Journal Journal: Flying again
So I took my oldest daughter (age 6) up for a day of Daddy/Daughter activities. We flew from FME to LNS for an afternoon tea. It was a hoot for both of us.
Ok, the hoot factor wasn't as high as I'd hoped. Filing my ADIZ flight plan was a piece of cake, but opening that flight plan was another thing altogether. I sat on the ground for nearly 20 minutes burning $3.10/gallon AvGas, hitting redial and getting nothing but a busy signal from Potomac Approach.
Meanwhile, my daughter had discoverd the joys of a VOX intercom. She'd blow in to the microphone on her headset and of course hear the intercom squelch open. When that wasn't good enough, she started singing. Who needs Kareoke?
Eventually, I got through, copied my squawk code, and departure frequency in about 20 seconds flat. All that waiting around for a 20 second information transfer...
We had a couple crosswind gusts on the runway, but it wasn't much of a problem. The two of us were in the air and having a blast. My daughter looked at the ground below and realized that the houses looked like toys, just as I said they would.
Later, outside the ADIZ, I gave her the controls and she banked us to the right and to the left. We climbed a bit, and she was proud of herself.
After landing at LNS, I taxied up to the completely empty GA ramp (Gosh, I remember that ramp being so busy in years past) and shut down.
I pulled our wheel chocks out from the airplane, handed my daugher one, and then she excitedly ran toward the other side of the airplane, while I was grinning inside. That grin didn't last long.
She had not been paying attention to where she was. My daughter ran straight back in to the stabilator face first. Oh, what a bloody nose.
I handed her my handkerchief, I chocked the wheels, set the parking brake and control lock, and then we made tracks for the terminal building so she could get cleaned up.
Later, after a nice tea and cheese stick appetizer (don't ask), we made our way to the flight planning room to file a flight plan to re-enter the ADIZ.
Silly security rules. We came in through the other gate. We knew the security code for that lock, but not the lock for the flight planning room. What a bunch of hooey. So we had to walk back out of the terminal building, on to the ramp, and then through the other side of the building where we would have gone in the first place --if my daughter hadn't needed to make such a bee line to the ladies room.
Figuring out when and where in the air to pick up your flight plan is not as simple as it sounds. You have to choose a fix somewhere outside the ADIZ and navigate reliably to that fix at a given time window so that the air traffic controllers can quickly identify you and work you in to the system.
I chose Westminster (EMI) VORTAC. In retrospect, I should have chosen something a bit further outside the ADIZ. Anything just past VINNY on V457 would have been fine.
Navigating inside the ADIZ is pretty straightforward. What is not so straightforward is that damned SFAR 94 FRZ which cuts in to the areas where we otherwise used to navigate freely.
I used to navigate to BELTS and then follow the instrument approach in to FME. However, these days, you can't fly that without a background check from the Secret Service. So I fly a mile or two south of CLEAT (It's on L-28 chart) and then begin turning slowly Eastward toward the Class B cutout for FME.
A current Intrument rating would have made this mess much simpler. I could have filed LNS V93 BAL FME and everyone would have been quite happy. An IPC is in the works.
It's good to be the daddy --even when it's not fun. (Oh, and my daughter still thinks I'm cool)