cleared for approach

At long last, I am happy to announce some progress in the friendly skies.

I passed my instrument instructor's exam Monday afternoon, which has all sorts of positive ramifications. It's probably the most important thing I've done since I started all this pilot stuff two years ago, so excuse me while I pat myself on the back here for a few graphs.

This basically means I can instruct instrument students in addition to private and commercial students. It also should give me a leg up in finding a job instructing, which I plan to seek immediately.

There has been a ton of maniac-esque studying over the last seven or eight weeks leading to Monday's exam, which explains the sluggish pace of my recent posts here.

The exam started with the written test about three weeks ago. That went well.

On the flight, we headed north out of JeffCo and accomplished a constant airspeed climb to start, timed and compass turns, unusual attitude recovery, holding procedures. Then we did a non-precision GPS approach at Erie, and concluded the checkride with an ILS back to JeffCo.

My old instructor Andrew, who now flies for SkyWest, was on his way up to Rapid City when we switched frequency onto Denver Approach. He knew I was doing my checkride, and he gave me a "Go Pete" that was much appreciated. Hard core, Andrew!

After it was all over, the only downside was I had to pretty much go straight to work. Nontheless, I had a shit-eating grin on my face which will stay lodged there for several days.

So the moral of this story is if you know anyone in the Denver area who needs a good flight instructor, pass my name along, as I am shilling for students.

I will, of course, leave a slot open for Local Shill on my schedule the next time he's in town. Our last flight together out of Teterboro was a memorable one.