Night Rating advice!

[Blinkz]

Hey guys,
I'm going to be doing my night rating in 2 weeks time and so was just wondering if any of you experienced people could give me any advice on what to expect and any hints you feel would be useful!! :} I have to admit I'm quite nervous, firstly and mainly because I don't think flying at night in a SEP is very safe. Secondly I haven't flown since July and haven't done a XC since March :{ also I've not flown from the airfield I'm now based at, altho am going to have a cpl of day flights and club checkout before I do the night rating to get used to the area and hopefully brush up on my skills. Thanks in advance!!! :ok:

[Hour Builder]

Secondly I haven't flown since July and haven't done a XC since March

well you dont have to do XC on your own at night to get the rating! only with the instructor

also I've not flown from the airfield I'm now based at

its not that hard to fly in the circuit though, probably easier at night

[Flik Roll]

Well, for starters it will be dark :}

From the few bits of night flying I have done it is fun! Just relax and enjoy it!

[markflyer6580]

I have got one solo left to finish my night rating so not hugely experienced but here are my views:
I enjoy it immensley,and contrary to what some people say its not dangerous,the engine is not aware that it is dark!

I found judging distance whilst in the air the hardest part,you can see a lot further at night,and hence that cluster of lights off the wing is actually a large town 30 miles away,when you are looking at the chart thinking"there are no towns there!":eek:

I fly at a fairly large intl airport so there is a fine array of lights on the runway however even with just the PAPI's off i struggled to judge height/glidepath and ended up landing a long way down the runway first time!

I also found that as soon as landing light lit up runway enough that was the time to start the flare and let the runway meet me rather than fly in to it!
I'm sure everyone will have a different technique for that though and its probably no good with a short field.

It is an enjoyable rating with no exams etc and only 5 hours so I think everybody should do it even if it as an emergency get you home/to diversion aid.

Also you feel like a real pilot when all the lights are on:} :ok:

[Hour Builder]

I enjoy it immensley,and contrary to what people say its not dangerous,the engine is not aware that it is dark!

thats not really why everyone thinks its dangerous

It is an enjoyable rating with no exams etc and only 5 hours so I think everybody should do it even if it as an emergency get you home/to diversion aid.

i couldnt agree more with this comment though

[Blinkz]

thanks for the advice so far guys. Everyone always says that the engine doesn't know its dark, but that not what bothers me! IF the engine were to die (and its got the same chance are night then at anyother time!) you'd pretty much be buggered, unless in the circuit of an airfield. On a XC the chances are you won't be able to see anything so all you can do is aim for the black and hope, not how I like to fly!! And yes I've heard that if your engine dies you should turn on the landing light, and if you don't like what you see turn it off :p At least in the day you've got a sporting chance to get the thing down into a field, at night there just nothing you can do :confused:

Ah well, I've only gotta do 5 hrs :D

[Hour Builder]

Blinkz thats exactly what I was hinting at when replying to an earlier comment on this subject

[markflyer6580]

I know what you are getting at,and I know full well that trouble would be had after an engine faliure:eek:

I like to avoid thinking about these things(eternal optimist-you have to be if want an atpl!)I did however do a pfl,some stalls and steep turns today to stay sharp.
You could say that a very low hour multi pilot could get themselves in a whole world of sh1t if they had an engine faliure in the climbout at night-spin in etc is worse than a controlled descent in to a dark patch after single engine faliure I reckon,thats my view on things with regards to the safer in twin debate thats all,not trying to stir it up with the engine in the dark comment.

Good luck with your rating Blinkz and safe flying,you will enjoy it once you are up there:ok:

[Sven Sixtoo]

Given that the only stupid Q is the one you don't ask:

Have you sat in the cockpit and explored where all the switches are?

Especially the cockpit lighting switches?

With your eyes shut??



What are the electrical failure drills for your ac??

(The RAF found out entirely by accident a couple of years ago that its SAR training ac would lose the hoist and most of the external lights in the event of a single eng failure - how well do you know your elec system??)

Do you understand the implications of the statement "at night there is no VFR"?

Are you aware that the UK SAR service is on 45 mins readiness at night ( so if you come down in water you could easily be waiting long enough to die from cold unless you DRESS TO SURVIVE)


If you have an engine failure at night, and there is no suitable place to land, do you know how to fly min speed all the way to impact (given that if all else fails the slower your forward speed the more likely you are to survive the impact)?

But mostly enjoy it - the air is still, the world is calm, the radio is quiet, its a gorgeous time to be airborne.

Sven

[RatherBeFlying]

The nighttime engine failures are mostly running out of gas, often because there was nobody to buy gas from at the last a/p.

Weather is the one to watch out for and on a moonless night you don't know there's a cloud ahead until you're in it, even if the forecast promised "high scattered at FL330".

You want to be very comfortable with descending and\or turning on instruments at night. This is not the time of year to spend time in cloud as they mostly have ice.

Night takeoffs from rural airports with little in the way of lighting from habitation can present illusions that result in your flying into the ground -- the AH is key.

Getting low on approach and hitting something is easy to happen at night because of illusions -- fly a complete circuit.

North America has the advantage that you can be VFR on an airway with guaranteed terrain clearance and talking to ATC. At night ATC has time for VFR and it helps to be on radar if things go wrong.

On-off switches for avionics are often not lit at night. You may think you are quite familiar with a particular a/c until you find yourself in the dark trying to figure out how to get a particular radio or GPS working;)

[G-MANN]

Does anyone have any pics of their night flying trips??

G-MANN

[Deano777]

I'm finishing off my night rating tomorrow night with an hr's Nav so I will try and get my instructor to take some piccies just for you :) (wx permitting of course)

[High Wing Drifter]

All,

What's your take on torches? I use one of those little Maglites, very easy to hold and point in the general direction of the instruments and hold the yoke at the same time. The only trouble I found was that the red filter, that my instructor suggested I use, made all the red stuff on the chart like the roads, Ds, Ps and Class A became invisible (or virtuall so)! To avoid this and avoid white light I went for the orange filter which seems to work quite well.

[S-Works]

I use a chemical lightstick, 12hrs light hangs from the roof and costs me about £.50pence! Orange and green seem to work the best.

Who needs to look at the map, thats what a panel mount GPS is for........:cool: :ok:

[RatherBeFlying]

For some reason the cartographers were told that roads did not matter in night navigation -- perhaps in the days when the carriages only carried dim lanterns; so they made them red:\

Post war and blackouts, the headlamps improved and major roads show up quite well on the ground if not on the map:O

[n5296s]

Does anyone have any pics of their night flying trips??

I'd love to help, but it's always been dark when I've flown at night, so the pictures don't come out very well... :hmm:

In the US there is no night rating, it's part of the PPL. But you need to be reasonably comfortable with flying on instruments, at least to the extent that you can use the AI to stay straight and level, because at night, especially in cloudy weather (high overcast), the natural horizon may be misleading or non-existent. This fact had a fairly large influence on the development of popular music.

I fly at night when the trip needs it, but I can't say I'm super comfortable about it from the pov of what happens when the fan stops. Most of my night flying is done to keep currency.

n5296s

[RatherBeFlying]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/kennedy/story/0,2763,206557,00.html

http://www.aopa.org/asf/asfarticles/sp0009.html

[Justiciar]

All,
all the red stuff on the chart like the roads, Ds, Ps and Class A became invisible (or virtuall so)! To avoid this and avoid white light I went for the orange filter which seems to work quite well.

If you are planning a night trip, take a colour photocopy of the relevant section of the chart and then mark the principal features like roads, towns etc in black highlighter. It is very usefull for a quick visual reference (though obviously take the chart as well!)

I did the IMC before the Night Qualification and the blind flying exercises it made life much easier.

[fixa24]

I was taught to draw a mud map on a piece of paper, tracing over your chart, marking out towns, etc. i do mark roads near my track, because surprisingly you can make out cars sometimes. i also draw the highest terrain on the mud map, and positive points where i can revise my LSALT if applicable. CTA boundaries aswell. be awarethat the maps dont have to be super accurate, as the flight plan you've worked out before you go will be(hopefully).:}
i can agree that clouds are soooo hard to see at night, i didn't know i was in one until i popped out of it and saw some town lights... it wasn't forecast either.:eek:
as for torches, i have a small torch(about the size of your index finger) which i use during flight for those instruments which aren't well lit (most in old C172's). and i have a swivel head torch i put in my shirt pocket with the head pointing to ASI/AH, ready to be switched on if the lights go out.
at the start i had the problem of not wanting to stray too far from the field, so i was turning base way too soon, and so i was high on final all the time. Gets better with practice. I also found if you leave a smidgen of power on throughout the flare and touchdown, it makes things smoother.
most of all, have fun. its fantastic.:ok: :ok:

[Bob Stinger]

Take a torch!

[S-Works]

"I also found that as soon as landing light lit up runway enough that was the time to start the flare and let the runway meet me rather than fly in to it!"

Not a good idea, you should not flare until the lights look like they are around your ears, flaring so high as you suggest is courting disaster.

Chemical light sticks make great torches and they last around 12 hours. I bulk buy in packs of 25 for about £15 quid and always have a couple in the aircraft and a couple in my bag.

[markflyer6580]

Like I said everyone will have a different technique,and as you pointed out I find that when i see the runway well enough with the light,the edge lights are by my shoulders-crap landing light I guess!
Seems to work-grease it everytime:cool:

[S-Works]

Until you start visiting other airfields that have dirrent lighting configurations and different widths or until your landing light fails..........

I only have around 500hrs at night but I must have gone through a dozen landing lights on my plane in that time. They always fail at the worst moments. Try your technique without the landing light and PAPI's and see how smooth they are then!

[markflyer6580]

Tried without papi's still smooth........1km further down the runway:}
No landing light wasn't so bad,first attempt resulted in a trial flight style-sh1t theres the runway harsh flare-ballooon-bounce etc!
Then used lights at shoulder set up worked nice second time.
I find of the various faliures,no papis is the worst followed by no panel lights as you turn base no torch allowed-ANR headphones are not so good for judging engine revs:eek:

[S-Works]

We have no PAPIS at our strip, just a row of garden lights on a narrow short strip in the middle of nowhere. Blackhole syndrome is there for the unwary.

[markflyer6580]

Bet that takes some getting used to/finding:eek:

[FlyingForFun]

For what it's worth, I agree with Bose-x.

My students aren't allowed to have the landing light on for a night landing until they can land without it. Then I brief my students that we will turn the landing light on, but I want them to completely ignore it. Without exception, the first landing with the landing light on results in either flaring too early or too late, depending on how bright the landing light is on the particular aircraft. So I then remind the student to ignore the landing light, and landings after that are absolutely fine.

Difficult things at night, apart from landings, include visual navigation (it's not impossible, despite what some people on this thread have said, and it's very rewarding to get it right, but it is always useful to have navaids for backup). Then there are the visual illusions, which are no problem if you've got an instrument qualification, but a bit harder if you don't. Taxying at an unfamiliar airport at night is fun (particularly if they don't light up their taxyway signs, as I found out recently - it was only by blind luck that I found my way to the correct holding point!). And probably lots of other things that don't immediately spring to mind...

Enjoy it!

FFF
---------------

[S-Works]

GPS......... Why makes things difficult... :cool:

[RatherBeFlying]

The landing light on descent gives you a chance to spot a bird and duck before it hits your windshield. If you're lucky like I was, the windshield remains intact and the guck covers the other side. This makes it easier to recover to a normal attitude;)
Also useful for taxi and making self visible to other traffic.
As for the actual landing, the edge lights are far more important.
I suspect the regs generally require a working landing light when flying with pax.

[FlyingForFun]

RatherBeFlying,

No requirement for a landing light whatsoever in the UK ANO, certainly for private flights in light aircraft (<5700kg). I don't think there is for commercial flights in heavier aircraft either, but I can't be certain of that without looking it up.

FFF
-------------

[BroomstickPilot]

Blinkz,
This has proven to be an extremely interesting thread.
Do you think you might see your way to writing a 'Night Rating Diary' to tell us how you get on with your night rating?
I should certainly read this with interest, and I'm sure many others would also.
Best regards,
Broomstick.

[Blinkz]

Hey guys, thanks for all the advice. I'm busy revising for my first phase of ATPLs which I've got next week :eek: so have been busy revising. Broomstick, thats a good idea and yea I'll def do a diary of my exploits! I'm still abit uneasy about flying at night but I guess thats just the risk you have to take, I'll speak to my instructor about it and see what he says.