Ground school was quick today. Only spent about thirty minutes chatting in the classroom before it was time to preflight!

Sometime after my flight yesterday (and NOT because of my landing) the magnetic compass fell off the windshield. My instructor was not sure if we were going to fly that plane today, but the mechanic got it fixed and we are back in the game.

Today we practiced slow flight maneuvers. I got a better feel for the aircraft at slow speeds (like 45kts… SLOW). We did slow turns and practiced that to help with landings. Then we did a few power off stalls. I killed us once, and then pulled out in time the second time. The reason I killed us is I went too far forward on the yoke… oops. Second one was better.

Then time for some touch & gos. I got to work the radio a bit today, and need practice. Seems like I get a little bit of overload with airspeed, altitude, and heading, that I forget the radio piece. We’ve never talked about it in the classroom, so I figure it will come up and I will get better with it.

First time to Propwash I was too high, go around. Second time was a good teeth chatterer like yesterday. Third was extra smooth. Instructor said the final landing at home field made up for the carrier landing at Propwash. As I was pulling up from my poor landing (and still remembering to steer the damn airplane with my FEET) he noticed his other student was watching.

Oh well, on the radio I heard someone else have a rough one and an on-looker said “Any landing you can walk away from is a good one.”

Practice, Practice, Practice.