Category: Learning to fly helicopters

Note: “Alternative version” – I just could NOT get it down right. I went round and round the houses, struggling to say something. I just could NOT get it down the way I wanted on paper. So… in the end, here are BOTH versions of Chapter 7. Maybe the kind reader, between the two versions…

“I am a small Man, limited and struggling, but the Universe is my Father “ Learning to Fly Helicopters Ch.7 “Joy, Caution, and Tragedy” I have been scribbling stuff all my life. But some chapters, some stories, have waited many decades to be written. Many are still… waiting. I don’t quite know why. Reluctance, for…

It is our dreams that sustain us, and carry us forwards Learning to Fly Helicopters Ch.6 General Flight Test and Beyond The Great Day had dawned. The written exams were all passed. The required flight hours and training had been accomplished. There remained only the GFT. The General Flight Test. That I would be flying…

Learning to fly helicopters Ch. 5 “oh, oh, oops…! Sorry…!” And so it came to pass that I turned up at an airfield that I had not previously been to. Innocently, full of the best intentions, I proceeded on down to land. High time fixed wing pilot, fixed wing CFII, low time helicopter student pilot.…

Learning to fly Helicopters Ch. 4 “Auto-tribulations ” (For Sam Mohring, because he said he’d like a sequel…) It was several more months before I could get back to California. This time I turned up with a very different attitude. Gone were the doubts. In their place was a lot more confidence. Confidence in the…

Learning to Fly Helicopters Part 3: “First Solo” (in a Helicopter) The irony for me of course was the fact that I had, myself, in previous life, sent many a fixed wing student pilot off on his or her first solo. And it was always I who, as the (h)airplane instructor, had watched (anxiously) as…

Learning to Fly Helicopters Part 2: “Do I trust this Thing?” The Robinson R-22… Long time ago. Early model days. Old fashioned twist grip, no governor, straight tail. I was suspicious, still, about the mechanical integrity of the beast. It looked so flimsy. Like a bunch of surplus tin cans beat roughly into shape. Now…

Learning to fly Helicopters Part 1: Seduction When a chap has already logged several thousand hours fixed wing, and then starts getting involved with helicopters, people will ask ‘why?’. When on top of that, he has previously been unkind about helicopters, people will be doubly intrigued. My quiet opinion, along with a great many fixed…