Mistakes? No, no, no. These are learning opportunities..

“Why isn’t the runway getting any bigger?” was the thought that was currently screaming through my mind whilst I crawled forwards at a painfully slow pace feeling more like a salmon trying to reach the sanctuary of calmer waters at the top of a waterfall, than a pilot.

“G-AB, Final” called the pilot of the one ton PA28 right behind me who I guessed was probably making at least 75 knots compared to my current tortoise like pace.

I was a little worried at this point.  Not scared or anything, but concerned that I might end up causing ‘G-AB Heavy’ to go around by not clearing the runway in time.

“You know how much more fuel those GA aircraft use” chipped in the annoying voice of my inner Catholic guilt.  Not that I am a Catholic, but my Mum is and I guess I get it from her.

Anyway guilt or no guilt, the runway was still where it had been a minute ago and so I was concentrating on making a good stable approach into the 14 knot headwind, which was, fortuitously (depending on your point of view) blowing almost directly down Sleap’s runway 23.

It was about this time that I realised I’d made my third mistake of the day, well technically it was my second, but the very fact I was in the circuit at Sleap meant that my third mistake was inevitable.  More on that later.

So, Mistake 2/3*

I was lined up, wind straight down the runway, gusting a little, not too much, but it was a very strong wind. I had deployed full flap.  In retrospect, and indeed when I performed the inevitable go-around shortly afterwards, there was no need to deploy the barn doors given my relative ground speed, I should’ve stuck with first stage, or even done a flapless approach, its not like I need the half a mile of runway 23 to land an Ikarus.

* delete as appropriate

After an approach during which I could have watched the entirety of Peter Jackson’s ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy, yes it really did feel that long, I finally crossed the threshold. I guess I was at about 25 feet, which was fine but I wasn’t really losing any speed.  Eventually, however, Romeo Zulu did begin to settle towards the runway.

I relaxed a little.

Thoughts of impending bacon and egg sandwiches and a refreshing cup of tea filled my mind.  Naturally, this is of course the exact moment that a nicely timed gust of wind blew any thoughts of bacon sarnie straight down the runway, filled my wings with lift and sent me floating towards the clouds.  By this point I was already quite close to touchdown speed, and so as I peered down at the earth that was now far beneath me I had no hesitation in selecting full power, raising the nose and climbing back towards the circuit, whilst at the same time closing the barn doors.

“Oh well, at least I wont cause G-AB to go around now” I smiled inwardly.

“G-AB going around” announced the radio.

The irony.  And I refer to the real definition of the word here Ms Morissette, not just the bad luck that you lament in your now (in)famous song…

I had been well clear of the runway, having never actually touched it and was well into the climb out when that call was made.  I mentally shrugged and assumed the unfortunate pilot behind me must have experienced a similar change in wind velocity as I had.

Second time around I had flown a good circuit, made an earlier turn onto Base to avoid the long drag towards the runway and turned final.  This time I selected only one stage of flap and the runway, reassuringly, continued to get bigger at a much more satisfactory speed this time.

I called final and focussed.

“G-AB Final”

Oh for goodness sake, not again…

I kept my attention on the runway, the air speed, the runway, the airspeed..

The words that had been drummed into me during my training floated to the surface of my mind.

“What are the 3 most important things on final approach Danny?”

“Airspeed, airspeed and airspeed”

Well my airspeed was good, 62 knots, a little extra to help cope with the gusty wind.

This time I crossed the threshold at about 10 feet, and slowly rounded out.

I was floating a lot though and was almost at the intersection of the two main runways when I finally touched down.  This meant I had to backtrack by the time I’d slowed down and, you guessed it.

“G-AB going around”

Oops, sorry my bad.  I did do my best to get out of the way.

A short while afterwards whilst I was munching happily on my gluten free bacon and egg sandwich I caught site of the pilots of the PA28 as they entered the café.  It was a student and instructor out of Liverpool, presumably here to practice circuits, touch and go’s, and, erm, go-arounds…

Rewinding the story a little, my first/second* mistake had occurred earlier in the flight when I had made one of my seemingly endless list of radio errors. Unusually this one was not related to phraseology though!

I had passed by Ashcroft airfield and cleared the Manchester zone so at this point I made a gentle turn onto my southerly heading for Sleap.  Pushing the throttle to the stop and climbing up to around 2200 feet I confidently switched frequencies from Manchester to Shawbury Radar, not forgetting to select VFR on the transponder first.

I paused.

Composed the radio call in my mind.

Then I thumbed the PTT.

“Shawbury Radar this is Golf Charlie India Romeo Zulu request basic service and MATZ transit”

I felt like a Radio God.

“Golf Charlie………………………………………….Zulu, squawk……………………pass…………………………………………….” – was the garbled reply I received.

Ah, best to put my Radio God badge on hold for now.

“Golf Charlie India Romeo Zulu, erm, um, readability 2, say again” I replied whilst I frantically tried to remember what the different readability levels meant from that must read CAA publication with the catchy title; CAP413.

5 is definitely all good, and 1 is basically, I can’t hear you at all, from what I remembered.

Happily it turns out I picked the correct definition as I looked it up the other day during my bedtime read of CAP413, doesn’t everyone do that?

2 = Readable now and then.

Eventually I managed to get my message across and understood the gist of what the patient controller was trying to tell me, which was to basically continue on my current track and report the airfield in sight.

The lesson here? Don’t call up ground stations until you are at least in the same county as their transmitters.

Anyway back to the controversial third/first* mistake.

I was scorching back to Barton, registering a ground speed of 100 knots several times on the GPS, due to the very powerful south westerly wind that had now seemingly made its way north.

As I arrived in the circuit I noted the windsock.  The same windsock that had hung limply as I departed less than 2 hours earlier on. So limply in fact, that it looked like it had as much life in it as I do pre-9am and without the pre-requisite four caffeine shots.

It was flickering between straight out (15 knots) and slightly, erm, erect, which I think is probably about 10 knots. It was also swinging around like the ball on one of those swingball tennis games that we all had in the garden as kids. You know the ones where your parents made comments like “ahh look the children are playing nicely”, but really you were just trying to knock your brothers head off by hitting the ball at a speed approaching mach 1.

Or was that just me?

Oh sorry Matt..

Anyway, the point here is that I had a more challenging landing than I had anticipated due to me not reading the conditions with as much diligence as I should.  There was nothing wrong with my landing, in fact it was very good, but I don’t think I should have been so surprised at the change in the wind direction and speed.

I guess a lot can happen in 2 hours, ask any Premier League football manager.

So was it two mistakes? Or really three?

Two weeks later the jury is still out, but what I do know is that learning occurred. And every flight that gives me more experience makes me a better pilot.

Long may it continue!