Flying IFR - Lesson 34 - Mostly Better

 I was flying N5337F today so no airplane issues, which is nice.

Good prelfight and was told we would do Troy Runway 9 circle to 27, followed by Flint's ILS 27 and VOR 36 circle to 27 and then Pontiac's ILS Back course 27L partial panel.

So got the clearance and it would be a bit sporty with crosswinds from 340 at 17-22 and a cloud layer around 3,000. 

Good takeoff and off to Troy we went.  The hold procedure at Celub comes up really fast as you're elaving Pontiac so you're scrambling to stay ahead of the process.

I correctly identified the hold entry and did the hold just fine.  Direct so not a big deal, but yay anyways.  Lots of wind pushing the plane around.  Did the approach complete with the circle and then went missed when I was 20 feet or so over the runway.

Then on to Flint so I had time to setup for the full ILS 27 procedure, begging with the hold.  Correctly identified the proper entry (teardrop this time) and did it correctly. So I may have just figured out holds.

I did the hold so well that Great Lakes Approach asked me to do it again for spacing, and I obliged and suspended the approach.

Then on to the approahc, very windy so a pain to keep the localizer centered but I got it down and had a good glidescope and a nice approach.

Then we did the VOR 36 and that went pretty well including setting the timer and everything else necessary for the approach.  Still very windy and shifty winds too.  

Back to Pontiac and Kevin turned off the G5s, zapping the Attitude indicator and HSI, leaving me to use the VOR receiver and compass for the approach.  

Kinda tricky.  You have to be on the localizer frequency but also tune in the Salem VOR on the same VOR unit as when you cross the Salem VOR radial you're at the final approach fix. Kinda more complicated flying it partial panel than with  fully functioning G5s.  Did it though with the reverse sensing and not screwing it up, did a nice landing.

Overall the remaining issue is I'm over-controlling the plane and need to lighten up, so the next few lessons will be in the simulator (Yay save money!, But boo oversensitive simulator).  

Just got to knockout the written and I'm ploughing through the study materials as both carefully and fast as I can.  Some questions are just a major pain in the you know what.

That's 2.0 with 1.3 simulated and .5 actual, 4 approaches, 2 holds and 1 nice landing.

Sunday Match Day

The day began walking Piper at 0600.  I swear, she has an alarm clock in her butt, as she's up like clockwork. As I walked her, fog began forming until visibility dropped rather impressively.

 

I then walked Jett and after that had breakfast and headed out in the fog to Wayne County Racoon Hunters for what is likely the last outdoor match of the season. 

The fog had pretty much blown out by the time I arrived, and it was sweater weather with the last stage getting some rain.

Our squad was a little small as we had two last-minute cancellations.   Kept us busy pasting targets, and I was scorekeeper for a fair bit of the match which is fun to do. 

Two Master-class shooters were in the squad, and to say they were good is an understatement. Very neat to see how they analyzed stages and figured out the most efficient way to shoot them. Both were super nice and helpful, and gave lots of good advice on analyzing and shooting a stage. 

Happy to note I did well, at least for me, in this match.  Certainly the pre-stage coaching helped, as did observing how the Master-class shooters tackled the stages. 

 There were certainly some fun stages, such as this unloaded table start with two separate shooting boxes:

Still, I put in a C-class performance but I felt I improved.  

On the last stage I got as re-shoot due to range equipment failure.  Someone had setup the popper that triggered one of two swingers but had installed the stick backwards.  Instead of the popper pulling the stick when it fell, the stick kept the popper up and stopped the swinger from swinging. Oops.  Good thing I had brought enough ammo.  On the upside, getting to shoot that stage again did improve my performance with the first one acting as a live fire practice as the swingers were the last targets in that stage.  So, that worked out well.

A very fun match and I learned quite a bit.  Still an absolute ton to improve on.

Mixed Messages From The Educational Establishment

There's very mixed messages coming out the of educational establishment.

On the one hand, parents are told their involvement in education is absolutely crucial:

Parent involvement in a child's education is crucial. When parents get involved in their children's education, children are more likely to do better in school, be better behaved, have more positive attitudes toward school, and grow up to be more successful in life.

On the other hand, parents are being told, rather vociferously, not to be involved.

If you try to learn what your children are actually learning, or dare opine against the current agenda of their being ideologically programmed, or dare try to have a say in what is being taught, or are concerned about school safety issues, then not only should you not be involved, but by doing so you're branded a likely domestic terrorist.

The National School Boards Association is now trying to walk back the unfounded accusations in their letter that led to the DOJ stating it would investigate parents who dared opine about the goings on at school board meetings, but the damage has been done.  Curiously their apology letter is not readily visible on their website. But, looking at the NSBA's website, its rather clear their agenda is less one towards education and more pushing the progressive agenda on kids and this nation.

Parents certainly do have a role in their children's education, and the need for more parental action and supervision over those who are setting the agenda for their children's education is now more apparent than ever before.

A Great Jitsu Seminar

Went to a Jiu Jitsu seminar today at our training center.

The visiting instructor was black belt Evandro Nunes.

A Brazilian, he's rather tall, and he's been a successful BJJ fighter and is now one of the top instructors for Gracie Survival Tactics  - A Gracie Jiu Jitsu program tailored for law enforcement usage.

Very effective stuff and excellent hand to hand training police to be able to control bad guys using technique rather than brute strength.

He began  the seminar with a brief intro and then asked what we were interested in learning. From a few questions he put together a 2-hour seminar on the fly. His technique looks effortless and amazing smooth, and all his years of practice are very evident.

It began with guard passing techniques and a philosophical approach to passing guard.  The idea is to have less focus on forcing a pass but instead more on first observing what your opponent is trying to do, and then move from safe  position to the next safe position and finally to a position where the opponent almost prefers that you pass their guard.

From there, we did some choke techniques and I'm happy to say I've now learned how to do the Anaconda choke, which is impressively nasty.  Basically if someone tries to get you off of mount position or knee on belly the wrong way they open themselves up for an Anaconda attack.  Much fun. I need more practice with it to really get it locked in, it but it's one heckuva neat technique. 

We then moved on to answers to knee on belly and how to either adjust to reduce the effectiveness of the technique or sweep someone doing a knee on belly technique.  Very fun stuff, and I need to work on that.

Finally we finished with a defense from a knife attack whether the attacker is below us or mounted on us. Good technique to control the attacking arm.  Downside is you likely are going to get stabbed and possibly more than once if someone pulls a knife in an entangled fight, but having some answer to it is better than nothing. 

A great seminar and I learned a ton in 2 hours.  Then we did some rolling which was a lot of fun and we got to try out some of the techniques we had learned.

Evandro is a super skilled and talented instructor and a super nice guy.  Great instructor with an excellent teaching manner. 

Did I mention he's really tall?

He's a great guy and I look forward to him visiting and holding another seminar soon.

Flying IFR - Lesson 33 - Could Do Better

For this lesson to my surprise I had DCT's chief instructor checking me out to see how I was doing.

Had N1689H and yes, the seat slipped yet again, the seat was also stuck too high up, and the tachometer is funky and  not goving proper readings.  On top of that, the yoke is a bit off center rig-wise.

In short not the best plane to be in for this check-up. 

So yep, everything started off a little off and went on from there.

Took off in a nice 10 knot direct crosswind which wasn't too bad.

Headed for Flint and did the ILS 27 which went pretty well and I figured out the hold but got thrown a bit by what the GPS was telling me to do for the hold, but it worked out ok.    Good descent but was over-controlling and chasing a bit.

Then on to the RNAV 27 approach with a hold it went very well, knew what the entry would be, and even as I had to do a hold a second time for traffic separation which was a bit unexpected it went ok.  Decent approach and landing.  In short I think I've got knowing what the hold entry will be down, need to perfect the actual entry and intercept itself still.

Then as a surprise he added a VOR 36 approach, so I had to retrieve that plate from inside Foreflight as I was being vectored to it, and he then turned off the attitude and heading indicators which he had me do it partial panel as I had been using the VOR 2 just to keep track of the missed headings after each approach and had been expecting to head back to Pontiac. F'ing great timing on that.

This did not go well.  I setup VOR 2 quickly but the controller dumped me off too far west of the approach and it was a massive pain to get back onto the approach course and was a complete mess.  Finished it up and went missed. Interesting miss, as the missed approach point is when the VOR flips from From to To.  However that flip occurs when you're well past the runway. Fun  to watch anyways.  Not a particularly enjoyable surprise approach.

Then back to Pontiac for the Localizer Back Course 27L with a lot of vector changes due to traffic and an expedited climb request to add to the fun. He then gave me back the heading and attitude indicators for the approach and I did it ok, but came in on final rather high but did a very nice landing. A very long taxi back from 27L due to all the construction and done.

Overall, per the chief instructor I apparently know what I'm doing but I was really over-controlling the aircraft. I really need to refuse to fly in N1869H.

Feels like 1 step forward and 1 step back.  Certainly not as great a flight as last Friday. Definitely in the F stands for Frustration in IFR stage.

That's 2.0, 1.8 simulated, 4 approaches, and 1 really great landing.

When You Get What You Want Good And Hard

Some progressives are slowly figuring out that when you defund the police and decide not to prosecute crime, crime for some reason, totally unknown to these folks, rises.

The Detroit News: 'A dangerous time': Portland, Oregon, sees record homicides

“People should be leery because this is a dangerous time,” said Lionel Irving Jr., a lifelong Portland resident and a gang outreach worker.

Portland’s police department is struggling to keep up amid an acute staffing shortage and budget cuts. Now, Oregon's largest city is implementing novel solutions aimed at improving safety, including adding traffic barrels to prevent drive-by shootings and suspending minor traffic stops so officers can focus on immediate threats.

Well,  when you embolden criminals and hamstring police in the name of social justice, don't be surprised that you will get neither actual justice nor peace and instead get criminals running amok.

Portland wanted it, and now they got it.  Let's see if they can learn from it at all.

So, What Was The Baby Launched From And How Fast Was It Going At the Time?

Headline writing can be messy. Here, the author of the headline has a baby becoming a rather deadly projectile and no editor picks up that the headline may be a tad off:

The Detroit News: Pair fatally shot with baby in car at Detroit gas station

Reading on, it appears the deceased were not, in fact, shot with a baby.

Rather the baby was in the car with them when they were shot at the gas station.

Getting gas in Detroit at night is a rather hazardous undertaking, and I would highly discourage anyone from doing so.

Detroit's murder and crime rate has certainly not declined, and in this woke era of "Defund the Police" and it's concomitant disrespect for law and order, it has, if anything increased.

Not Flying - Can You Hold, Please?

 Today was "Let's fix Aaron's inability to do holds day".

About time I took on this major source of frustration.

Discussed holds for a bit and then hit the simulator.

Started with some holds at Flint, did Troy and Saginaw too just for fun.

Working on it and drawing out the holds while flying as well as figuring out what I was doing wrong all the while.

I think I've finally got it and can now figure out what kind of hold entry it will be while in the plane.

 Next, I then got help and fixed and figured out how to actually do the teardrop and parallel entries strictly on my own without the GPS providing directions.

Very productive use of time this lesson, and I even got better flying the simulator.  

Looks like I just fixed the biggest problem I've been having.  We will do some actual holds in the plane on Friday to see if I've got it down.

That's 2.1 Ground Trainer, 2.1 Simulated Instrument, and 9 holds.

Move Over Murder Hornets, Make Way For Attack Deer

Just when you think the year won't get much weirder, we have the case of the Michigan attack deer.

The Detroit Free Press: 'I thought I was going to die': Woman attacked by deer in front yard, saved by son

 

Let's Go Brandon Meme Travels Across The Northern Border

This is rather interesting:

Canadian federal government public servants may no longer send in written form, including email, colloquialisms with double entendres that may be considered "offensive"  and most especially they cannot write: "Let's Go Brandon" which was most specifically called out.

 

Interesting as one must wonder how many Canadian federal government workers  are ticked off enough at the Biden admin over everything from the Us/Canada Border to Keystone, to Afghanistan, to be writing Let's Go Brandon in their missives for this to be an issue that gets into a memo.

Also interesting as how the Public Service Alliance of Canada, the union for the same bureaucrats is, per the letter, fully on board with their members being terminated immediately without recourse for something as simple as a double entendre or Let's Go Brandon.    If I were one of their members, I'd be rather cross at this lack of appropriate representation.