What's your 'student-pilot-time' horror story?

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JamesDoolittle

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JamesDoolittle
Just out of curiousity, what's the worst that happened during your student pilot time? Instructors from hell? Got lost? Crosswinds that were way out of your limits?

Personally I'm very limited in horror stories, however I remember a story of an instructor and a student.

The student was doing one of her checks and was failing miserably. The instructor, a nice guy but a big mouth when he had to, told her off. She let go off the controls and started banging on top of the dashboard.... She did not pass.

Outside aviation, I know this guy from Europe doing integrated training and was in Arizona for training. He ended up going to jail in Arizona for DUI.... Big delays in his training.

Not really any major stories I have I realize, maybe you guys have some nice ones? :)
 
I tried to kill my CFI.

Botched landing, decided to go around. Disgusted with my attempt at landing, removed all flaps at once on climbout at around 100 AGL over the runway. Started sinking toward the runway, saw the runway getting closer, pulled back on the yoke instinctively. Let me say, it is very hard to overcome the desire to pull back when the ground is coming at you. CFI shoved the yoke forward in time to prevent catastrophe.
 
Long cross country day. Anchorage to Homer, Homer to Talkeetna, Talkeetna to Anchorage. Lovely day. Approaching Homer for the first time I came over the ridge and got a view of the Bay and the airport. I dutifully made my call to the flight service for weather and traffic. I positioned the plane, made the calls, and set up to land. On short final I hear a guy yelling at me on the radio that I cut him off and forced him to go-around and that he almost hit me. I looked around and never saw a thing and went ahead and landed, scared and shaken. I parked and went right into the FSS to see what was going to happen. The FAA guy had heard the whole exchange. He told me I hadn't done anything wrong and that I'd handled the situation very well. Then I watched as he called the 135 operator that had just landed after me and ripped that guy a new one for calling a 20 mile final and scaring the crap out of a student pilot. I fueled the plane and left. While fueling I added the spare quart of oil that was in the plane. No big deal and off I went.

The long leg to Talkeetna was uneventful. Once north of Anchorage I was in familiar territory. Approach and landing in TKA were solid. I taxied to the fuel pump and once again found the engine low on oil. The FBO didn't have the same brand or type of oil as the school,used so I called in for advice and was told to use what they had. Oils are compatible. What I didn't tell them was that it needed two quarts. I never thought anything of it. I added fuel and oil and off I went to Anchorage. It was another uneventful leg. As I approached the Cook Inlet shoreline, the Lake Hood airspace boundary, I called tower. I was no expert but I found their comments odd. They asked me if I was okay and then if I'd like them to close my flight plan. I told them I was fine and to go ahead and close my plan. In I came. Upon landing they told me to contact the school right away. Well, duh, that's where I had to park so that was automatic. I was greeted by an instructor and a mechanic when I arrived to parking. First I got scolded for being late enough that FSS had called the school looking for me. Worse was that tower had called the school and told them I was trailing smoke from the time they could first see me. The mechanic started stripping the cowl while he questioned me. "Maybe a little rough for the last few minutes, but nothing remarkable", I told him. The engine was oily. The plane smelled hot. In seconds the mechanic found that I had a separated cylinder. I never knew. As they say, ignorance is bliss.

What a day.
 
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A buddy of mine was a student pilot working on solo hours. He was on short final and a high time pilot landed on top of him 50 feet off the ground. The high time pilot was on the wrong frequency and did a straight in approach, it was his home airport. High wing -v- low wing. Totaled both planes, but both walked away. High time pilot never flew again, my buddy went on to finish up his ticket and flies a lot.
 
Went through 3 CFIs for my PPL, first one just flat out wasn't a good CFI, second disappeared off to the airlines, third got me through my PPL.

Learned what to look for in a CFI, rest that I have had through my CPL were great.
 
Geico266 said:
A buddy of mine was a student pilot working on solo hours. He was on short final and a high time pilot landed on top of him 50 feet off the ground. The high time pilot was on the wrong frequency and did a straight in approach, it was his home airport. High wing -v- low wing. Totaled both planes, but both walked away. High time pilot never flew again, my buddy went on to finish up his ticket and flies a lot.
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You'd think that would be a 1 : billion shot but I am aware of at least 3 instances. This one was in my area (Roanoke TX) in 08

Warrior-Stinson-landing-0508c.jpg
 
The worst story I know is when (years before I started flying) a college friend went up for a solo flight, with strong crosswinds and snowbanks flanking the runway. He apparently couldn't maintain the centerline, drifted to one side, hit the snowbank, pulled up to go around, stalled, crashed (fatal).

That crash was definitely on my mind when I solo'd about 5 years later.
 
I think every student pilot has an oh **** moment at least once, though usually not quite as bad as those here.

On my first-ever go-around, in a 172N with a STOL kit (= real draggy) on a hot as hell summer day, I discovered why the checklist says to pull flaps to 20 deg immediately. The runway was a mile long, but 40 deg flaps in those conditions means no climb no matter how long. And it was obstructed by a cement plant with some ugly looking towers.

I did figure it out in time, though it took a lot longer than I would have liked.
 
Got lost on the way to the Poconos. All I saw were trees and more trees. I messed up my timing and got off track and had low fuel on board. My dad wouldn't help me find the airport and just crossed his arms and told me to find an airport and land. I eventually found the airport. I had a blocked pitot tube and had to abort a takeoff. While doing my night VFR XC weather unexpectedly went IFR and the ILS for my home airport was out so we diverted to another airport. The plane I flew in was a 172N that had about 12,000 hours on it. Pretty much every other flight, the flaps wouldn't go down so I had lots of practice with no flap landings. A few days before my checkride the plane broke (I'm don't exactly remember what happened). My CFI had access to a G1000 172. We went up for a few hours to get used to the slight differences and different avionics although it wasn't too bad since I was VFR.
 
jordane93 said:
Got lost on the way to the Poconos. All I saw were trees and more trees. I messed up my timing and got off track and had low fuel on board. My dad wouldn't help me find the airport and just crossed his arms and told me to find an airport and land. I eventually found the airport. I had a blocked pitot tube and had to abort a takeoff. While doing my night VFR XC weather unexpectedly went IFR and the ILS for my home airport was out so we diverted to another airport. The plane I flew in was a 172N that had about 12,000 hours on it. Pretty much every other flight, the flaps wouldn't go down so I had lots of practice with no flap landings. A few days before my checkride the plane broke (I'm don't exactly remember what happened). My CFI had access to a G1000 172. We went up for a few hours to get used to the slight differences and different avionics although it wasn't too bad since I was VFR.
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So, just how big was that fish that got away?

A green student on a check ride in an unfamiliar G1000, eh? What could possibly go wrong?

"OK, let me see a coupled VNAV descent into the 45." If it's in the airplane, it's fair game.

And I'll bet that engine start was fun, too.
 
MAKG1 said:
So, just how big was that fish that got away?

A green student on a check ride in an unfamiliar G1000, eh? What could possibly go wrong?

"OK, let me see a coupled VNAV descent into the 45." If it's in the airplane, it's fair game.

And I'll bet that engine start was fun, too.
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We didn't really go over the G1000 too much. The DPE just gave me scenarios like AHRS failure and other indications of malfunctions. Overall it wasn't really a big deal. If it was IFR I wouldn't haven done it.
 
I have a couple of stories, actually. The first was kind of scary, the second was just embarrassing.

The first took place while I was doing solo pattern work at 76G, where I finished up my PPL. It's a rural field with a 4000-ft 4/22, a very flat area with only two things to be careful of: a power line over 100 AGL just a few hundred feet from the threshold of rwy 4, and a gap in the trees right at the threshold. The power line means that you need to stay high and then dive for the runway at a steeper than normal angle, so airspeed control can be challenging for student pilots. The gap in the trees causes weird turbulence and wind tunnel effects; I called it "the Gauntlet". On this particular occasion I was just coming through the Gauntlet, leveling off and getting ready to flare, when a big gust of wind picked me up and carried me away from the centerline, over the retention pond east of the runway. I was heading fast for the trees and could not do anything to stop it with controls alone, so I firewalled the throttle, banked sharply left, and went around. It was all over in less than 10 seconds, but it was a hella scary 10 seconds. I've had closer encounters with trees since then, but that was my only near-crash as a student pilot.

The second was the first time I flew solo to a Class D field. I already had over 100 hours and felt competent enough that I didn't need to announce to every controller that I was a student pilot. Just as they were handing me off to the tower, Approach threw one at me that I'd never heard before: "Contact Tower on 120.3, maintain beacon code." So I asked what a "beacon code" was, and the controller explained that it was the squawk code. Okay, thank you, I will keep the squawk and contact tower on 120.3. But when I checked in with tower, the controller scolded me for being on a discrete code. I explained that I had been told to keep the squawk, but the tower controller said that the approach controller who performed the handoff had said that "she's a student pilot and she will be squawking 1200". "Well, he told me something different, sir." "Okay then, no problem."

I was just embarrassed, but my CFI was mad as hell when I recounted the story. According to him, "beacon code" was controller jargon and not standard terminology for use when communicating with pilots. I suspect he didn't really believe that though, and the term is certainly in the AIM, so probably most of his anger was really with himself for leaving something out of his syllabus.
 
I once had a student, on his solo, confuse an instruction from ATC. The confusion lead ATC and me listening to believe he was about to take the runway instead of hold-short. There was a large jet on SHORT SHORT final carrying the entire Husker Football team.

In the end, it was no big deal, just a few seconds of confusion..but for those few seconds..I was picturing a Husker mob burning my house down followed by hanging me from a tree before sunset.

Looking back ATC really should have commanded the jet to go around given the confusion. Pilots in the jet wouldn't have heard the exchange as the student was still on ground frequency.
 
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I went out flying on a broken ceiling VFR day, found a hole, climbed through it, while maintaining cloud clearance. Hole closed, I got stuck. Had to fly inland a bit to get down. Told my CFI what happened, and he yanked my solo endorsement until we could fly a bit more under the hood.
 
I don't have anything as dramatic as these as a student pilot, not nearly, but there was one instance where I learned very well why we keep the crosswind correction in on rollout. I learned to fly in a light sport (Tecnam Eaglet), which is obviously really light. But they also have a pretty massive tail that acts as a kite.

Sooo at one point, when I was doing some solo pattern work with a crosswind, I forgot my crosswind correction on rollout, and the little light plane skipped down the runway on the downwind wheel. Never got near an accident, but it was very eye-opening.

The scariest moment I ever had in a plane was when I was getting checked out in a 172. Should be a stupid simple plane to land, but not when the yoke is sticky. Basically, when I went to flare, I couldn't get the nose to come up, and somehow we ended up nosing forward and a little to the right on the right main gear and the nosewheel, with the left main in the air. Something of a strange wheelie. It was pretty terrifying for me, but thankfully the instructor in the right seat was able to fix things pretty quickly. I think what happened is that I did my "flight controls free and correct" checklist item with with both hands, but then when I went to flare I was doing it one-handed, at which point the yoke binded (bound?).

I told my CFI, "There's something wrong with this, I'm not sure what's going on" so he was on the controls for the next landing, and of course his yoke was totally fine so nothing happened. We did some more touch and goes, none of which were good, all of which were passable, at which point we went back home and got everything signed off for the checkout. It wasn't until later that I realized that it was a sticky yoke. They finally figured it out and got it fixed (whoa, 172s are actually super simple to land...who knew?), though not before scaring my instructor and me pretty badly.
 
Full flap stall on departure, over High-Tension wires, because of a faulty Flap Switch (with about 12 hours in my logbook) :hairraise:
 
JB1842 said:
Got airsick and threw up during my check ride. I hate foggles.
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The only time I got even slightly queasy was during this exact portion of my check ride.

I didn't hork, just got a bit green, and not even enough for the examiner to notice.

It's not so much the view limiting device, as the technique for disorientation. Looking at the floor while the examiner does the aggressive roller coaster thing was not a nice combination. Looking at the AI during recovery was just fine.
 
MAKG1 said:
The only time I got even slightly queasy was during this exact portion of my check ride.

I didn't hork, just got a bit green, and not even enough for the examiner to notice.

It's not so much the view limiting device, as the technique for disorientation. Looking at the floor while the examiner does the aggressive roller coaster thing was not a nice combination. Looking at the AI during recovery was just fine.
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The rolls got me. Plus a hot July afternoon didn't help. There is a reason most of my flying is morning and late afternoon/early evenings.
 
FORANE said:
I tried to kill my CFI.

Botched landing, decided to go around. Disgusted with my attempt at landing, removed all flaps at once on climbout at around 100 AGL over the runway. Started sinking toward the runway, saw the runway getting closer, pulled back on the yoke instinctively. Let me say, it is very hard to overcome the desire to pull back when the ground is coming at you. CFI shoved the yoke forward in time to prevent catastrophe.
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^^^My almost identical story
 
FORANE said:
I tried to kill my CFI.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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And THIS is why, when CFIs ask me why I don't become an instructor, I just say, I'd rather get paid to teach students who aren't trying to kill me all day long.
 
1st was about my 5th solo, I decided to practice stalls in the C152. I had been reading about flying since I could point at the airplane pictures and flying RC gliders and airplanes since I was 10 years old.

When my instructor demonstrated stalls to me i was kind of disappointed, I expected them to be more exciting. So I went out and tried power on, power off, with and with out flaps. So while trying a power on full flap stall I pulled the nose up aggressively, suddenly the plane flipped over and it seemed like I was looking straight down. I pulled back to level flight, pulling a couple G's doing so and headed back to the airport my excitement appetite successfully satisfied and maybe a bit of an overdose on adrenalin.

My instructor and I then had a discussion on stalls and went and practiced some more. Main Lesson Learned... When it really drops a wing remember to bring the throttle back to idle, it will recover much quicker and pulls less G's.

Brian
 
While doing touch n' goes, I let a x-wind get the better of me, which had me headed straight toward the runway edge and an adjacent ditch. I had too much momentum to stop, so I pushed in full throttle. I lifted off and just barely cleared a runway light. It shook me up, but upon reflection I was glad my split second decision was to add throttle and then keep the nose low to gain airspeed.

Also, my first CFI had me take a night solo cross country. Upon entering the pattern at the distant airport, I discovered my landing light was out, so I landed without - and took off without. I wasn't really nervous because my CFI and I had practiced lights off landings at night. I later changed CFIs and discovered that a night solo cross country wasn't even a requirement - WTF??! :rolleyes:
 
ETres said:
I later changed CFIs and discovered that a night solo cross country wasn't even a requirement - WTF??! :rolleyes:
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I think that it's worse than that. I am pretty sure that they are not permitted.
 
Geez, some of these are scary.

My worst one was on my first solo XC. Alternator light came on during climbout from my home airport. I checked a few things real quick then called the tower to tell them I would be coming back. Ran the pattern, landed safely, and took the plane to maintenance. Really kind of a non-event other than when it happened.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
You'd think that would be a 1 : billion shot but I am aware of at least 3 instances. This one was in my area (Roanoke TX) in 08

Warrior-Stinson-landing-0508c.jpg
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It's pretty much once or twice a year as I recall. I remember it happening when I was a student pilot, and there have been plenty of similar since.
 
I can't remember if I had any exciting events like these. Is that a good thing? Maybe I wasn't doing it right.
 
Geico266 said:
A buddy of mine was a student pilot working on solo hours. He was on short final and a high time pilot landed on top of him 50 feet off the ground. The high time pilot was on the wrong frequency and did a straight in approach, it was his home airport. High wing -v- low wing. Totaled both planes, but both walked away. High time pilot never flew again, my buddy went on to finish up his ticket and flies a lot.
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I was in a very similar situation, but managed to not get landed on...

3rd solo and I'd been running around the pattern doing touch-n-gos. On short final, someone else called that they were shooting the approach and were on short final (first contact on frequency). I couldn't see them anywhere, so I called "Aircraft on short final, Warrior N12345 is on VERY short final at 350ft." (105ft AGL) They called saying they were going around, and before I'd lost another 50ft in altitude they passed directly over me. I don't know how close, but it was definitely within 50ft.

I went full stop and parked. They departed the area - never saying anything about it on the radio.

Some folks on the ground said I was lucky - they nearly landed on me - and if I'd have tried to go around, it would've been messy. :eek:
 
FlyingIsGood said:
I was in a very similar situation, but managed to not get landed on...

3rd solo and I'd been running around the pattern doing touch-n-gos. On short final, someone else called that they were shooting the approach and were on short final (first contact on frequency). I couldn't see them anywhere, so I called "Aircraft on short final, Warrior N12345 is on VERY short final at 350ft." (105ft AGL) They called saying they were going around, and before I'd lost another 50ft in altitude they passed directly over me. I don't know how close, but it was definitely within 50ft.

I went full stop and parked. They departed the area - never saying anything about it on the radio.

Some folks on the ground said I was lucky - they nearly landed on me - and if I'd have tried to go around, it would've been messy. :eek:
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You did exactly right. If you have Right of Way, the rule is you continue on course/speed for a reason. There should only be one person maneuvering at a time to avoid a collision, until it becomes apparent they won't be able to manage. That point in the situation for your trivia knowledge is known as in extremis.

Personally I would have headed for the deck to get well below the glide slope to open the gap though.
 
Henning said:
You did exactly right. If you have Right of Way, the rule is you continue on course/speed for a reason. There should only be one person maneuvering at a time to avoid a collision, until it becomes apparent they won't be able to manage. That point in the situation for your trivia knowledge is known as in extremis.

Personally I would have headed for the deck to get well below the glide slope to open the gap though.
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I initially figured they could be lower than me, and sorta braced when they said they were going around - just waiting for them to come tearing up through the floorboard (they never called their altitude).

I was also kicking myself in the *** for not seeing them when I was on base - even though I would always look before turning final. It was a serious lesson on why you've got to keep your eyes outside, scanning for traffic as much as possible.
 
My worst experience was due to unexpected weather on my first solo. My first CFI (he's now with an airline) headed to a towered airport to knock out my first solo and 3 landings at a towered airport.

Winds were calm. We did three trips in the pattern together. We had double checked the major weather sources. Nothing was called for anywhere.

He hopped out, I took off. First trip in the pattern i noticed there was some signs of change. Suddenly the wind sock began to move ever so slightly.

Landed, followed taxi instructions, took off. This time around it was noticeably bumpy in the air. Not good. Now the wind sock was showing a direct crosswind and gusts.

Towered called "cleared to land, wind 15 gusting 22", direct crosswind. I landed it but I was not comfortable doing it at all. from what I remember It seemed like I was at a direct 45 degree crab just to remain center line on final.

Tower gave me taxi instructions and I called it. Told him it was beyond my limits. Tower replied with "yeah, probably, winds are now 18 gusting into the 20's".

I picked up my CFI and he was happier that I made the call than that I had made the landings. We took off and headed home. Over the trip it got bad enough that he said normally he wouldnt fly in that kinda turbulence.

He still made me land at home, which I did just fine, but that experience overall set me back months. It took 3 to 4 months for me not to start pouring sweat any time I even thought of flying. My landings were horrible for about a month or so, and I didnt solo for awhile.

I pushed through the funk and eventually got my confidence back but it took a long while. My palms still sweat when I remember being on final freaking out with a strong crab. I remember now the gust blew me from center line to almost off the runway once I straightened out just before flair.
 
I arrived for my check-ride and started reviewing my log book and discovered one of my flights logged as a cross country was only 49nm and thus did not count, so I only had 9.5 hours of Cross Country time when I needed a minimum of 10 hours (dates me a bit).

Examiner agreed to continue the exam, but I would have to complete the other .5 hours of cross country before he would issue me a temporary certificate. I actually rather enjoyed the rest of the exam and all went well. At the end he let me know that I had passed but we would discontinue the exam until I completed the missing cross country time.

The next day I headed out on my cross country, as I approached the city I was flying to I identified the major highways going into the small town and they matched up with the town I was going to. I then started looking for the airport which I knew was alongside one of the highways. I couldn't find it. Flying back over town I started looking for a park I was familiar with in the town, I couldn't find it either. Deciding I wasn't at the correct town I needed to figure out where I was. I had read about pilots reading road signs to determine where they were, so outside of town I dropped down to about 500 feet and flew toward town looking at the road signs. All I discovered is that from 500 feet you really can't read road signs. Just as I was giving up there was one sign at the edge of town and the only word I could read on it was "Halfway." Great halfway from where?

So I initiated plan B. I started climbing with the plan to get high enough to pick up a VOR and determine my location. One of the problems was the airport I was going to was right on the corner of 3 sectional charts of which I had 2. Remember I am thinking all I need to do is complete this cross country to get my private pilot certificate.
So I started laying the maps out that I had and started tracing circles with my finger around my destination airport on the maps I did have, my finger finally ran over a town call, "Halfway". Finally I knew where I was, I had flown up the wrong side of the mountain range, I was simply in the wrong valley. I climbed over the mountain into the next valley and there was the correct town.

The next day I met with the examiner and he issued me my Private Pilot Certificate.
 
Had a few little things. I guess the worst was somehow the cowl latches on the plane did not grab correctly. On take-off maybe 20 feet off the ground the cover flipped open and covered a good portion of the window. I did what I was trained to and landed the plane on the remaining runway. CFI, I think was actually proud of me. Then there was the old guy at the airport that saw the entire thing. As we taxied back to try again (there was no damage), he waived and was laughing at us.
 
Two situations come to mind, one of which I've posted in a different thread before...

1. Was practicing my takeoff and landings solo, had nailed the first landing, the second landing was kind of iffy because of the wind changing but I figured I'd end on a high note so up we go again. Third time, I'm settling into the flare and suddenly a gust comes along and I'm facing about 30 degrees off center. To this point I had been lucky in having mostly relatively calm wind during landing practice so this was a relatively new and unwelcome situation. I managed to get the plane straightened out and held the flare until touch down, it wasn't pretty but nothing got bent. I called it a day after that and my hands were shaking a bit as I walked into the fbo.

2. I was doing a mock checkride and everything was going fine, we weren't going to get the whole thing in due to some weather coming in, but figured we'd get what we could. So we do ground refs, steep turns, stalls and then he has me put on the hood, we do unusual attitude recovery and he has me fly on a couple headings at different altitudes. As we're flying on course I smelled something pretty noxious, first thought was "it wasn't me, was it him?" Then I realized it was more of industrial smell and I started wondering what we were flying over. Then the smell hit full force and I finally asked him what the smell was. He was quiet for a second, then tells me he has the controls and to take off the foggles, he then proceeds to get on the radio and announces a suspected electrical fire. Thankfully we were directly over the airport at the time. I think that and the lack of any visible flames kept him from declaring an actual emergency. After the fbo confirmed they were sending someone out to meet us we shut off the master and he landed the plane. Turns out the insulation on one of the wires going to the master had burned. The instructor did say I handled the situation well and he was impressed at how calm I was during; was still a little freaked out afterwards though.

Sent from my Nexus 10 using Tapatalk
 
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