Overcoming the Mental Side of Flying

It has been an interesting week of flying here in beautiful Del Rio, TX.  The weather was forecast to be pretty crappy, and the forecast proved to be quite accurate.

That really sucks when it comes to pilot training, because a lot of the things we do require VFR conditions.  Outside of the training arena, the weather would not have been that big of a deal, but for all of us newbies it was less than ideal.  It was also a great learning experience for me of just how important it is to keep your mind ready when it comes to flying.

Early this week I was scheduled for a simulator session in the morning, and a flight in the afternoon that was not looking real promising when the day started due to crappy weather.  As the day went on I started to check out on flying because most of the flights had cancelled for weather.  I got my paperwork ready to fly, but I was really just going through the motions and wasn’t putting in the effort that I should have.

We got to brief time and I sat down with my IP already convinced we were going to cancel, but even then I knew better.  I personally said we should probably still brief because you never know what will happen with the weather.  We went through the brief, and as we did we heard updates that the weather was improving and it looked like we would be able to fly.  I now found myself in a bad spot because I had already started to checkout, and now needed to go fly.

I won’t go into all of the details of the flight, but suffice it to say it was not a very good flight.  I missed a handful of small things that were not terribly critical, but were things I should not have missed.  I got behind the plane, and while I eventually caught up, I wasted training time because my mind was not in it.  I also got spatial disorientation, which did nothing to help the situation.

By the time we landed I was pretty down on myself, with only myself to blame.

Fast forward two days and I was in almost an identical situation.  I had a simulator session in the morning, followed by a flight in the afternoon.  Pretty much everyone had cancelled their flights due to weather, and right up until the brief I thought we would cancel too.  The difference yesterday was that I forced myself to stay in the game mentally.

As I prepared my paperwork the weather actually kept getting worse but I just kept telling myself that I was not going to let the same thing happen again. We were still going to fly and I was going to be ready.  With the weather as crappy as it was I was honestly at a loss of what I was going to do even if we did take off.  It had been cloudy for days and the people who had flown did not bring back great reports that would allow for the aerobatic training that I really needed.

But I just kept running through ideas in my head.  I could just go and do some instrument approaches, but then the nearby airports were also below minimums.  I could also go up into the MOA and practice some of the instrument maneuvers in actual IMC.  That would be better than nothing, but I really needed pattern work, and that just wasn’t going to happen.  I also didn’t want to get stuck in the air and have to divert to San Antonio for the long weekend, but that was just my mind trying to find reasons not to fly.

It came time to brief and my IP wasn’t even in the room so I was further convinced we would not fly, but I just kept telling myself we were going flying.  Even after we sat down to brief another student walked in and my IP told him he would likely have to weather cancel, so I was sure I wasn’t going flying.  But we kept briefing.

Halfway through our brief an announcement came out that the T-38s would not be flying as long as expected so there was a larger time slot for us.  What happens here when the weather is marginal is a status referred to as alternating instruments.  Essentially, when the weather is bad we set specific times for the T-6s and T-38s to recover.  Because we fly at such different airspeeds this is simply a safer situation when the weather doesn’t allow for a VFR pattern.  The fuel capacity of the T-38 also makes this a smarter solution.

It wasn’t until that announcement was made that my mind finally started to convince the rest of me that I was actually going flying.

We finished our brief and got suited up before going to the step desk.  That is the last stop before we fly and the last chance for someone to stop us.  Because of the weather, we were the only ones up there waiting to fly.  Even the other flights that had been scheduled from my class had cancelled for weather.

While we waited to get approval to go my IP made the comment that, “When I’m the only one stepping to fly it makes me question my decision of whether I should go or not.”  This is a very true statement, and is something every pilot should remember, but ultimately proved to be not true on this day.

After some reassurance for the weather shop, the Operations Supervisor cleared us to go and fly.  We got out to the plane not in a rush as the weather was only supposed to improve at this point.  We taxied out to the center runway, which is not what we normally use, but had much less water and was thus safer.  We ran our pre-flight checks, and took off, going into the clouds within the first few hundred feet.

We ended up climbing to near the top of the MOA in the hopes the sun had burned off some of the clouds because they were not super dense, but as we got to 21,000 feet we were still in IMC.  Instrument maneuvers it would be apparently, and that is just what we did for the first fifteen minutes or so.  We had noticed some VFR layers on our climb up and decided to drop down and see if we couldn’t find a gap.

A brief aside on the super fun capabilities of the T-6.  Needing to descend about 10,000 feet my IP suggested I try an idle/speed brake descent just to see how fast this plane can drop when you need it to.  It sounded like fun to me, and I pulled to the PCL to idle, extended the speed brake and pitched the nose down.  I can’t tell you what our actual descent rate was because our VSI pegs out at 6,000 ft/min.  Let’s just say about a minute and a half later we were at 10,000 feet and that was with pulling in the speed brake a few thousand feet early because we broke out of the clouds and seeing the ground rushing towards me that fast was intense.

As luck would have it, there was actually a pretty substantial area of VFR conditions, and we were able to get a bunch of good training in.  I did my first split-S and aileron roll.  I also made great progress in some of my other VFR maneuvers.  I was shocked at how much we got done on a day when I didn’t think we would even take off.

To cap off the flight I also got to hold because there was so much traffic coming back in at the same time, and then flew an ILS (poorly), back home to a pretty nice landing if I do say so myself.

All in all it was a much better flight than earlier in the week because I forced myself to stay in the game.  Even as I looked for safety concerns and reasons why we wouldn’t be able to fly, I just kept telling myself we were going to fly, and it paid off for me in the end.  I got fantastic training, and continued to move towards the ultimate goal of getting my wings.

I expected the physical action of flying to be my biggest challenge at UPT because I already have a lot of experience in the air, but this was a great reminder of just how important the mental aspect of flying is.  I didn’t do much that I hadn’t already seen, but I did it so much better because I was mentally ready for it instead of quitting like I did earlier in the week.

Flying is challenging under the best conditions, but it is even more important to be completely on your game when the conditions are not ideal.  There is a time and a place to call it and not fly when the conditions are bad, but I am grateful I listened to my IP and pushed through (the second time this has happened with the same IP) because I would have missed some good fun, and some valuable training.  There is just so much to learn in this industry and I am grateful for all of the lessons I continue to learn every day.