IFR

I have had so much work travel lately, it's been hard to find time to fly...much less blog about flying.

I've continued doing solo practice when I can--ground reference maneuvers, performance takeoffs and landings, and such--and also getting back into the book-studying again, in preparation for my test, which I hope to take in August.

One of the requirements for the private pilot certificate is to receive 3 hours of instrument training...basically, just a "taste" of flying solely by reference to instruments. Joel and I talked about this requirement some time ago, and decided it would be more educational--and fun--to actually do it as an instrument flight rules (IFR) flight somewhere.

Last Friday morning, Joel filed IFR from Olympia to Troutdale (KTTD), a small GA airport on the east side of Portland. I had never been there before, so the flight promised to be full of new experiences for me.

A couple of weeks ago, I picked up a copy of the FAA Instrument Flying Handbook, which gives a pretty good overview of the basics. And with the few hundred hours of simulator instrument flying I've done over the years, I was comfortable with many aspects of the flight. But I had no idea what to expect from--and in fact was quite apprehensive about--flying in actual instrument conditions.

I secured time off work on Friday morning, and met Joel at the hangar at 8:30. After preflight, we started the engine and for the first time, I called up the ground controller and requested an IFR clearance. I copied everything down, read it back, went over it with Joel, and we taxied out.

We were assigned runway heading on departure, which was good, since I would only have to deal with punching through the cloud layer--about 2000' thick, starting at 1500' above ground--rather than turning in it too. As we climbed, it was an odd feeling to be approaching the clouds, which I've been trained (and trained myself) to avoid. As they got closer, the visibility closed in a hurry, and soon we were in the soup. I focused mostly on the attitude indicator (aka artificial horizon) but regularly cross-checked against the altimeter and vertical speed indicator (to ensure our rate of climb was steady) as well as the airspeed indicator (to keep it at 75 knots, just a hair faster than best rate of climb). During this time, we switched to the Seattle departure frequency, checked in, and received direct to the Battleground VOR just north of Portland.

We broke out of the layer around 3500, I leveled off at 5000, and I kept heading and altitude within the required bounds for IFR flight. It was actually quite a bit easier than I expected it to be. Joel did quite a bit of teaching about using the Garmin 430 GPS for IFR...it really makes things easy, and I learned things that will be useful for VFR flight as well.

After Battleground, Portland approach had us on vectors (with instructions like, "Cessna 75898, fly heading 220, descend and maintain 4000, vectors final approach course.") I had no real trouble staying ahead of the airplane. We asked for, and received, the GPS-A approach, with vectors to final. Approach took us right over Portland International (KPDX), and I allowed a quick glance out the window to the big runways, terminal, and lots of activity below (the sky over Portland was scattered at about 3500'). Our next vector took us right over downtown Portland towards Troutdale, with a nice steady descent.

When we broke out of the last bit of clouds, Troutdale was right in front of us, and the approach controller gave us the tower frequency for Hillsboro (KHIO)...which we dutifully tuned in. It took a few exchanges before the controller realized we were on the wrong frequency, and told us so. We looked at the approach plate, noted the frequency there, and dialed it up. We were advised of a departing helicopter and instructed to circle north of the field for runway 25. There was a lot going on and I did get a little behind the plane, overshot final, but salvaged a barely acceptable landing. My first IFR flight was in the books!

We taxied to the FBO, and while Joel went inside I called up flight service and filed our flight plan back...actually, Joel got to supervise the whole thing because it took me some time to get everything organized and get ahold of a flight service specialist. No issues filing, we were back in the aircraft for the flight home. We were given the Blue Lake 3 departure out of Troutdale, which has pre-determined vectors to fly, but it was no problem for me (with Joel's help announcing each change a bit before I needed to do it.) After we broke through the clouds, we were immediately advised of a Delta heavy Airbus 1000' above us, 8 miles ahead, moving from our 2:00 to 8:00 (inbound to PDX.) I picked him up first, moving right along, no factor for us, but looking pretty in the morning sunshine.

Our route home took us right by Mt. St. Helens, then we set up for the RNAV approach to runway 35 at KOLM. Again the Garmin made it pretty easy, though I struggled a bit to keep the needle centered, especially in and out of the clouds. The winds were blowing and a little variable at Olympia, so the pattern and landing were bumpy and interesting, but I nailed it and was glad to be home.

It was a very enjoyable way to satisfy this part of my training requirements, and helped convince me that I want to continue on and get the instrument rating. But first things first...the private, which is getting closer by the day.

Flight track (Google Earth) for the flight is here.

The flightaware.com history for 75898, including our flights, is here.