Gaining a pilot license is just the beginning of an endless cycle of maintaining proficiency.
Hours are flown not only to get additional ratings but to ensure safe flying. As a ground rule, three takeoffs every ninety days is the bare minimum.
However, flying is not always predictable.
We hope for good weather – visibility, ceiling, wind speed, heat, and humidity, but they are never a certainty.
Recently, we had wonderful visibility and ceilings, but the winds were less than ideal for me as a lower time tailwheel pilot.
I was out of my comfort zone.
The restorer has been patient, giving me room to learn with the safety net of his experience. I got some altitude in the Cub last week, following through on the flight controls as the restorer took off and landed.
This opportunity to gain experience with support is invaluable.
We are all learning as we go.
Even after skills are attained, we are perfecting those skills by gaining confidence in our abilities, takeoff after takeoff, landing after landing.
As a new pilot, the blonde bomber said after a recent flight she felt comfortable expanding her personal wind minimums slightly to 10 knots.
She’s talking through much of her experience and along the way reminding me that each day is a good day to learn.
The lessons aren’t always held neatly in a syllabus and will vary, but every day there is something to learn.
A retired airline captain I worked with at the air ambulance told me that the day I passed my checkride as a copilot, I was then a captain in training.
Always watch what is going on, ask questions, and eventually understand.
While the captain was talking about flying, he was also talking about life.
Technical proficiency is necessary for flight but so is being a team player and respectfully communicating under pressure. Learning to fly is just as much about learning how to get along as it is manipulating the controls.
Taxiing the Cub recently, the restorer reminded me to slow down.
It felt like a fast walk to me, and if it had been in Sis, our Bonanza, it would have been an appropriate speed.
He explained how in a tailwheel airplane if taxing too fast and brakes are applied heavily, the nose could go forward, possibly causing a prop strike.
Hearing constructive feedback is part of how experience is gained.
While the restorer was right, I had to take a step back to hear him. I needed to remove the emotion I was feeling from the situation to focus on the action discussed.
Learning never stops, the situations and teachers will change, but the act of learning never stops.