Santa Monica Checkride – Piper Archer III
The main reason for my return trip was to celebrate my close friend’s birthday. Second on my list was to go flying. More specifically, to get checked out with one of the local flight schools in an Archer and to get checked out to land in Catalina Island. Well, I got checked out in the Archer but, because of weather conditions, I was not able to get the Catalina checkride.
(For those of you that are not pilots, renting an airplane is different from renting a car: just because you have a license to fly does not mean someone is going to rent you an airplane. You first have to show that you can fly before you are allowed to rent an airplane.)
Santa Monica Airport (SMO) is now my favorite airport to fly out of. It has a lot of activity, a lot of life to it and a great location. It is this location that requires you to be on your toes and familiar with the local procedures. Your two concerns are the airspace surrounding SMO (LAX is just south of SMO) and nose abatement because of the surrounding homes. Of the two, noise abatement took more getting used to. I am used to flying in Class B in Houston but I have never had to worry much about noise. (Hobby Airport has homes surrounding it and yet it is one of the few places where you will hear controllers say “no speed limit” … not that it means much to us flying in Tigers, Pipers or single-engine Cessnas!) At SMO, they have start times (starting your engine before 7AM on weekdays, 8AM on weekends and holidays is frowned upon) and departure/approach procedures. For example, taking off runway 21 requires a 10 degree left turn followed by a turn to 225 once over the golf course. If you are staying in the pattern you are not supposed to turn crosswind until you are over Lincoln Avenue.
Something else that was different for me was talking on the radio. In Houston, when contacting Hobby Tower or Houston Approach/Departure, I give them my airplane type and N-number and wait for acknowledgment (“Houston Approach, Tiger 960TengoEcho” for example). The reason we do that is because controllers tend to be very busy and may not be ready for more than that on first contact. After acknowledgment, I would continue with my request: “Houston Approach, Tiger 0Tengo Echo, two miles to the east of West Houston Airport at 1,500 feet, would like to go in-bound for Hobby with information Papa” (the request taking the form of who you are, where you are and what you want). I started using this method going in and out of SMO but I was told to say everything I needed to say on the first call. As you can tell, this is a lot to throw at someone that is busy and may not be expecting or ready to take your call but that’s what they want.
My first landing at SMO was different in that as soon as my speed was down the instructor was telling me to exit the runway, no need to wait for tower to give me the OK. I started looking for a taxiway but I could not see any! That’s when I was told just exit at an angle, clear the runway, stop and switch to ground.
Aside from learning procedures for flying in and out of SMO and LAX’s airspace, this was also a chance to review basics like emergency procedures (frequencies, transponder settings), reading charts, steep banks turns, stalls and slow flight. I have to admit that it can sometimes be a little annoying flying with a new instructor because they all seem to have different styles or ideas on flying and those sometimes clash with what I am used to, have been taught or prefer. One time I was getting checked out at West Houston by a rookie instructor who insisted on having me land on the numbers and come to a stop. This sounds good until you have to get on the power to hurry to the first exit one quarter of a mile away because someone just called short final! This instructor was pretty good in that he did review a lot of things that were not fresh in my head.
I did get one really good tip from the instructor: don’t put your headset on the dash. In my years of flying I have never heard anyone say anything about this. Well, I take that back: I do remember someone telling me not to leave my David Clarks on the dash but that was out of fear that they might be stolen. Most of us have a tendency to rest our headsets on the dash as we get settled in: this is a good way to scratch the inside of the windshield.
Archer 3FoxtrotDelta
This is the best Piper I have ever flown! This plane is only seven years old (2000) and has the latest gear, complete with dual Garmin 430s. Finding the Mic button on the yoke was even challenging since it has so many buttons on there. When I tried using the radio nothing happened. I looked at my Garmin but it did not show me broadcasting. I looked again at the buttons (there must have been three or four at my thumb’s disposal) and realized I was pressing the wrong one! (I never bothered to check to see what I was pressing before.)
The other thing we searched for was where to put the key! We used it to unlock the airplane but that was all we needed the key for. This Archer had its switches for lights, magnetos, fuel pump and the “Start” button overhead.
Justice Aviation
After considering what the different flight schools at SMO had to offer and their rates, I settled on Justice Aviation. What really did it was the fact they had a relatively new Archer available for rent (at $137 per hour, wet). Their offices were easy to find and, as I already mentioned, they have some great planes available (including a Cirrus).
More On Renting An Airplane
Justice Aviation did appear to be very professional but like many schools I have flown with, they did fall short on scheduling. This is a recurring problem with many places: Your first time flying with them you call ahead, schedule an airplane and instructor. They usually ask you to come in early to do paperwork. So you show up early, take care of paperwork and then you wait. Oops! Your instructor had something come up and now you will fly with someone else 30 minutes later than planned. Sometimes it is not the instructor but the airplane that is not available because it is in the shop for scheduled maintenance or someone crashed it (that was the case at West Houston a while back) but you find out only after you show up. Sometimes you have both of these happen to you with one place: Show up one day and the airplane is in the shop for maintenance. Come back the next time and the instructor is not available. And don’t think that because you are flying with a national chain things will go better: the last example of airplane/instructor being unavailable happened to me when I tried flying with American Flyers at Hooks Airport.
