last, I have my NZ PPL. It took a while to arrange because they insisted on a full, thorough BFR, which took me six sessions to complete. I was worried that they were going to bounce my application, because I couldn't reach them on the phone to seek clarification over just what documents would suffice to prove my lack of transport offence history in the UK - but they haven't argued with the set I sent them.

The license itself is a plastic card, valid for life - though only useful while my medical and BFR are current.

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I recently finished reading Riding Rockets by Mike Mullane, former USAF officer and astronaut with three Space Shuttle flights to his name. It's a fascinating warts-and-all account of his time in the shuttle programme: the pressures and rivalry around crew selection, the effect it had on his family, nerve-racking launch scrub after launch scrub, the heartache of Challenger (and a chapter about Columbia, though he had long since retired from the programme by then) - and more intimate details about being an astronaut than you probably wanted to know! Well recommended.

Phew.

Just got back from my mandatory two hour mountain flight. Not to teach me how to really fly in the valleys, y'understand, but to give me a feel for it in case I ever get into trouble. (On reflection, this makes it sound a bit like being strapped into a chair and told I will appreciate the mountains!)

When we got to the foothills, the instructor asked me which way the wind was blowing. North-easterly, I ventured, given that was what it had been on the ground? Bzzzzt! Thank you for playing. That was on the plains some 50km away. Here was in the mountains, the wind was doing its usual thing of flowing over the hills from the west. He went on to demonstrate just how predictably different the wind is; it flows rather like water, and his local knowledge took us to some different effects. All the while we were flying up and down valleys, below the level of the (sometimes cloud-shrouded) mountain tops on either side, getting much closer to the cumulus granitus than I have ever been before...! I kept instinctively wanting to fly up the centres of the valleys, that being as far away from the sharp pointy bits as possible, but that is usually the wrong thing to do; you fly on one side, so that if you should decide that you need to turn around, you have the full width of the valley to play with. There were optical illusions aplenty; the flattish valley floors often misled me into thinking they were level, underlining the need to keep on top of where the real horizon would be.

Next step will be my BFR, and then I'll be able to apply for my NZ license!

I was wrong the other day... it seems I do need to cover the NZ low flying and terrain avoidance syllabus before they'll let me convert my license. In fact there are some manoeuvres in that course that are covered in the BFR, so yesterday I spent a good hour or so in our local low flying areas.

Wow.

Here the normal minimum height for flight is 500' above ground level - similar to the law in the UK - but that's relaxed in the LFAs. I wouldn't normally dream of flying so low, but knowing what to do is one of those skills that could save your life if you're boxed in by terrain and/or weather.

We fly at slow speed at low level. ( Read more... )

I got back in the saddle today.

NZCH is surrounded by a control zone with what feels like zillions of entry and exit routes. It turns out that you can pretty well predict that you're going to be given whichever route is sanest for whatever it is you're doing, but that doesn't stop the charts from being a bit overwhelming at first glance, and the radio work from being a bit confusing until I get my head around the local reference points. ("Pylons" - where two power lines cross the river. "Two chain" - corner of a forest. The raceway, the TV transmitter, a shopping mall, a particularly distinctive swimming complex, New Brighton pier - they make sense, provided you know where they are...!)

We went to West Melton, which is all of 6 minutes flying time from Chch, for a few circuits and so I could see the place and have the adjacent rifle range(!) pointed out to me (so that I know where the boundaries are and don't fly over it). My flying was a bit rusty and ragged around the edges - surprise surprise - but the instructor was happy that what I demonstrated was safe, just needing to sharpen up a bit.

The NZ flying syllabus includes techniques for flying in mountainous terrain, which of course I've never done before. However it seems I don't need to receive that training in order to get my NZ PPL on the back of my UK license (not that I want to shirk it - I can imagine Alpine flying will be Really Something Else and I'm really looking forward to being able to). So I've been advised to get on with my BFR so that I can get the paperwork done, then we can look into mountain flying in due course.