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Since checkrides are
typically conducted during daylight hours we end up testing
night flying competency during the oral portion of the test.
Knowledge required of the applicant includes aircraft and
airport lighting, equipment, night vision, night X-C, safety
and risk management, and night illusions.
In keeping with
scenario-based testing, I suggest that the applicant
is planning a flight that will include a return home at
night, and ask the applicant what additional preparation
will be required. Hopefully, among other things, the
applicant will tell me that he would add the aircraft lights
to his preflight inspection routine. I then likely ask what
lights the applicant’s aircraft has, and of those, which
ones are legally required for night flight. Sometimes I get
a baffling listing of redundant lighting systems, especially
if the applicant is trying to get by with rote memorization
rather than true understanding. I often hear that the
airplane has navigation lights, position lights, a beacon,
flashing anti-collision lights, strobe lights, landing light
and taxi light. By using the shotgun approach and mentioning
every kind of exterior light he has ever heard of, he hopes
I will say OK and move on. Too bad, but it won’t do.
The applicant is
required to know about the aircraft he brought for the test,
and to understand what he is talking about. When presented
with the shotgun answer to the lighting question, I then take
each item mentioned and ask where it is located on the
airplane. Of course what I want to hear is that navigation
lights and position lights are the same set of lights, and
be told where they are located, and what color. When I get
told that the nav lights are the red and green ones on the
wingtips, with no mention of the white one facing to the
rear, I immediately know that the applicant doesn’t
understand the concept of determining the position and
direction of travel of another aircraft from which color
lights are visible. If I then inquire about position lights,
I get a blank stare.
I use the same
approach to the beacon/anti-collision/strobe light question.
These may or may not be the same lights, depending on the
airplane presented for the test. Many of the newer,
composite airplanes, like Diamond and Cirrus, don’t have
flashing beacons at all. They rely on wingtip strobes to
meet the flashing anti-collision light requirement. The
point of all this is that successful night training has to
consist of more than meeting at the airport some evening
after dark, doing a quick pre-flight, and then doing 8
takeoffs and landings, followed by another lesson where the
obligatory night cross-country is accomplished.
To see what aircraft lights look like from
various positions, see the examogram entitled
Night Flight and Aircraft Lights. There is a
multimedia presentation that lets you view them
in a night sky. |
Proper night training
begins with a ground school session where aircraft and
airport lighting is taught, and the potential for
duplication of terms explained. Other subjects covered in
that ground session should include night vision, illusions,
disappearance of the threshold lights, night cross-country
flight planning (altitude to fly, visual checkpoint
selection, etc.), engine failure at night, ground fog, night
vision, and the rules for night currency and light usage.
You can rest assured that any student may be quizzed about
these things during the oral.
The word “beacon” can
be very confusing to the low-time student. Are we talking
about the flashing white and green rotating beacon at the
airport? The flashing red light on top of the vertical
stabilizer? Or the non-directional beacon (NDB) located 4 NM
off the field? Before you sit down for your oral exam, make
sure you know the differences.
When discussing night
cross-country flight planning, expect to talk about
selecting visual checkpoints. Applicants always want to pick
large towns, the ones depicted in yellow on the sectional
chart. Those larger ones are not always the best choice,
especially when they more than 5 NM,
off to the side of the course line. If the visibility is
less than severe-clear you might miss them entirely, and in
any case it is difficult to know exactly when you are at the
checkpoint because the distant large town is off your
wingtip for some time. The better choice is one of the very
small towns, represented by a tiny open circle, which is
right along the route of flight. Even those small towns have
some street lights in the town square, and are actually easy
to spot at night. You’ll be able to mark your time
accurately because you’ll pass right over or just beside a
very small spot.
Radio towers, by themselves, make very poor
checkpoints. Why? Because even though they are easy to see,
there are too many of them. You can never be sure if the one
you are passing is the one you selected or another one just
a few miles away. It is better to relegate radio towers to a
confirming role. You come to a town you selected as a
checkpoint, but you need to confirm that the town you see is
the selected one. There’s a radio tower just north of town,
on the chart. Looking out the window, you see the tower
north of town. The town is very likely the one you wanted.
As a DPE, I am very disappointed
in the flight instructor if, when discussing the need for a
landing light (required only when carrying paying
passengers, 135 or 121 flights), I learn that for the
8-landing lesson the instructor just sat there while the
student did the 8 takeoffs and landings, and did nothing
else. This is one of the hallmarks of the uncaring,
time-building instructor. Typically, after 2 or 3 night
landings, the student learns that they aren’t much different
or more difficult than day landings. If the instructor just
sits there for 5 more, he’s almost taking the student’s
money under false pretenses. It doesn’t take any longer to
run through a series of failure scenarios where the student
gets to land without the landing light, no panel lights, no
landing light or panel lights, and a simulated complete
electrical failure with no panel or landing lights, and no
(electric) flaps. While there is no FAA requirement for
these failure scenarios, they don’t take any extra time or
cost extra money, and not doing them is huge waste of a
golden training opportunity. Make sure your instructor
covers these simulated failures and realize how easy they
are to deal with. Then, years later when one of them happens
for real, it won't be the first time you've experienced it.
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