Lesson 37

So finally Ive been submitted to take the oral exam of everything Ive learned to date.  Ive been studying and have just about all the acronyms committed to memory that I will need.  My instructor gave me a scenario in which I am to create a navigation log to submit as part of my oral exam.  It states that I have agreed to fly a friend to Tampa for an evening concert.  I will drive to Jacksonville and rent a Cirrus SR20.  Because of an airshow in the area and the incoming airplane traffic, it will be easier to fly VFR to Ocala, and then because of weather, file an IFR flight plan to Tampa.  So first thing first, I want to pick a route on my charts.  Looks like I'm going to fly west then south.  Looking at the weather and the winds and temperatures aloft report, I chose 4500 feet.  The only thing I really need help on is calculating how long it will take for me to attain my top of climb and the distance.  I headed for the Learning Center where I found a free tutor (the commercial students volunteer their time in the Learning Center to whoever needs it as a way to show they want to be a CFI (Certified Flight Instructor)).  He guided me for both the IFR and the VFR top of climbs and I did the rest.  

1pm came and I met with the examiner... the same one I had for lesson 16.  It is known he is pretty lenient and easy to please.  Though I have found I get more nervous for an oral exam than I do with a written test.  We started with Certs and Docs.  I knocked that out of the park easy.  We went to Airworthiness where again I did just fine.  Next we went to weather.  We went over to the Operations building to access our weather computers.  He showed me a few charts, asked about cold fronts and warm fronts, and isobars, which were no problem.  He asked me to read off a few text weather products from various reporting stations around the country.  One that was particularly interesting was I think Mount Washington's observation service, which unlike most stations can report clouds below the station and from what he told me can place visibility anywhere from 0 to 120 statute miles.  You don't normally see anything over 10SM visibility.  Today fortunately didn't have a whole lot of weird weather, so I got through it pretty well.  

Next we were back in the exam room where we went over the cross country flight planning.  He liked my work on the nav logs, and we went on to airspace.  I could feel my brain freezing up.  He even did exactly what my instructor had done with me the day before.  He went along the same route I chose for my nav log and asked me what airspace I was in at certain points on the charts. Then would ask me what the cloud clearances (how far away you have to keep yourself away from the clouds while flying in VFR conditions) and I blanked.  My mind went to mush.  I didn't want to guess, and I started looking in my books for the answers.  Which, even though these orals are open book, with cloud clearances I really should have this in memory.  He apologized but said he couldn't pass me on airspace, but the flight planning was solid.  I'm about halfway through the oral, but because I took my time answering all his questions, we didn't have enough time to complete the oral.  So for the remaining topics, I will do them another day and this time I will be ready for airspace.

My instructor was pretty happy with my results but disappointed as was I with the airspace section.  We decided to meet the next day to go over it for an hour of groundwork.  

Friday came and I went in to see the head instructor to let him know how I did.  I told him I was happy with the results as I knew I was a little shaky with the airspace to begin with.  He then mentioned I will more than likely be keeping my instructor, but for the next two weeks will have someone different since my current CFI will be getting married and on his honeymoon.  I told him that was fine and if I could have him back when he returned that was even better. 

With all that I'm pretty happy with my results so far.  My instructor thought the most difficult parts were out of the way. So we shall see what  St. Joseph of Cupertino and St. Thérèse of Lisieux (Patron Saints of pilots) have in store for me next.