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Thread: Almost Solo!
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Old 26th June 2002 | 10:20
  #12 (permalink)  
Don D Cake
 
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 120
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From: St Albans, herts, UK
Eight weeks ago I was despairing that I would never be able to land an aircraft. I almost gave up. I was flaring too high and bouncing or just ballooning. Then on one circuit at about 20 feet AGL, I saw my hand pulling the control column back. I wasn't consciously telling my hand to do it but it sure was happening. I think I was subconsciously terrified of flying into the ground. On the next circuit I made a determined effort not to pull back to early and I landed, not perfectly but i was reasonable. Over the next couple of weeks I made a dramatic improvement in my landings and a couple of weeks ago I soloed.

The first solo was actually quite easy. I was concentrating so much that I didn't have time to get scared. I felt quite nervous as I rolled down the runway to take off but once I had rotated I thought "You're the only person that can land this a/c now, get on with it"

Don't be frustrated, it'll come.

Now if I could only fly straight and level whilst looking at a map....
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