Desert Pilot Podcast

This cockpit audio was recorded at least 2 1/2 years ago I don't really know. I just found it going through my computer and decided to share. I'm flying 3 touch-n-gos and have 2 other pilots in the plane with me. Dave an instructor and another buddy of mine who is a private pilot in the back seat. 3 pilots in an airplane is always fun. Download the podcast here

This last week I went flying for the Civil Air Patrol (CAP). Unlike most days in Arizona where the skies are clear or maybe just some high stratus clouds in the flight levels we had a low level cloud layer. It was a cloud layer from about 6000 to 10000 feet of nice fluffy cumulus clouds. I had never flown above a cloud layer that I could not see the ground. It was a little disconcerting at first but it was nothing after awhile and fun. Here are a few pics from the flight.

This last Wednesday morning I did my first Civil Air Patrol cadet Orientation Flight (or O flight). Three 13 year-old cadet boys and I went off for a 2 hour flight making 2 stops letting each cadet taking turns in the front seat flying. Each cadet gets 5 of these in CAP. First stop was Case Grande, second was Coolidge airport. When we landed we saw a DC-4 on the ramp fueling up. We got out and walked over to it. You don't see a DC-4 everyday and after talking with the pilot we learned that some one had bought the old plane that had been at Coolidge for years and they were ferrying it up to Anchorage, Alaska. They let us climb inside and take a look around. It going to be used to hall fuel to small towns in the bush in Alaska. I only had my cell phone for pictures so they are not that great but cool none the less. me and the three cadets. These are the big tank they had in the back to hall the fuel. UPDATE 6/13/10 : I got sent some more pics from a little better camera so I tho...

I did another funded Civil Air Patrol (CAP) flight this last week. Instead of taking my audio recorder this time I decided to shoot some video. I shot video in the past with the video function on my camera but I've since gone out and bought a Kodak Zi8 that shoots HD. I'm still getting used to all the settings that I has. The video I shot for this flight was not the best that I think the camera can shoot. The morning shots seem to be fine but the prop wash seems to get really bad later in the day. I'm going to try to mount it in some different locations in the plane and see what works best. Because the shots were so different I didn't edit a nice video I just put some of the raw shots on the web.

This week I went on a  Civil Air Patrol  flight. This mission was really awesome it was to go out and have the Air Force practice intercepting us. I was flying scanner and finished the scanner training up. Here are a few photos from the flight.

I talked about how I was checked out to to fly the CAP aircraft on my own time and I am but I'm going for mission pilot. In order to start the training for mission you have to finish 2 flights as scanner he is the guy in the back behind the pilot looking for things below. On the 1st I took a mission. It was early, like 4:30am in the morning, we flew south of Gila Bend and in the interest of OpSec we'll keep it at that what we did. All you need to know that it was fun and am just a little closer to mission pilot. The bird early in the morning. flying out out the back beautiful morning sunrise Me backseat flying

Got my first free flying "mission" with CAP today. It wasn't a lot it was a short 20min flight from Chandler to Deer Valley airport and back. I shared the flight with 2 others so I only flew on the way back. All the pics I took from the back seat on the way there. I hadn't been in the back for about 6-7 years. The pic below is some of the CAP planes in a row before we left at Deer Valley and it looked cool. Here is what we flew. I think I would fly around the valley when I do it again because of all the extra radios that are in the CAP airplane there was tons of static and radio interference around south mt. (two peaks on the map) from all the radio towers on top. the flag on my shoulder me Chandler tower flying over Stellar airpark south mountain this is a military center of some sort the radar gave it a away but I'm not quiet sure, looks army Deer Valley's brand new tower At Deer Valley we had a few hour class about mountain flying it was very infor...

This morning I took my Form 5 checkride and passed. A few weeks ago I talked about how I had joined the Civil Air Patrol (CAP) and am having a blast. There is a link on the side bar too. I joined to help build my flight hours and also the idea of low-level search and rescue (SAR) sounds fun to me too. Today was the first step to be coming a SAR mission pilot I took what is called the Form 5 flight evaluation which basically lets everyone know that you are serious about flying for CAP. What it is, is a mini private pilot checkride that is very relaxed. What we did was took-off from Chandler and stayed over the farm fields between there and Casa Grande. Did some things like steep turns, stalls, turns around a point, and landings. I didn't do everything perfect (maybe I'm too hard on myself) but I thought I did well and my instructor did too and passed me. Like I said this is just the first step. Getting the Form 5 means I can rent a CAP plane if I want which I pay and I can also...

View CHD-GEU in a larger map So I thought I would try out some thing new, this a map of roughly where I flew today. It was just a quick flight to Glendale Airport. As you can see I can't fly straight there because of the airspace over Phoenix it is just easier to fly around it all. In the last few weeks I've joined the Civil Air Patrol . There is a squadron (305) out of Falcon Field in Mesa . I joined because they do a lot of cool "missions" like search and rescue, homeland security, and in AZ help out with things on the border. You don't have to be a pilot to join and there are lots of different things people do on the ground and in the air that don't require a pilots license. But if you are a pilot the deal is even better because you can get the government to pay for your flying, in other words free flight hours. and for a pilot like me just starting out that is as good as money. The Civil Air Patrol or CAP is funded partly by the Air Force and they overse...