So before the start of the lesson, I walk up to Mike and share with him my newfound wisdom from reading an article in
AOPA Flight Training. There was an article in the July issue
about the important of learning short and soft field takoffs and landings, not only training for them on your standard paved runway, but actually trying them for real. Mike responded by saying, you just ruined your surprise! :-). Today he planned for us to land at the "Butler Farm Show" airport for our short field exploration and at his friends house, the McDonald grass airstrip. Well, I'm not sure if I would call the Farm Show airport a runway, it was more like a sidewalk, and to land you have to cross over some fairly high powerlines right before the beginning of the runway. But Mike s
howed me how it was done and we somehow managed to squeeze the airplane onto the middle of the runway. We parked the plane in the grass and ran across the street for a little break at a family fun place. After racing the go-karts there (I came in first after ducking under some dude in the final turn... :-), we hustled back the trusty trainer to do our short field takeoff (for real this time). We then cruised over to his buddy's house to try out a little grass field landing action. How cool that was! I really enjoyed the thrill of landing on grass, and in particular the thrill of the takeoff, having to lift off at the lowest speed possible and then accelerating in ground effect. That landing and take off is not one I will forget for quite a while. I can't wait to do another one! (Photo credit go to Mike, sorry Mike I stole your pics!)
about the important of learning short and soft field takoffs and landings, not only training for them on your standard paved runway, but actually trying them for real. Mike responded by saying, you just ruined your surprise! :-). Today he planned for us to land at the "Butler Farm Show" airport for our short field exploration and at his friends house, the McDonald grass airstrip. Well, I'm not sure if I would call the Farm Show airport a runway, it was more like a sidewalk, and to land you have to cross over some fairly high powerlines right before the beginning of the runway. But Mike s
howed me how it was done and we somehow managed to squeeze the airplane onto the middle of the runway. We parked the plane in the grass and ran across the street for a little break at a family fun place. After racing the go-karts there (I came in first after ducking under some dude in the final turn... :-), we hustled back the trusty trainer to do our short field takeoff (for real this time). We then cruised over to his buddy's house to try out a little grass field landing action. How cool that was! I really enjoyed the thrill of landing on grass, and in particular the thrill of the takeoff, having to lift off at the lowest speed possible and then accelerating in ground effect. That landing and take off is not one I will forget for quite a while. I can't wait to do another one! (Photo credit go to Mike, sorry Mike I stole your pics!)
