It was a beautiful morning to fly. The winds were light from the west with a mostly clear sky. I was determined to master these approaches, and with the light winds I could actually focus on the lesson more and spend less energy fighting turbulence. I was excited.
As we're getting ready to turn onto the runway for takeoff, another plane comes in to land. We wait our turn until we hear the pilot announce on the radio that his front tire went flat. He was stuck on the active runway and had to wait for line service to tow him back to the hangar. I turn off the airplane and wait patiently, along with two other planes. About five minutes later, the runway is clear and we're free to fly. We takeoff from runway 27 and climb to 2,500ft. My CFII, Mark has me make a left turn to get us flying in the general direction of our desired airport. We listen to the weather report and then contact St. Louis Approach. "Skyhawk xx43D 5 miles north of the St. Louis VOR, inbound for the VOR-Alpha approach in to Creve Coeur. I have the local weather," I say. The controller didn't hear me, so I repeat my statement. This time he understood half of what I said, but told me that my radio wasn't coming through clearly. Mark then took over the radio communications, which had better success. I was a bit bummed, as I felt like I knew enough and was comfortable enough to handle all the radio talk this time.
The controller gives us vectors (directions) to Creve Coeur and gives us the clearance to enter Class B airpspace, but he must have missed which approach we were asking for. He told us to turn right to an East heading. This didn't quite make sense, so Mark asked him to confirm his instructions. The controller said his request was correct so we continued our flight to the East. When the controller gave us another strange heading to turn to, we knew something was wrong. Mark figured out that he was giving us directions to track a GPS approach, not the VOR-A approach that we requested. After another radio call was made, the mistake was fixed and we got on the right course for the VOR approach.
After positively identifying the Foristell VOR by listening to the Morse Code, the controller has us intercept the radial that we'll follow to the airport. The air is so smooth that I could maintain altitude and heading without any effort; it was nice. I'm lined up perfectly with the approach, just cruising along until we reach the final approach fix. The controller gives us the clearance to carry out the approach, which means we are free to turn to whatever heading we need and descend as necessary. At the final approach fix, we slow down, descend and lower flaps. Looking good. As we get close to the missed approach fix (the point where you decide to land or not), Mark says that's far enough and we end the approach.
After ending communications with ATC, we fly north back over the Mississippi River into Illinois. We're going to follow the VOR approach into Smartt Airport. Mark asks me if I feel up to the challenge of doing the entire approach alone. After a deep breath, I say yes. We fly outbound for several miles, then get ready to make my procedure turn inbound. I read my chart and thought I need to turn right to a heading of 163, but I was wrong. This picture shows what I would've done, had I made that turn.
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| Wrong approach method |
As you can see, it would have put me on the east side of the correct inbound course and running parallel to it. I would've had to intercept the course again to get back on track, which would've made things more difficult had I really been flying in instrument conditions. Mark corrected me, by telling me to fly this:
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| Correct approach method |
As soon as he got me on the right track, I was good to go. I followed it right in to the airport. Since we didn't want to land on the runway it was taking us to, we followed the procedures for a circling approach. Mark told me to take my foggles off. The airport right was out my window, only 400ft below me. We maintain altitude and follow the traffic pattern around to set us up for a landing on runway 27. The light winds made for a wonderful landing. It was so nice that I wanted to do another. We had a half hour of time left, so we took to the skies once more. Mark complimented me on the takeoff then we climb to pattern altitude of 1,200ft. Turn left onto the downwind leg, set up to land, turn onto the base leg, drop more flaps, turn left onto the final leg. Looking even better than the first landing, I come in to land. The wheels gently kissed the runway. I smiled.
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