Ted
The pilot formerly known as Twin Engine Ted
- Joined
- Oct 9, 2007
- Messages
- 30,014
- Display Name
Display name:
iFlyNothing
I keep on hearing a lot of negativity about Lockheed, and now recently ATC. I think people like to complain too much, so I'm going to counter that. I can't think of a single time that Lockheed flight service has given me a problem, and I can only think of rare instances when ATC hasn't been accomodating. Granted, my flying experience has been limited to about 150 hours in under a year, but still, I just don't see where the negativity comes in. Let me share my adventrues on Sunday as an example of good things.
Those of you who've read my other thread know that I passed my instrument check ride on Saturday. On Sunday, I put it to good use. For the past few months, my mom has wanted me to fly her from New York City down to Wytheville, Virginia, where my aunt and uncle live. It's something of an 8-8.5 hour drive, and mom doesn't have a car anymore. This is my doing - I believed the safety of the world was more important. Trying to do a trip like that when you're only VFR is difficult at best, and then other problems kept on arising that cancelled our various attempts. On Sunday, the stars aligned. My new IR was going to help, too.
I filed every segment. This made for a total of 6 calls to Lockheed, 5 to the WX-BRIEF and then one to ATC Clearance. Everyone I talked to was friendly, gave me the information I asked for (and more if it was relevant), and was overall courteous. One even answered the phone "Goooooooood afternoon, Lockheed Flight Service, this is Mike!" I don't get that friendly of customer service when I call a company that I'm trying to buy something from. One kept me on the phone for a while with a weather briefing, but I appreciated it as I didn't have a weather station to look at, and there were thunderstorms looming.
Once in the air on each flight, the ATC controllers I dealt with were friendly, courteous, and professional. When flying around the NY Bravo, things happen quickly and you need to be on top of things, but so long as you are, there are no problems. I even filed my flight plan out of HPN incorrectly (oops...) and the ground control politely informed me of what I needed to change for future reference, and changed my flight plan for me. Bad Ted, no biscuit. Lesson learned, I won't make that mistake again. Mistake #2: On the ground in Roanoke (KROA, a Class C), I forgot to call clearance delivery, instead went right to ground for my clearance out of there. Once again, stupid on my part, I'm not used to flying out of Bs or Cs, and KROA is not a busy airport at all. They certainly look like they get more GA traffic than commercial.
In the air, I had to make two diversions to different airports. When I took off out of HPN, shortly thereafter I started wanting to make a bathroom stop. Great. Well, because my routing was changed, it took me directly over KLNS, an airport that I know well. Great, I decided I would just land straight into there and use the bathroom and get fuel and lunch. I requested the diversion, ATC happily complied, and I was on the ground in LNS.
On the way from LNS to my destination, there were thunderstorms looming in the sky. Using a combination of my storm scope, the Eye-dar, and ATC, I got around them with no troubles. ATC changed my routing, gave me vectors, and did their best to keep me out of the storms, despite the traffic that was going into and out of the ADIZ (I was with Potomac approach for a while).
Then again I had to land in Roanoke, because LNS didn't have fuel, and I decided I didn't want to push my limits getting into Wytheville. Although only about a 30 minute flight away, I was getting closer to my reserves than I wanted. Requested the deviation, got it, and landed. The last hop to KMKJ was a short one, and that left me enough fuel to get home.
Getting home was great. I got my clearance from the ground via cell phone (KMKJ is untowered and you can't get Atlanta Center from the ground), and then was off and on my way. On this portion of the route, there was less need for assistance, but when I asked for it, I got it. At one point I popped into a cloud at 9000, watched the temp drop from +3C to -3C, and then mild to moderate rain started. I immediately requested 7000, and got it without hesitation. +5C down there, much better. Then, through PA, about 20 miles ahead of me I saw a lightning bolt hit the ground and my storm scope lit up like a Christmas tree. A few seconds later a second lightning bolt did the same thing. I called up ATC, asked if they were showing any weather about 20 miles ahead, and sure enough, they were, and asked if I wanted to divert around it. I ended up getting a clearance that cut a few miles off my intended route, not to mention got me around that weather.
That same controller also witnessed some stupidity on my part. While checking my chart out, I misread it and thought I saw a shortcut that I hadn't seen before. Turns out I was wrong, and it was slightly longer (proof I chose my original route for a reason). I was initially approved, and then apparently the computer squawked at the controller something, because he called back and said "62G, the computer's saying that your original route was actually shorter, the one you requested goes down to Selinsgrove." "Oops, I suppose I chose my initial route for a reason" "Yeah, the computer's smarter than both of us, it seems." A friendly conversation.
So, here's the summary: If I asked for help, I got it. I was even offered help at times when I didn't need it. Nobody was rude, and they always worked with me, not against me. This is what I am used to getting from ATC and Lockheed. I'm sure that those who have had bad experiences are conveying genuinely bad experiences, but I think it's about time we also started sharing when we came across good things with these groups that are frequently ridiculed without getting any positive press from us. I think my flying on Sunday is much more indicative of the kinds of treatment we get from these people than the negatives we hear from time to time.
Those of you who've read my other thread know that I passed my instrument check ride on Saturday. On Sunday, I put it to good use. For the past few months, my mom has wanted me to fly her from New York City down to Wytheville, Virginia, where my aunt and uncle live. It's something of an 8-8.5 hour drive, and mom doesn't have a car anymore. This is my doing - I believed the safety of the world was more important. Trying to do a trip like that when you're only VFR is difficult at best, and then other problems kept on arising that cancelled our various attempts. On Sunday, the stars aligned. My new IR was going to help, too.
I filed every segment. This made for a total of 6 calls to Lockheed, 5 to the WX-BRIEF and then one to ATC Clearance. Everyone I talked to was friendly, gave me the information I asked for (and more if it was relevant), and was overall courteous. One even answered the phone "Goooooooood afternoon, Lockheed Flight Service, this is Mike!" I don't get that friendly of customer service when I call a company that I'm trying to buy something from. One kept me on the phone for a while with a weather briefing, but I appreciated it as I didn't have a weather station to look at, and there were thunderstorms looming.
Once in the air on each flight, the ATC controllers I dealt with were friendly, courteous, and professional. When flying around the NY Bravo, things happen quickly and you need to be on top of things, but so long as you are, there are no problems. I even filed my flight plan out of HPN incorrectly (oops...) and the ground control politely informed me of what I needed to change for future reference, and changed my flight plan for me. Bad Ted, no biscuit. Lesson learned, I won't make that mistake again. Mistake #2: On the ground in Roanoke (KROA, a Class C), I forgot to call clearance delivery, instead went right to ground for my clearance out of there. Once again, stupid on my part, I'm not used to flying out of Bs or Cs, and KROA is not a busy airport at all. They certainly look like they get more GA traffic than commercial.
In the air, I had to make two diversions to different airports. When I took off out of HPN, shortly thereafter I started wanting to make a bathroom stop. Great. Well, because my routing was changed, it took me directly over KLNS, an airport that I know well. Great, I decided I would just land straight into there and use the bathroom and get fuel and lunch. I requested the diversion, ATC happily complied, and I was on the ground in LNS.
On the way from LNS to my destination, there were thunderstorms looming in the sky. Using a combination of my storm scope, the Eye-dar, and ATC, I got around them with no troubles. ATC changed my routing, gave me vectors, and did their best to keep me out of the storms, despite the traffic that was going into and out of the ADIZ (I was with Potomac approach for a while).
Then again I had to land in Roanoke, because LNS didn't have fuel, and I decided I didn't want to push my limits getting into Wytheville. Although only about a 30 minute flight away, I was getting closer to my reserves than I wanted. Requested the deviation, got it, and landed. The last hop to KMKJ was a short one, and that left me enough fuel to get home.
Getting home was great. I got my clearance from the ground via cell phone (KMKJ is untowered and you can't get Atlanta Center from the ground), and then was off and on my way. On this portion of the route, there was less need for assistance, but when I asked for it, I got it. At one point I popped into a cloud at 9000, watched the temp drop from +3C to -3C, and then mild to moderate rain started. I immediately requested 7000, and got it without hesitation. +5C down there, much better. Then, through PA, about 20 miles ahead of me I saw a lightning bolt hit the ground and my storm scope lit up like a Christmas tree. A few seconds later a second lightning bolt did the same thing. I called up ATC, asked if they were showing any weather about 20 miles ahead, and sure enough, they were, and asked if I wanted to divert around it. I ended up getting a clearance that cut a few miles off my intended route, not to mention got me around that weather.
That same controller also witnessed some stupidity on my part. While checking my chart out, I misread it and thought I saw a shortcut that I hadn't seen before. Turns out I was wrong, and it was slightly longer (proof I chose my original route for a reason). I was initially approved, and then apparently the computer squawked at the controller something, because he called back and said "62G, the computer's saying that your original route was actually shorter, the one you requested goes down to Selinsgrove." "Oops, I suppose I chose my initial route for a reason" "Yeah, the computer's smarter than both of us, it seems." A friendly conversation.
So, here's the summary: If I asked for help, I got it. I was even offered help at times when I didn't need it. Nobody was rude, and they always worked with me, not against me. This is what I am used to getting from ATC and Lockheed. I'm sure that those who have had bad experiences are conveying genuinely bad experiences, but I think it's about time we also started sharing when we came across good things with these groups that are frequently ridiculed without getting any positive press from us. I think my flying on Sunday is much more indicative of the kinds of treatment we get from these people than the negatives we hear from time to time.
