Looking To The Sky

Flight today was focused on more landings staying in the landing pattern of the Troutdale Aiport (KTTD) since the clouds were so low, I really couldn’t do much else.

The day consisted of 5 landings.  The first two were normal takeoffs and landings, and the last were short field take-offs and landings.

The idea of a short field take-off is taking off with a short runway or obstacles in the path.

A short field take off is done where you:

1. Get to the back edge of the runway giving you the most length of space.
2. Apply 10 degrees of flaps
3. Apply full brakes
4. Give full power
5. Release the brakes
6. Apply slight pitch forward for faster increase in speed
7. Begin roll-out
8. Pitch for 70mph
9. Once clear the obstacle, raise flaps
10. Pitch for 80mph and resume standard departure

Landing is pretty much the same as a normal landing, except you always use FULL flaps (some planes have 40 degrees of flaps and it’s generally used on judgement of the pilot).

More info can be found here: Short and Soft Field Takeoffs

Overall, most of my landings and takeoffs went well, just need to spend more time thinking through the landings and takeoff procedures.

Logs

Flight Time: 0.9 Hours
Landings: 5