On Friday, November 28, 2008 I team up with 3 other people from San Diego and we fly on a small plane Piper Warrior to Camarillo Airport close to Channel Islands Harbor http://www.channelislandsharbor.org/

There well sail out together with 5 other people (9 people total) on Catalina 350 Palapa: http://marinasailing.com/YachtLookup.asp?YachtName=Palapa to Anacapa island: http://www.nps.gov/chis/ and return back same day.

This night flight on November 13 over Carlsbad airport is a part of our preparations for our first flight-sale adventure.

We are meeting in Palomar Airport (KCRQ) at Orion Aviation – West.
We can fly only VFR with cross-wind not more than 10 knots.
If we do not have VMC we cancel the flight and (if we do not cancel the sailing) drive to Channel Islands Harbor.
We are going fly back after sailing (if we have VMC) and we practiced with Sergey night landing in KCRQ.

Take look in rout of flight in advance : “kcrq vpspp vpldp vplhp vplvt lax vpgty cma” in http://skyvector.com/
both on sectional and LA Terminal Area Chart (TAC) – third and forth buttons in top-right corner of the chart. To see legend of charts reduce zoom (bottom-right) – legend is on the left margin of the chart. The most important are routes and rules of passing through class B LAX airspace – on the left margin of LA TAC.

Also if we fly on the next day we need to reserve a hotel in Oxnard, right?

From Wikipedia:

Night VFR, or night visual flight rules (NVFR), are the rules under which flight primarily by visual reference is done at night.

In many countries, VFR flight at night is not permitted, in which case night flying is by instrument flight rules (IFR) only which, in almost all countries, requires an instrument rating. The UK is an interesting exception, as is the United States.

Aircraft flown under the V.F.R. at night require:
• a landing light;
• illumination for all instruments and equipment, used by the flight crew that is essential for the safe operation of the aircraft;
• lights in all passenger compartments;
• an electric torch for each crew member

From Student pilot online book:

Chapter 12 – Night Flight

A veteran pilot once remarked that night flying is no different from day flying-it’s just that at night you can’t see anything. Although his statement carries a good deal of truth, you can usually see something. To compensate for what you can’t see, you need proper instrumentation. To make the most of your vision at night, you need to understand how the eye operates in darkness.

“Autokinesis” (short for autokinetic visible light phenomenon) is one of the special visual hazards of night flying. It resembles vertigo in some ways. Autokinesis occurs when you stare at a pinpoint of light in a dark sky. After a while, you get the feeling that either you or the light is in motion. To prevent this from happening, keep your eyes moving. Don’t stare at a single light too long. Autokinesis used to be responsible for numerous aircraft disasters, until we discovered the cause for this optical illusion.

Night flying requires a different visual technique than day flying. You can see an object best during daylight by looking directly at it. At night, however, a scanning procedure is more effective-to permit “offcenter” viewing of the target. In other words, you will find after some practice that you can see things more clearly and definitely at night by looking slightly to one side of them, rather than straight at them.

The explanation for this lies in the dual structure of your eye. There are two kinds of light-sensitive nerve endings at the back of your eye: (1) the cones, which distinguish color and require considerable light to function, and (2) the rods, which detect objects only in shades of gray but can operate in very dim light.

The cones, because they need greater intensity of light to function, are used in day vision. In fact, the cones stop working altogether in semidarkness. Millions of these tiny structures are clustered at the back of the eyeball, directly behind the pupil. Not only do they distinguish colors, they pick up distant objects.

The rods are concentrated in a ring around the cones. Being colorblind, they see only in grays and are used in peripheral vision during the day-that is, to perceive objects in motion out of the corner of the eye. Because the rods can still function in light of 1/5,000 the intensity at which the cones cease to function, they are used for night vision. These structures are 100,000 times as sensitive in the dark as they are in sunlight. However, they do need more time to adjust to darkness than the cones do to bright light. Your eyes become adapted to sunlight in 10 seconds, whereas they need 30 minutes to fully adjust to a dark night.

Duration : 0:9:16

Technorati Tags: adventure, California, Carlsbad, cma, Flight, flight-sale, kcrq, landing, lax, Night, NVFR, piper, skyvector, training, VFR, vpgty, vpldp, vplhp, vplvt, vpspp, Warrior

Episode 07041904
flight training, Sandy and Jo Ann Hill – Rusty Sachs – Tom Evans

Duration : 0:54:3

Technorati Tags: faa.gov, public.resource.org

What:
Red Bird FMX Full motion flight training device. This is the first flight training device that combines full motion, control loading, worldwide terrain database, and more then 200 degree visual system into a package that is cost effective for initial flight training. This is new technology that has the potential to change the way flight training is carried out.
IMG_0230_Desktop_Resolution.JPG Why: Simulators save time, money, and are safer then a airplane for flight training.

How:
This is also a excellent VFR simulator. A VFR simulator has to be more realistic then a IFR simulator because VFR flying is by feel and visual clues.

Simulators are well proven for IFR. This device will do an excellent job as a IFR trainer and be capable of simulating legacy instrument panels and the future with G430/530, G500/G600G1000 instrumentation. It is also approved for doing instrument rating renewals.
Why a use a simulator?

* Normal flight training in an airplane is very inefficient. For example if you are having trouble with the flare you have to do a walk around, start up, run up, take off, fly a 6 minute circuit for EACH 15 second flare and touch down practice the student needs. In a sim all you have to do is setup the airplane up on a 1/4 mile final, fly the approach and landing and reset back to 1/4 mile, again and again until you get it. Same thing with steep turns, stalls, spins, (no commute to the practice area) This alone saves MASSIVE amounts of time and cost. Similar to Batting practice trying the exercise again and again quickly to get the skill level up.
* The simulator can be scheduled no matter the weather
* Almost no mechanical issues, stable rates (no fuel and insurance issues) and no aggravating navcanada excuses
* The simulator can be ‘paused’ in the middle of a critical exercise to aid learning and understanding
* Many more exercises can be carried out in a shorter time since the instructor can fast forward or relocate the ‘aircraft’ in seconds.
* You can learn lessons you dont want to learn in the real airplane. How much cross wind can you handle? Engine failures at night? Are you noticing the oil pressure dropping? Crank it into the sim and find out! Scenarios based on real life that will challenge you. You can practice the dangerous exercises you would not want to do in real life.

Can you log it?
Yes you can log it, but can you log it as airplane time? No. No simulator can be logged as airplane time. Not even the fancy airline level D simulators. Toward a licence you can count 2.5 of the PPL instrument requirement, CPL 10 hours, and the Instrument rating 20 hours. Logging time doesnt mean its useful. The better question is it good training. If you can be safer, better prepared, and organized for the lesson in the airplane you will get more out of the lesson in the airplane. Thus making you a better pilot for less cost, time, and effort.

There are several studies going on right now about crediting of time toward the PPL CPL on a sim, but really it doesnt matter, because so many students go beyond the minimum time required for a licence. Can we get the total hours down toward the licence using a flight simulator? Certainly we can!

What can we do with the sim?
Instrument Rating Renewal training/flight test.
Orientation training
Radio procedure , English Aviation Fluency training
PPL air exercises
CPL air exercises
instrument procedures
Night Navigation
Day Navigation above 5000 feet enroute.
Mountain training
Garmin 1000
Garmin 430/530 GNS
Loss of Control and recovery exercises
Unusual Altitude recovery
GPS checkouts
Instrument rating renewal rides
Route checkouts

Thanks to “That will leave a mark productions” for another great video!

Duration : 0:9:56

Technorati Tags: aviation, FFS full motion simulator, flight school, flight simulator, flight training device, flight training unit, FTD, learn to fly, pilot training

Duration : 0:10:37

Technorati Tags: AND, EXTRA, Flight, FROM, JAMES, SCENES, the, training, u2

Duration : 0:4:28

Technorati Tags: Air, Canada, Charter, Flight, school, service

Lots more on this plane at our RC BLOG!
http://www.rcpowers.com/forum/blog.php?b=151

Duration : 0:6:39

Technorati Tags: airshow, aoa, crash, dave, ducted, edf, electric, fan, Flight, jet, nitroplanes, powers, rcpowers, testing

Duration : 0:3:38

Duration : 0:23:48

Technorati Tags: 16mm, 8mm, conversion, film, hidef, home, movie, slides, video

Duration : 0:9:40

Technorati Tags: Aviacion, B737, B737NG, Device, Flight, FTD, Simulator, training

Duration : 0:9:33

Technorati Tags: 172, airport, Carlos, cessna, emergency, Flight, forward, off, power, San, side, slip, stall, steep, training, turn