In a 152, no less! This was truly an achievement! ^_^
Anyway, a bit of preliminary information - The airport in question here is 3MY, or Mount Hawley Auxiliary. The instructors in question are Adama and Renae, a husband-and-wife team who work there. Adama is my normal instructor. The airport is underneath Greater Peoria Regional's class C, the bottom of which is at 2000 MSL. Anyway, on with the show!
I showed up 10 minutes late to find Renae (who I had never flown with) waiting for me. It seems Adama had left late for another cross-country and wasn't going to make it back in time, so he asked her to babysit me through a few patterns. (He even warned her about me. I felt so proud! ^_^) So up we go. A few patterns into things, on climbout, I observe a few birds headed the same direction we are. I say, "Oooh, traffic!"
Scare #1!
Renae missed the birds and thought I meant an airplane. She says "What? No way, where?" and starts looking. I said, "Oh, I meant the birds." She looked like she was going to punch me for a second, then says "Birds are NOT traffic!" (I've done this with Adama before and it doesn't scare him because birds are a see-and-avoid thing. Maybe I shouldn't...)
Anyway, on to number two! (This one is my favorite ^_^) Out there in the sky, Adama is returning with his other student. They are about 20 miles out when they hear me make the following transmission on the radio:
"Mount Hawley traffic, Cessna 789MikeFox is left downwind for One Seven... (about a one-second pause) AW, CRAP!"
He begins wondering just what happened. He can't see us yet, but the urgency of the crap was enough to worry him. Sure enough, a few seconds later on the radio comes me with "We're still here!"
Immediately prior to this both Renae and I were watching someone apparently without a radio crossing the airport. In determing his direction of travel, I stopped paying attention to what I myself was doing, which was bad. I satisfied myself that he was not a factor, started my downwind-leg report, looked back at the panel, and observed the altimeter passing 1950. This led to the "AWW, CRAP!"
We descended fast (I didn't bust airspace, but only by about 30 feet or so...) and laughed ourselves a bit at the inadvertent transmission - I said, "You know, I bet they (meaning the ground) think we just bought it..." and made the "We're still here!" transmission. We didn't know Adama had heard us so it was just harmless funny to us. Anyway, Adama joins us in the pattern as we're doing our touch-and-goes, follows us around the patch a few times, then we land and go inside. He does the same. We're inside filling out the paperwork when Adama comes in and says "OK, so I'm 20 miles out, listening to the radio, and I hear you say 'Aww, crap!'... What was that?" Renae and I both started laughing ^_^ We explained it to him and he thought it was funny, so no harm done. And thus I scared two instructors in one day.
The real scary part will be tomorrow - I turned in my pre-solo written, so unless I messed up something I don't know about, if all goes as planned tomorrow, I get my solo... watch out, world!
Anyway, a bit of preliminary information - The airport in question here is 3MY, or Mount Hawley Auxiliary. The instructors in question are Adama and Renae, a husband-and-wife team who work there. Adama is my normal instructor. The airport is underneath Greater Peoria Regional's class C, the bottom of which is at 2000 MSL. Anyway, on with the show!
I showed up 10 minutes late to find Renae (who I had never flown with) waiting for me. It seems Adama had left late for another cross-country and wasn't going to make it back in time, so he asked her to babysit me through a few patterns. (He even warned her about me. I felt so proud! ^_^) So up we go. A few patterns into things, on climbout, I observe a few birds headed the same direction we are. I say, "Oooh, traffic!"
Scare #1!
Renae missed the birds and thought I meant an airplane. She says "What? No way, where?" and starts looking. I said, "Oh, I meant the birds." She looked like she was going to punch me for a second, then says "Birds are NOT traffic!" (I've done this with Adama before and it doesn't scare him because birds are a see-and-avoid thing. Maybe I shouldn't...)
Anyway, on to number two! (This one is my favorite ^_^) Out there in the sky, Adama is returning with his other student. They are about 20 miles out when they hear me make the following transmission on the radio:
"Mount Hawley traffic, Cessna 789MikeFox is left downwind for One Seven... (about a one-second pause) AW, CRAP!"
He begins wondering just what happened. He can't see us yet, but the urgency of the crap was enough to worry him. Sure enough, a few seconds later on the radio comes me with "We're still here!"
Immediately prior to this both Renae and I were watching someone apparently without a radio crossing the airport. In determing his direction of travel, I stopped paying attention to what I myself was doing, which was bad. I satisfied myself that he was not a factor, started my downwind-leg report, looked back at the panel, and observed the altimeter passing 1950. This led to the "AWW, CRAP!"
We descended fast (I didn't bust airspace, but only by about 30 feet or so...) and laughed ourselves a bit at the inadvertent transmission - I said, "You know, I bet they (meaning the ground) think we just bought it..." and made the "We're still here!" transmission. We didn't know Adama had heard us so it was just harmless funny to us. Anyway, Adama joins us in the pattern as we're doing our touch-and-goes, follows us around the patch a few times, then we land and go inside. He does the same. We're inside filling out the paperwork when Adama comes in and says "OK, so I'm 20 miles out, listening to the radio, and I hear you say 'Aww, crap!'... What was that?" Renae and I both started laughing ^_^ We explained it to him and he thought it was funny, so no harm done. And thus I scared two instructors in one day.
The real scary part will be tomorrow - I turned in my pre-solo written, so unless I messed up something I don't know about, if all goes as planned tomorrow, I get my solo... watch out, world!
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