When I took off at 9:00 this morning, there was no wind and no clouds. The sun had yet to warm the ground significantly so there were almost no thermals. In other words, it was the perfect time for flying.
I find that I'm struggling to enter the landing pattern from a distance so my goal today was to practice doing just that.
I need to learn and memorize the correct relationship of distance from the pattern, altitude above pattern and airspeed as they all relate to setting up for the correct entry. Getting that all in place is simply a matter of practice, practice practice and when I'm good at it, I should end up entering the downwind leg of the pattern at the correct height, correct airspeed and correct distance from the runway.
I left Northampton and flew north for about 7 miles while climbing to 3,000 feet. Then I turned around and headed back to Northampton to land.
On the first attempt, I entered the downwind leg at the correct airspeed and in the correct location but I was about 300 feet too low. A little jockeying of the throttle and the yoke got me to the right place and I landed nicely. Then I took off to do it all again.
My second attempt was a lot better and I entered the pattern at the correct speed, the correct location and the correct altitude.
When I took off the second time, I decided to fly around a bit so I flew along the Connecticut River and then headed to my favorite place, the Quabbin. My third entry into the pattern was spot on and I turned that landing into a quick touch & go. From there, I stayed in the pattern and completed my final landing in plenty of time to secure the aircraft for the next student at 11:00.
Here is a FlightRadar24 screen shot of my flight this morning:
Here is a decent picture of the UMass campus from 2,500 feet:
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And for the record, I was home and doing housework when the light sport ran off the runway at Northampton this afternoon. I was in the air when he first took off and departed the area but I was long gone when he returned.
For that, I'm grateful because if I was in the air when he had his incident, I would not have been allowed to land in Northampton and would have had to land at my alternate airport (Barnes out in Westfield). That means I would have had to wait until the runway at Northampton was clear before I could return.
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The damned torsion spring on my garage door snapped this morning. I was initially kind of pissed but then I was very appreciative of the fact that it was a torsion spring and not one of those old fashioned extension springs that we all used to have on our garage doors. When one of those things let go, it flew off with enough power to send itself through a wall.
So now we are waiting for the parts to arrive so Craig and the guys from Overhead Door can fix it. There will be much rejoicing when the door is back in working order.
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