We are so blessed having lovely September days above 20 degrees Celsius in September.
I had booked my "usual" flying lesson time of Sunday 10am, which gives me time to go to church for 8.30 then drive to Shoreham Airfield for a 10am lesson. This is good for me as I skip breakfast, lift blood sugar slightly with white coffee, and have low risk of hypo from insulin during the flight as I haven't had any fast insulin since dinner the night before.
Today we would be practicing setting up aircraft config for the Base Leg and then Final as we head towards doing take-off and landing circuits part of training in a few weeks time (I hope). We headed off towards the Isle of Wight practicing last week's climbs, then I did a 180 degree turn to head back towards Shoreham and our Base and Final leg practices. Here's that 180 degree turn through my GoPro mounted on my shoulder...
Base leg config is carb heat on, set 1500 RPM, hold nose up until speed drops below 100 kts, add 2 stages of flap in quick succession whilst keeping pitch consistent, set pitch for 75 kts, then on Final (normally as you turn to line up with runway) add third stage of flap and trim for 70 kts. I then praticed "going around" - full power, remove 3rd stage of flap, carb heat off, check positive climb, remove next two stages of flap. Here I am practicing those maneuvers...
Then near Shoreham my Flying Instructor asked me to do the real turn onto Final for the first time and get in Final config (3rd stage of flap, pitch for 70 kts), before he took over, lost a lot of height as I was high, and made a great cross-wind landing...
This was a really enjoyable flight, and I feel like the aircraft is doing what I want more than me "riding it".
Here's a chart of our flight...
Weather...
- EGKA 280820Z 02005KT 9000 0700E BCFG FEW001 14/14 Q1021
- At 08:20 GMT on 28th (September) wind 20 degrees at 5 kts, visibility 9000 but just 700 to East, Patches of fog, a few clouds at 100 ft. Temp 14 degrees, dew point 14 degrees. Barometric pressure 1021 hPa.
Blood sugar readings...
> 2 hours before flight: 5.8
< 30 mins before flight: 7.0
Landing: I didn't test before landing as I wasn't doing the flying for this part of the flight
(I did check check back in terminal after landing and blood sugar was 6.2)
Flying hours...
This flight: 1h 5m
Accumulated: 6h 15m
I was blessed with a beautiful sunny Sunday morning for my 5th flight. I got up around 6.30am to watch a great webcast of a SpaceX launch to the International Space Station (geek!), swotted up on my lesson notes for today's flight, went to my local church for 08.30 Communion service, then straight off to Shoreham to fly at 10am.
Morning flights work well for me as it's easy to miss breakfast and therefore avoid injecting insulin and the dangers that brings. My blood sugars on waking were 6.3 which is fine for first thing. By the time I got to the airfield I had drunk a large tea, and two coffees - all with milk - and the lactose in the milk plus the carbohydrate in the Eucharist wafer had lifted my blood sugar to 9.1 which is quite high. However the CAA like blood sugars to be a little high as it's safer for flying so I was happy with that.
It's interesting - for best health I would target blood sugars of between 5 and 6. But to fly you need blood sugars between 5 and 15. As hypos are dangerous I aim to fly with blood sugars between 7 and 9 so I guess flying isn't going to be "good" for me. To be honest I think it's blood sugars above 10 for long periods of time that cause real complications so I don't think I need to worry about having slightly higher blood sugars while flying than I would otherwise target.
My Flying Instruction (FI) met me in the terminal and while he checked out another plane for a later flight, I did the Cockpit Preparation and External Inspection checks on the Piper Warrior that I would be flying. I will make a video of this for you soon as it's quite interesting.
Winds were from the East so we would be using hard runway 02. This is quite a long taxi away from the standing area, and my FI let me do pretty much the lot. Taxiing is quite fun but steering using toe-brakes takes some getting used to. Here's a video of that taxi...
With the FI at the controls we took off towards the East, turned left, and climbed to 2,000 ft heading towards the Isle of Wight. Today I would be learning about climbing and descending. That's not as simple as it sounds - especially if you want to do it safely and smoothly. We went up in stages of 1,000 ft eventually reaching 10,300 ft over the Isle of Whight. We turned around then did gliding and powered descents back towards Worthing Pier where the FI took over for the landing.
To climb you follow the routine P-A-T... Power, Attitude, Trim. So from straight and level with engine at 2,300 RPM you do a good scan of the sky especially above the aircraft, check mixture is rich, increase to full power while countering the resulting yaw with rudder, and the nose naturally comes up. Pull back on the stick until the speed drops back and stabilises at 75 kts. When all is settled you trim the aircraft using the trim wheel between the seats so you are not having to pull back on the stick any more. Every 500 ft we need to check that the way ahead is clear as the aircraft nose is blocking the view. We alternated the two commonly-used ways to do this - drop the nose and have a good scan, and turning left then right then back to centre. Dropping the nose gave the best visibility in my view.
To level out from the climb you follow the routine A-P-T... Attitude, Power, Trim. You push the stick forward so the nose comes down, and watch the speed start to increase back towards cruise speed of around 95 kts. You then drop the throttle back to 2,300 RPM using the rudder to counter the resulting yaw, and stabilise the aircraft using the trim wheel.
Here's a video of me trying to do that smoothly while turning to avoid clouds as we pass through 3,000 ft...
We were very blessed with the weather, and for the first time while flying I saw airliners high above me at between 20,000ft and 30,000ft shining brightly in the clear blue sky. We got up to 10,300 ft which is twice as high as I have flown before. The climb was getting harder and harder as we got higher and the air got thinner - in other words at max power while holding the same airspeed of 75 kts our vertical climb rate was getting smaller the higher we got.
High above Bembridge on the Isle of Wight we turned around, and I managed to get some nice pics out of the window including Bembridge Harbour (bottom-right corner of first picture) where as a child I slept on my parent's boat many times...
Next I learned about gliding descents which is a descent with the engine at idle. It's not quite that simple. Once again the routine is P-A-T. You make sure mixture is rich and put Carb Heat on to protect the engine from over-cooling in the cold air and low load, then reduce engine power to idle while controlling resulting yaw with rudder. Let speed drop to target speed, then lower the nose and maintain speed. Every 500 ft you need to ensure the engine is remaining hot by going to full power and then back to idle while neutralising the resulting yaw. To level out it's P-A-T again... turn Carb Heat off and apply cruise power of 2,300 RPM whilst controlling the resulting yaw with rudder, then lift the nose to neutral and trim for level flight.
Here's a video of me trying to do that smoothly - listen out for the surge back to full power then back to idle half way through the maneuver to keep the engine warm...
Finally I worked my way down to 1,600 ft over Worthing Pier by practicing the Powered Descent. This is similar to the Glide Descent except the engine is at 1,900 RPM so doesn't get too cold. This means the surges up to full power and back to warm the engine are not needed.
After the FI landed on runway 02 he let me practice taxiing using not-in-use grass runway 07 back to the parking area. On grass you taxi a slower, and keep stick back to keep weight off the nose wheel. Once again steering and stopping is by using toe-brakes. Here's a quick video of that...
This was a really fun lesson and I feel I have much better control of the aircraft now. I'm also looking out of the window much more, flying less by the instruments, and handling the aircraft on the ground now too. It was wonderful to be so high and see airliners for the first time. Our southern coastline really is a beautiful place to fly.
Here's a chart of our flight...
Weather...
- EGKA 210820Z 01012KT 9999 SCT028 17/10 Q1023
- At 08:20 GMT on 21st (September) wind 10 degrees at 12 kt, visibility 10km or greater, scattered clouds at 2,800 ft. Temp 17 degrees, dew point 10 degrees. Barometric pressure 1023 hPa.
Blood sugar readings...
> 2 hours before flight: 6.3
< 30 mins before flight: 9.1
Landing: I didn't test before landing as I wasn't doing the flying for this part of the flight
Flying hours...
This flight: 1h 10m
Accumulated: 5h 10m
The CAA guidance on the medical safety and therefore licensing of pilots with Diabetes is confusing and in some places contradictory. This puts my Medical Examiner in a difficult position! Consider the following…
1. No: The basic CAA guidance to Medical Examiners says don’t give a medical certificate to someone with Type 1 Diabetes…
Statement C covers the rules if you have Type 1 Diabetes (the condition is known in the medical world as Diabetes Melitus):
Part 1 below appears to say that Type 1 Diabetics cannot be given a medical certificate.
Part 2 is odd because there is no other practical way to stay alive if you have Type 1 Diabetes other than to use insulin. I wondered if you could live entirely on Protein and Oils (think of a meat, hard cheese, salad, green veg, peanuts, olive oil diet – essentially zero carb/sugar) just did some research. The answer is this just won’t work as even when your body burns natural fats and oils your blood sugar rises.
A Class 1 medical is needed if you want to be a commercial pilot. I do not, I only need a Class 2 medical for a PPL.
Class 2 Statement G covers how compliance can be achieved, but the language is odd as the first sentence says that people with Type 1 may be assed as fit, and the second sentence says medications that will not make you go low may be acceptable. Um, there are no medications for Type 1 that I know of that cannot make you go low, as by definition they transfer blod sugar into cells thereby lowering blood sugar that can lead to hypoglycemia. Are the sentances linked? I guess so but it’s not entirely clear. In other words can the first sentence be taken on it’s own and give me hope – “Applicants with diabetes mellitus may be assessed as fit”?
2. Yes: The UK CAA Diabetes certification guidance gives testing and blood glucose targets for pilots with insulin-treated Diabetes (thought doesn’t specifically state Type 1 or Type 2)…
Here
it clearly states how to test blood sugar when treating Diabetes with insulin,
and I have used this to make a flip-out extra page in my flying log-book so I
record blood sugar at different stages before and during a flight.
3. Yes: The UK CAA provides a Briefing Sheet for pilots with Diabetes…
This event was held at Gatwick in Feb 2014 which is clearly “friendly” towards Diabetics flying, and the Final Summary and Conclusions are here…
It looks from this like the UK is positive about supporting well controlled Diabetics fly whilst data is gathered on any risks based on actual issues found rather than fear.
The morning after my third lesson I had my fourth. It was a Sunday early morning lesson at 9am, so I woke up at 7am so that I could check my blood sugar levels at least 2 hours before flight as required by the CAA. My blood sugar was 4.2 which is lowish but would normally be okay. However, as the CAA require a blood sugar of at least 5 I had a biscuit with my morning tea while I wrote up blog for Flight #3. I didn't want to inject insulin before flying so skipped breakfast until after the flight.
I got to the airfield at 8.30 and had a refreshing coffee in the lovely restaurant while I waited for the flying school to open. I checked my blood sugars again. The value was 8.7 showing the biscuit and even the milk in my drinks had topped up my blood sugar.
My Flying Instructor (FI) greeted me and gave me a copy of the Standard Checklist for a Piper PA28 Warrior III aircraft. This is an A5 sized, wire bound book with shiny cardboard pages that's easy to hold open on any given section - useful if it's balanced on your knee. Today we would do our first external pre-flight inspection of the aircraft, I would do my first Before Engine Start check, I would get to taxi the aircraft for the first time, and I would do the Power Check and Before Take Off checks.
Here's a video of me doing the Power Check and Before Take Off check...
With the FI doing the flying we took off on runway 07 and turned right to fly over the coast and out to sea. Turning left back into the wind we climbed to 4,600 ft and headed along the coast towards Eastbourne.
Today I was going to learn about flying straight and level at different speeds and attitudes. To be honest I wasn't great and adapting to a new speed and found myself relying too much on instruments and not enough on picking an attitude out of the window using clouds and horizon as reference and only momentarily glancing at instruments as I scanned and did my FREDA checks (see flight #3) so as a result did a bit of oscillation.
Here's a video of me going to full power, keeping the nose down, and getting the aircraft stable at 110 kts; then dropping the power, lifting the nose, and getting the aircraft stable at 75 kts; then a slow-speed turn 180 degrees to head back towards Beachy Head...
So a fun lesson but I'm frustrated that I relied too heavily on instruments. I won't make that mistake again, and need to be much more visual outside the aircraft and trust my ears sensing engine RPM etc much more.
Here's a chart of our flight...
Weather...
- EGKA 140750Z 05009KT 7000 FEW018 16/14 Q1022
- At 07:50 GMT on 14th (September) wind 50 degrees at 9 kt, visibility 7 km with a few clouds at 1,800 ft. Temp 16 degrees, dew point 14 degrees. Barometric pressure 1022 hPa.
Blood sugar readings...
> 2 hours before flight: 4.2 (ate a biscuit to raise them above lower limit of 5.0 for flying)
< 30 mins before flight: 8.7
Landing: I didn't test before landing as I wasn't doing the flying for this part of the flight
Flying hours...
This flight: 1h 0m
Accumulated: 4h 0m
I'd been waiting for my next lesson for some time. A summer holiday abroad and then a weekend of hazy weather had prevented me getting airborne again. The haze was particularly frustrating as the weather had been generally good but the flying school reported no lessons were taking place because there was simply no horizon visible once aircraft were in the air.
To compensate I booked two lessons for the following weekend - one on Saturday afternoon and one on Sunday morning. This blog covers the Saturday afternoon one.
To keep as safe as possible I didn't have any carbohydrate before the lesson. A cheese and ham omelette for breakfast followed by some ribs for lunch (minus the sticky sauce, tomato soup, and garlic bread that my family had with them) kept me eating just protein with no insulin needed for either. For energy I knew the ribs were quite fatty plus I had a small packet of peanuts at the airfield before I flew. Blood sugars were 6.6 before my omelette, 8.3 an hour and a half before my lesson, and 7.5 half an hour before my lesson.
I received a good briefing from my Flight Instructor (FI) before going to the aircraft. Today was about learning how to fly straight and level whilst scanning the outside in a methodical way for other aircraft, known as "traffic". You scan in 30 degree sectors making sure you look above and below the aircraft, and at the end of the scan you check something according to the FREDA acronym. Also, you alternate scans with one looking close to the aircraft, and the next looking into the distance.
FREDA stands for Fuel, Radio, Engine, Direction indicator, and Altimeter.
Fuel: Check level of selected tank and switch to alternate tank as required (approx every half hour).
Radio: Check selected correct frequency and that you can hear others as expected.
Engine: Check Temperatures and Pressures (T's & P's), occasionally select Carb Heat on and check for no material change in RPM that would indicate icing.
Direction indicator: Ensure magnetic compass aligns with Directional Indicator and adjust DI as needed (it does drift over time).
Altimeter: Check you are at the height you intended, that you are allowed to fly at that height, and that the barometric pressure is correctly set.
We took off on runway 07 which is a grass strip and turned right, over the coast, then right again to fly westerly. I took over once we got above pattern altitude and we climbed up to 5,300 ft while negotiating around clouds (fun!) until we were in clear air and had a clear horizon. I hadn't flown this high before and the view of the south coast and the Isle of White was just lovely.
My FI then set the aircraft into certain attitudes by inducing a climb or descent, different engine speeds, different trim, at one stage a gently descending turn, and each time I had to regain straight and level flight with the aircraft back fully trimmed. This was great fun and a challenging exercise. We did this flying in different directions over the Solent, so we could keep away from Goodwood Revival festival just north of us.
We headed back to Bognor then turned right towards Worthing Pier and started our descent from 5,300 ft aiming to be at 1,600 ft over the Pier. During this descent I saw an aircraft beneath us below our right wing. I thought it was 1,000 ft or so below us and pretty much on our bearing. I called out the traffic to the FI and he took control wanting to have a look. He did quite a sharp bank to the left so he could see below the aircraft, followed by quite a sharp right bank to bring the aircraft into his visibility with us flying straight again towards the Pier. Due to the relatively close proximity of the other aircraft he remained in control, and by the time we passed the other aircraft at about 2,000 ft we had Shoreham in sight for a straight in landing on runway 07. He did a lovely landing as usual and we headed to the fuel area to get the aircraft fully fueled for the next day. The time was now about 6pm.
Here's a video of me scanning, spotting the other aircraft, and the FI taking control to bank left and right to get a good look at it...
- AT 14:50 GMT on 13th (September) wind 50 degrees at 11 kt, visibility 10+ km with a few clouds at 1,400 ft and scattered clouds at 2,400 ft. Temp 21 degrees, dew point 14 degrees. Barometric pressure 1024 hPa.
Blood sugar readings...
> 2 hours before flight: 6.6
(> 1 hour before flight: 8.3 - not needed to be logged by CAA rules)
< 30 mins before flight: 7.5
Landing: I didn't test before landing as I wasn't doing the flying for that part of the flight
Flying hours...
This flight: 1h 0m
Accumulated: 3h 0m
