Saturday, October 4th

Two great flights to report. On Wednesday Troy and I flew to College Station to shoot some approaches. A bit shaky on the first, better on the second, and the third was this one back home into Arlington.



I was about 8 miles out, about to intercept the ILS for this runway when Troy cuts the power on my left engine to idle... simulated engine failure. We had done this several times, but this was the first time trying it while attempting to maintain the glideslope into the runway and under the Foggles. As you can see, I wound up a bit long, but I was pretty happy with my first attempt under those conditions.

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Friday night was the biggie. The 300-mile marathon... and back. It's actually a requirement for the commercial certificate, which is coming up, but ATP kills two birds with one stone by having us shoot instrument approaches along the way, all under the Foggles. I preflight 4917A and file for...

- Arlington to Mineral Wells, GPS approach. Nailed it, then went missed (intentionally didn't land)
- Mineral Wells to Abilene, VOR approach. Nailed it, then went missed again.
- Abilene to Midland, ILS approach. Another good one, this time to a full stop.

We meet up with another Seminole team (instructor Aaron and student Adam) in Midland, grab the FBO's courtesy car and grab a bite to eat, then take off again...

Midland to Alliance for 10 VFR night take-offs and landings. I had been here before in the Cessna, but this was the first time since I had worked out the kinks in my landings, and the first time in the Seminole.

We had finished a few when Aaron and Adam came in behind us to do the same. Once again we pick a night with no other traffic using the airport, so the tower assigned the left pattern for 16L to A&A and the right pattern for 16R to Troy and I. It didn't take long before we were flying in tandem, like looking into a mirror, including the base leg for landing, in which we momentarily are flying head-on. This is a humbling enough experience during the day, but when it's night, with another plane's landing light shining in my face... oy. I don't mind telling you that I peed a little.

Ten laps in a traffic pattern is draining enough, but we're not done. Last stop is Cleburne, where we shoot a visual approach and land.

"Back home, boss?" I ask Troy, who looks at his watch and sighs.

"We've got another hour left."

We head for the practice area south of Arlington and well, just fly around. Rather pleasant, but it's now 0100 and we've been flying with only one break since 1700, and consciousness is getting scarce. Aaron shares an idea on the radio.

"I'm asking ATC if they'll vector us through DFW so we can take a tour."

The airspace around DFW is extremely busy and as such, air traffic control keeps very tight control of it. However, in the wee small hours on a Friday night even controllers get bored. Sure enough, ATC clears A&A to fly direct over DFW airport and east to downtown Dallas. Troy and I wait a bit for spacing, then get request and get cleared to do the same. This was a pretty sweet ending to the evening... got great views of the big airport from 3,500 feet and then did a lap around downtown Dallas at 2,500 feet... both areas normally verboten for civil aircraft.

A few more stop-and-goes at Arlington and we're done.

My head hit the pillow at 0300... hard.