July 27, 2011
My boyfriend, Dion, and I took some time off work and spent a few days in Nashville, TN. I decided that it would be fun to find a local flight school down there, rent an airplane with an instructor, and go fly around Nashville for an hour. After some research, I ended up choosing Wings of Eagles flight school in Smyrna, TN. It is based in a Class D airport and it's primary fleet of airplanes consist of Diamonds. I scheduled a week in advance to fly in a DA-40 so that I could take Dion along for the ride. I chose to fly with a female instructor, Nora.
We arrived at 9am and met Nora. We were a bit early so we had to wait for them to get the plane ready. Once she had the plane fueled and preflighted, she came inside to get us. We were going in their top of the line Diamond DA-40 XLS model. This thing was loaded with all sorts of fun stuff. It had the Garmin G1000, leather seats, auto pilot, and air conditioning. Nora and I sat in the front seats, and Dion sat in the back. He said he had more leg room than he would've on a airliner!
I taxied out to the runway, then Nora did the takeoff. Once at a safe altitude and configured for normal cruise flight, she gave me the controls. We went out east first so that we could see the big lakes they have. Then we turned on a northwest heading so that we could fly near downtown Nashville. It was incredibly hazy, which made it hard to see far out, but it was still gorgeous. The scenery from the air was just breathtaking; the hills and lakes are so much prettier than the boring flat farmland back home. However, I thought about suitable emergency landing areas, and there just wasn't much to choose from if we were to need it.
After about an hour, we came in to land. We entered the 45 for a right pattern to runway 19. She helped me out a little with the landing since it was a new plane to me. We then taxied back to the ramp and went inside. It was really neat to have the opportunity to fly with her. She was a very sweet young women and she let me ask her questions along the way about being a women in a male dominated field. It was quite interesting and I really wasn't too surprised with her answers. Before we left, she handed me her business card and told me that if I had any questions at all, to please give her a call or email. She understands what it's like to be in my shoes (even though I haven't had any real issues at this point) and she would be willing to give advice, encouragement, or any other assistance. Thanks Nora!
*Thank you Dion for taking these videos!*
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| Me in front of the DA-40 XLS |
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| DA-40 Cockpit |
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