mooneygirl

Thank goodness for that air frame. #TexasStrong https://www.pe.com/2018/01/17/small-plane-crashes-in-parking-lot-of-santas-villege-in-sky-forest-no-major-injuries/ A small plane carrying four people crashed Wednesday morning in the parking lot of Santa’s Village in Skyforest, the San Bernardino County Fire Department said. The plane, which the Federal Aviation Association registry identifies as a Mooney M20E, crashed about 11:30 a.m., fire department spokesman Eric Sherwin said. All four people — a pilot and three passengers — walked away with minor to moderate injuries.

For Central Coast/SoCal pilots. Passing the word along for help with the Thomas Fire/Mudslides in Santa Barbara, CA. We need boats and airplanes! Critical personnel need to be moved to/from Santa Barbara while the freeway is closed. If you have a boat or airplane and can help, please text or email Emily: (805)620-2849 ThomasFireHelp@gmail.com. Please include the type of vessel, carrying capacity, availability and your contact name, email and phone number.

My Mooney has about 300 hours. He is a great co-pilot and even was in the back seat during a big portion of my IFR training. He never comments on my landings either!

That is so totally cool. Congrats, and welcome to the club. I can't believe how much I was able to fly VFR. The rating makes everything SO much easier.

I was able to purchase this unit from a friend at a heavily discounted rate.

Maggie: 530W install plus Garmin transponder Me: commercial, CFI, SNF, OSH, AOPA Regionals

I should have been clearer. Mine was rough on run-up.

I had a rough mag when I was headed out on an IFR training flight. Thought it was a mag. Turned out to be a spark plug, which was a cheaper fix. Seems like we have a MooneySpacer who is based at Monterey....

That is so cool. Would love to see a photo!! #MooneyZoom

I just wanted to take a moment to thank you all for the mentorship, friendship and inspiration this year. I was struck by the results an AOPA poll which said that the majority of respondents listed a "new rating or certificate" as being a primary goal for 2018. I plan on doing a more writing [for AOPA and Plane and Pilot] on achieving our aviation goals, dealing with setbacks, and overcoming roadblocks. If any of you would like to chime in on your goals for 2018 that would be cool. As well, if you have overcome something to achieve a goal I would love to hear about that too. Posting here is fine, or my email is Jolielucas@charter.net Happy Moo Year!

Here is a little compilation video of 2017 and my 130 hours of flight. Merry Christmas everyone.

You might want to have your gear pre-load checked. Shouldn't be so hard to swing in my opinion. For me having 1000 hours or so in the E, getting the gear back up was the least of my worries. Also trim is super important. Congrats on the IR devotion. I received my rating November 17th and have flown about five flights IFR since then. Great platform for learning. As a PS: I get my gear down before the FAF, then 100 on approach.

The smell was not too bad. I had the vents closed, and my ram air door closed too until well passed the smoke. Glad you liked the Mooney Girl apparel!

Yes, I am going to check filter and pitot. Thank you!

It is great to see Mooney getting so much press. The Ultra is a wonderful platform. For those of us vintage owners, we know the quality upon which the later designs were borne. Let's hope that 2018 is a positive year for our brand and most importantly our workers in the factory in Kerrville.

I have signed up and am looking forward to it. The folks at MillionAir were awesome, as was the whole event.

Merry Christmas to you too. I am looking forward to Yuma formation clinic and OSH18.

Today was a great day for me. Long post. Feel free to drink heavily as you read, or eat sugar cookies. It started off as a Pilots and Paws rescue flight for a one-eyed cat named Gio. Since I was headed up to the Bay Area, I thought I would contact my 96 year old pen pal/friend William Mason [Army Air Corps Flight Instructor at Rankin Field with my Dad, and brother to uber famous Sammy Mason] who flew out of Petaluma to see if we could meet up for a burger at the 29er Diner. I did all my flight planning with Foreflight, Skyvector, and the NOAA site for weather... severe clear except for smoke in vicinity of departure airport, Santa Maria, CA. I filed the flight plan online and got an email that it was received by flight service [she thinks "What a rock star I am for using all this wonderful technology"] When I left the house this morning it looked like dusk instead of dawn due to the smoke. I could see that San Luis Obispo was clear, so I thought, at most, I would be in the smoke [IFR] for a few minutes. Opening the hangar door I could see a fine layer of ash all over my Kennon cover. As I loaded up the plane I looked out and saw the tiniest of tiny suns trying to burn through the smoke. I got my taxi clearance and asked tower for my IFR clearance to Petaluma. The next bit of news was not so happy "6619U I have no IFR flight plan for you in the system." Drat! I mentioned that I had even gotten an email confirmation. Hmmm. I let the lovely tower folks [really they are, no sarcasm there] know when I was done taxiing I would figure it out. Figure it out I did. Guess who filed the plan for a WEEK from today? Me, yup me. Duh. Luckily I had the routing, so no worries, got it put into the system. Now on the the obstacle departure procedure and up to the Bay Area. The smoke was maybe 1000 above ground level... maybe. I was in the smoke, I mean in the smoke. Could not see anything, nothing. "Okay sister, this is what you are trained for, instrument scan, track the course, you can do this. Probably won't be but a minute or two." Yeah---no. Just under thirty minutes later I come out of the smoke right over the Paso Robles airport. I knew that my tracking was not the best while in the smoke. I was disappointed that I sort of got flustered. I was able to just regain my composure and soldier on. Hecky darn, that was stressful. I flew up the coast and the day was spectacular. ATC was super helpful and I was able to navigate well with my lowly 2-VORs, DME, Garmin 396 and Ipad mini. I asked for the Bay Tour [as did about a hundred others] and was grinning ear to ear flying over the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz and the bay. I headed off to Petaluma and landed safely. The next few hours were spent with Bill and his daughter. We got to catch up, talk about aviation and some of his glory days. Bill owned a Stearman for many many years. When it was time to leave I made sure to check the date and time on my flight plan and hit "File"--- voila it went through. I did get vectored in a way from ATC that reminded me of an old high school cheer "lean to the left, lean to the right, stand up, sit down, fight, fight, fight" On the way home I was at 9000, and got a beautiful and enduring view of the sunset off my right side. I knew that the smoke would be formidable on the approach into the Central Coast. I descended down from 9000 to 8000, then down to 5000. Under the smoke it was black as night. I requested a precision approach from ATC. I thought it best to fly the ILS approach I had practiced many times that took me right to runway 12. Between the black of night, and the ash build up on the windscreen, and the general haziness from the smoke, the approach was challenging. My needles were centered DEAD-ON the whole time. I did have a little bit of an optical illusion just above the aim point. It was hard for me to tell how high I was above the runway to begin the flare. I should have maybe looked out the left window, but I didn't. Landing was rock star-- which is so wonderful. All in all I had an hour of actual. I am grateful to have had wonderful instructors,and of course have the best airplane in the world. Merry Christmas everyone. I am snug as a bug, under my heated blanket with Mooney at my feet. Life is good.

Such a hoot. I love that I have the formation flying skills now.

It was a fun flight from Chandler AZ to KERV and back in the Ultra. WE had a great stop at White Sands, NM. Most of the way there was IMC. It was also quite the thrill of a lifetime to fly in Mooney Lead for the photo shoot. I was actually flying the Acclaim lead in the photo where Pia is directly over the Mooney Factory. Our brave photographer was in the baggage compartment with the door off. Fun times

Good luck Ron. Let us know how you do.

Gotta get that rating! I hope you enjoy my article about finally attaining the instrument ticket. 2018 will be my commercial and CFI. Happy Thanksgiving everyone https://blog.aopa.org/aopa/2017/11/20/gotta-get-that-rating/

Hi Mike Thank you! I have four hours of actual in my training. It was very valuable. I know I am a newbie, but I have a great education, the best airplane, and a healthy dose of caution.

I used the AOPA template for minimums. Right now most every approach [in actual] is double the minimums. 4000 ft from freezing level/icing. Wind is dependent on whether it is down the runway or not. I flew 130 hours last year, VFR. This is going to be awesome sauce.

Hey there, It is hard for me to say what the most fun was. I really like taking that hood off and the runway is right there. It was kind of fun to master the DME Arc. Mostly I really enjoyed learning more and more about aviation and safety. The formation training I did helped with my IFR. I tend to be a little OCD. I had two instructors and the examiner himself that said that if I was able to not try for perfection so much it would be better. I had no GPS, no autopilot. Just two VOR heads and a DME. My new to me 530W is going in with the new transponder soon. Dual Simulated Instrument Flight Simulator Instrument Dual Instrument Ground Totals 4.00 60.75 2.20 63.35 21