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wabpilot · 12-19-2007, 22:09 PM

Worst flight I ever had was one where I was giving an IFR phase check to a student. Not my student BTW. His instructor came to me and clued me in that the student was having a tough time with partial panel work, but was refusing to acknowledge his problem. Thus, he was not progressing at all.

The pre-flight was all well and good. In the TF-9F, the instrument student flies from in back with curtins all around. Those make it impossible to peek out. Because the student is in back and all curtined in, the instructor has to taxi, takeoff and land. Although in theory with a GCA the student should be able to at least land the aircraft safely. In theory at least.

I taxied out, took off and handed the aircraft over to the student. I told him to climb to FL200, while maintaining a constant 250 knots indicated below 10,000 feet. He did that well. Right on 250 KIAS. As he passed through 10,000, I amended his instructions and told him to level off at 14,000 on a heading of 200 degrees. He did that perfectly. I was beginning to wonder about my fellow instructor. I had him do some precision turns. Each turn was well done. Then I gave him a couple of climbing turns and descending turns. It all looked good. He was definitely on track to pass the phase check.

The final task was partial panel. The TF-9F had an electric attitude indicator in back that could be disabled from the front without disabling the front attitude indicator. And, the TF-9F did not have a warning light in back, just a little flag on the indicator. I turned off the AI. Then things got wild!

The student proceeded to follow the AI as it wound down. Periodically he would realize his other instruments were not in agreement, including the battery powered AI. (To be fair, the battery powered AI was a little gauge about half the size of the main AI.) Thus, he would try to recover leading to some very interesting unusual attitudes. Unusual attitudes that Mr. Grumman never envisioned for his little trainer jet, or any other airplane known to man. We rocketed from 10,000 to 20,000, rolled inverted, almost stalled, then did a snap roll. Finally, I took over the plane and told the student to take down the curtins and look out. We were inverted, at almost minimum controllable airspeed in a climb. A lot of silence from the back seat, and then an "oh sierra" from the student.

I got the nose down and rolled us back to the upright. And then, I flew us home. I had no intention of letting that student touch the stick with me in the plane again.

The student finally realized that he was not passing the partial panel phase, and he shaped up. I gave him another phase check and he did partial panel just fine. So, all's well that ends well. We never did get that TF-9F back from the NARF though.

12-19-2007, 22:09 PM	#10 (permalink)
wabpilot *Military Professional* Join Date: 12-05-03 Location: Commuting between Dresden and Ft. Worth Posts: 558 Country:	Worst flight I ever had was one where I was giving an IFR phase check to a student. Not my student BTW. His instructor came to me and clued me in that the student was having a tough time with partial panel work, but was refusing to acknowledge his problem. Thus, he was not progressing at all. The pre-flight was all well and good. In the TF-9F, the instrument student flies from in back with curtins all around. Those make it impossible to peek out. Because the student is in back and all curtined in, the instructor has to taxi, takeoff and land. Although in theory with a GCA the student should be able to at least land the aircraft safely. In theory at least. I taxied out, took off and handed the aircraft over to the student. I told him to climb to FL200, while maintaining a constant 250 knots indicated below 10,000 feet. He did that well. Right on 250 KIAS. As he passed through 10,000, I amended his instructions and told him to level off at 14,000 on a heading of 200 degrees. He did that perfectly. I was beginning to wonder about my fellow instructor. I had him do some precision turns. Each turn was well done. Then I gave him a couple of climbing turns and descending turns. It all looked good. He was definitely on track to pass the phase check. The final task was partial panel. The TF-9F had an electric attitude indicator in back that could be disabled from the front without disabling the front attitude indicator. And, the TF-9F did not have a warning light in back, just a little flag on the indicator. I turned off the AI. Then things got wild! The student proceeded to follow the AI as it wound down. Periodically he would realize his other instruments were not in agreement, including the battery powered AI. (To be fair, the battery powered AI was a little gauge about half the size of the main AI.) Thus, he would try to recover leading to some very interesting unusual attitudes. Unusual attitudes that Mr. Grumman never envisioned for his little trainer jet, or any other airplane known to man. We rocketed from 10,000 to 20,000, rolled inverted, almost stalled, then did a snap roll. Finally, I took over the plane and told the student to take down the curtins and look out. We were inverted, at almost minimum controllable airspeed in a climb. A lot of silence from the back seat, and then an "oh sierra" from the student. I got the nose down and rolled us back to the upright. And then, I flew us home. I had no intention of letting that student touch the stick with me in the plane again. The student finally realized that he was not passing the partial panel phase, and he shaped up. I gave him another phase check and he did partial panel just fine. So, all's well that ends well. We never did get that TF-9F back from the NARF though.