Today, I'm proud to announce that I did my very first Cross Country Solo trip. It was successful but adventurous! It was a standard start to a flying day. I got the weather reports, worked on my flight planned to Chattanooga, and had my instructor look over everything and did one final briefing. I called into the local Flight Service Station to file my plan and to get a weather briefing, pretty standard, but there was some kind of air-drop happening just Northwest of Rome, I was advised on it, but it didn't affect me at all... I am curious what was being dropped. I headed out to good ol' 653KB... advantage: Both magnetos work without having to clear the right one. Disadvantage: No autopilot, but not having autopilot or a Glass cockpit makes a real pilot out of you, and I had neither.
Taxied out to Runway 9, and took off for an altitude of 4,500. About 5 miles Northwest of KRYY, I had to open my flight plan, called Macon Radio (Flight Service Station) to open it, but they didn't answer, so I had to call on a different frequency, not the most clearest in the world, but still understandable. After talking to them, I called into Atlanta Center to get a Flight Following. As a VFR pilot, it's highly recommended that you get a Flight Following in case something goes wrong, plus you are in immediate contact with Air Traffic Control so they can get emergency services going. When flying VFR, you do it in two ways: Pilotage, and Dead-reckoning. (Remember those two.) Piloting is when you use your maps, checkpoints and magnetic heading to get to your destination, and Dead-wrecking is when you use mathematics to get to your destination. So, I had 3 checkpoints on my way to KCHA, they were the Town of White, Power lines 3 east West of Calhoun, and water tanks west of Dalton, near an I-75 exit. Based on mathematics, it was going to take me 36 minutes and 57 seconds to get to Chattanooga. About 37 miles out from KCHA, Atlanta Center had me switch over to Chattanooga Approach, and stayed there for the rest of my trip. About 5 miles north of the Water Tanks checkpoint, I was told to turn and stand by for further vectors to the airport. In the mean time, the ceiling (the bottom of the clouds) started to get lower and visibility started to drop from 10 miles to about 6. About 7 miles out from KCHA I could see the airport, and was cleared to land on Runway 2. Very uneventful landing, taxied off, and taxied back to the beginning of the runway. Got all my paperwork ready and I called out to Chattanooga Tower, and informed them I was ready to take off.
I was given the clearance to take off, and to remain runway heading (don't turn) and be advised to switch over to Chattanooga Departure shortly thereafter. Powered my little baby up, and headed out. Was given clearance to turn to my intended heading, and switch over to Departure. Departure gave me clearance to go to 3,500ft, stay VFR, and to remain on my heading. Based on mathematics, it was going to take me 34 minutes and 22 seconds to get back to KRYY, that was about to be blown out the window. A few moments later, they told me that I needed to change my heading and stay on the heading until further notice due to traffic coming in. So, I turned to the heading they told me to, and continued on my way, waiting for them to tell me to head back on course. Well, apparently, they forgot about me. After awhile, they told me that I could turn back on course. The issue was, I was off course now, and missed my first checkpoint heading back to KRYY. My first checkpoint was a Dam, followed by Power lines 3 miles east of Calhoun, the town of White, and Altonna Lake. Well, the dam is behind a mountain ridge which is now obscured due to haze and the mountain itself. Dead-reckoning is now out of the question, and now it's up to Pilotage... but only with the map. So I started to pick out land features, that were also seen on the map I had. I was able to get west of the Dalton Airport, and stay on that course until I saw the Calhoun airport, the associated power lines. After the power lines was the town of White, which I was able to fine tune in my course better, and come straight into KRYY. If I just used my course after Chattanooga Departure told me to return to course heading, I would have been way off course. I got clearance from KRYY Tower to come in on runway 27, I was number 1 in the lineup, with no rush. While on approach to 27, at 2,000 feet, I saw something that I hadn't seen before: A plastic bag! Well, I've seen a plastic bag before, but this one was at my altitude floating along. Great, just what I need, my pitot tube gets blocked by a plastic bag... Haha...
Going to Chattanooga, winds were okay, but coming back, I was getting bounced up there. One thing I really would like to learn more about is PIREPS, who do we give them to, the Flight Service Station or Air Traffic Control, really thought I should of gave one today due to the turbulence up there.
Next cross country solo flight is schedule for the 17th, which will probably be to Athens, GA. Looking at weather models, it looks like winter might be returning, so need to get as much done (flying-wise) as possible and wrap up the bookwork, which I plan to wrap up this week.
Some people have asked, “Cross country trip, you mean you go across the country?” My wish is yes, but that would be very expensive. Per FAA Regulations, this is what a Cross Country Trip means: 61.93(a)(i) Conducting a solo cross-country flight...that is greater than 25 nautical miles from the airport from where the flight originated.
Below is a map of my route today: Pinkish line is my "intended heading." Baby Blue line is my course up to KCHA. Red Lines are my checkpoints to KCHA. Green Lines are my checkpoints to KRYY. The Black Line is my route I actually took coming back to KRYY (not a true-true showing, but close enough.)
Two FedEx MD-11s chillin' out at KCHA. I wasn't able to get their tail numbers, but I know they are part of the MD family.
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