Pietenpol-List: Piet pilot lands on aircraft carrier
Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2008 12:11 pm
Original Posted By: "walt evans"
Well, so that's stretching the truth just a tad, but notice I said Piet PILOT,not the Piet itself ;o) While visiting with friends up in Anacortes, WA for thelast week or so (he's a Marine aviator, instructor, and electronic countermeasuresofficer) I got about an hour of stick time in the EA-6B "Prowler" simulatorat Whidbey Island NAS. You talk about incredible! I had never "flown"anything like this before and did pretty darned good! This was not a video game;the cockpit is complete and accurate and although it isn't a full motion simulator,the view is panoramic and photorealistic and the engine sounds in theheadset are accurate. I shot a virtual touch and go (VFR) to the main runwayat Whidbey, then "flew" the jet over to SeaTac for another visual approach andlanding, then the sim operator put us out at sea for carrier landings and Igot to shoot about a half-dozen of them. I didn't hit anything, didn't put theairplane in the drink, and had a great time flying.It was really amazing. I managed to hook a wire on my last attempt at landingon the carrier deck, but made the mistake of failing to go to full power whenthe gear hit the deck. That is counter-intuitive for a Piet pilot, just likeholding speed and attitude all the way to touchdown (no flare). The cool thingis that the sim operator (the voice in the headset, not my buddy in the rightseat) asked me "flying left seat, you're obviously a private pilot, what doyou fly?". Figuring he didn't know from nothin' in the civilian world, I justsaid "small single-engine aircraft" and that was that until my buddy mentioned"Pietenpol" and the sim operator started chatting about how he and a friendwanted to buy one and were working on a deal when the airplane was lost in a hangarfire. From then on he talked to me a bit more on technique, helpfully tellingme that landing to the carrier deck is pretty much just a short/soft fieldlanding and to treat it like that. Very nice guy, and I shook his hand afterthe sim session and told him my tail number was 41CC.Anyway, after getting my fuel shutoff valve replaced yesterday, even with winds15 gusting to 20 in a 10 degree x-wind, I flew 41CC to some of my best approachesand landings ever. I flew three touch and goes at my home field, parkedthe airplane to make sure my fuel valve wasn't leaking and everything was airworthy,flew over to a nearby field to fuel up, then came back and shot two morelandings that were very satisfying. I guess that simulator time did me somegood!It sure is fun to fly Piets... and to hear that they are known and loved far andwide.Oscar ZunigaAir Camper NX41CCSan Antonio, TXmailto: taildrags(at)hotmail.comwebsite at http://www.flysquirrel.net________________________________________________________________________________Date: Sun, 08 Jun 2008 13:44:20 -0400
Well, so that's stretching the truth just a tad, but notice I said Piet PILOT,not the Piet itself ;o) While visiting with friends up in Anacortes, WA for thelast week or so (he's a Marine aviator, instructor, and electronic countermeasuresofficer) I got about an hour of stick time in the EA-6B "Prowler" simulatorat Whidbey Island NAS. You talk about incredible! I had never "flown"anything like this before and did pretty darned good! This was not a video game;the cockpit is complete and accurate and although it isn't a full motion simulator,the view is panoramic and photorealistic and the engine sounds in theheadset are accurate. I shot a virtual touch and go (VFR) to the main runwayat Whidbey, then "flew" the jet over to SeaTac for another visual approach andlanding, then the sim operator put us out at sea for carrier landings and Igot to shoot about a half-dozen of them. I didn't hit anything, didn't put theairplane in the drink, and had a great time flying.It was really amazing. I managed to hook a wire on my last attempt at landingon the carrier deck, but made the mistake of failing to go to full power whenthe gear hit the deck. That is counter-intuitive for a Piet pilot, just likeholding speed and attitude all the way to touchdown (no flare). The cool thingis that the sim operator (the voice in the headset, not my buddy in the rightseat) asked me "flying left seat, you're obviously a private pilot, what doyou fly?". Figuring he didn't know from nothin' in the civilian world, I justsaid "small single-engine aircraft" and that was that until my buddy mentioned"Pietenpol" and the sim operator started chatting about how he and a friendwanted to buy one and were working on a deal when the airplane was lost in a hangarfire. From then on he talked to me a bit more on technique, helpfully tellingme that landing to the carrier deck is pretty much just a short/soft fieldlanding and to treat it like that. Very nice guy, and I shook his hand afterthe sim session and told him my tail number was 41CC.Anyway, after getting my fuel shutoff valve replaced yesterday, even with winds15 gusting to 20 in a 10 degree x-wind, I flew 41CC to some of my best approachesand landings ever. I flew three touch and goes at my home field, parkedthe airplane to make sure my fuel valve wasn't leaking and everything was airworthy,flew over to a nearby field to fuel up, then came back and shot two morelandings that were very satisfying. I guess that simulator time did me somegood!It sure is fun to fly Piets... and to hear that they are known and loved far andwide.Oscar ZunigaAir Camper NX41CCSan Antonio, TXmailto: taildrags(at)hotmail.comwebsite at http://www.flysquirrel.net________________________________________________________________________________Date: Sun, 08 Jun 2008 13:44:20 -0400