Today didn’t go well, at all. 

My flight today was from North Palm General Aviation Airport, to Treasure Cay, to Marsh Harbour, to West Palm Beach, back to North Palm General Aviation. Basically, for those of you who don’t know, another trip to the Bahamas. A much further trip though, and just for the flying.

I decided to take the flight today because tomorrow, my passport expires, and I wanted to go out there one more time before it does, because in the time it takes to renew my passport, I hope to be back in New York. 

Today’s weather didn’t start out the best, and the forecast wasn’t optimal either, but the trip looked doable. So I filed my flight plan, did the preflight, and went.

Upon flying by Grand Bahama, I found as an unwelcome surprise that radio coverage out there is extremely spotty. Miami Center couldn’t see me, Freeport Approach couldn’t see me (no radar), and Freeport Approach stopped being able to hear me after I passed to the east of Grand Bahama. Treasure Cay is an uncontrolled airport, with no ATIS, AWOS, or ASOS. So I go in for my landing, to encounter some of the worst turbulence I’ve experienced on final, and make an absolutely awful landing. I bounced at least 4 times. The airplane just didn’t want to stop flying. Thankfully the blunt of the bouncing was done on the main gears, not the nose gear. 

Treasure Cay to Marsh Harbour was uneventful, it was such a short hop that not talking to anyone didn’t make me uncomfortable, and my landing was better. However, reactivating the return leg of my flight plan was a challenge. Directly out of Marsh Harbour at 3000 feet to stay clear of the clouds, there’s basically only one frequency that worked for me, which was the Marsh Harbour Unicom (almost useless for my purposes). I tried at least five frequencies (Freeport Radio on two different frequencies, Nassau Radio, Miami Center and Freeport Approach) - no answers from any of them. It was only when I got back to Grand Bahama that I was able to reopen my plan and start talking to Miami Center. After this point it was all uneventful until arriving at West Palm.

Wind: 050 14G22. Runway: 10R (3200x75 ft). Landing attempts: 2

First attempt, I hit some awful turbulence on base to final, but directional control wasn’t too difficult. I maintained centerline, and right as I touched down, I think I caught a big gust, because before I knew it, the plane was back in the air (but not because I touched down too hard, because I barely felt the touchdown). Now though I think the gust stopped, and I could feel the plane ready to just drop to the runway, which it did, and this time, bounced because I touched down too hard. To avoid bouncing yet again, I gave it a little power, but by that time I didn’t think I could safely make it to the runway, so I went around. 

Second attempt, I made solid contact with the runway, but I felt I had almost no directional control on the runway, and that the plane wanted to veer off to the left and flip over to the right. Looking back, I should’ve used crosswind aileron correction upon touching down, but I wasn’t thinking clearly at that point. I’d had to go around for real, not just as practice, which then made me fairly nervous about being able to get in at all. I’ve never had to do that, I’ve never gone to land and felt unsafe doing so. It caught me off guard. The plane eventually lost enough momentum where I felt I could control it and I exited the runway. I was shaken pretty badly.

After clearing customs, I called my flight school and told them I didn’t think I could go back to North County by myself, until either the winds died down, or if an instructor came to meet me (which mine did). It’s a very short flight, but the runways there would’ve had just as bad an angle to the wind, and I was in no condition to do it. So my instructor flew with me back to North County, and he did the landing. 

Looking back, two factors led to all of this: 1) pressure to get the trip in before my passport expired, and 2) a little bit of complacency with flight procedures to the Bahamas, being I’d done it before and it went fine. I should’ve done research about communicating past Grand Bahama, and what it’s like. I didn’t. 

I’m glad I decided I was done at West Palm and that couldn’t do my last leg though. My instructor and the chief pilot at the flight school told me I made the right call calling them. Thinking about it, had I decided to risk it and do that one last leg myself, that’d have been the last wrong call away from an accident. 

1. amulherresgatada liked this
2. bxecky said: overcoming obstacles will make you a better pilot in the long run. :)
3. bxecky liked this
4. westjet757 said: interesting that this followed the pattern of a few accidents, relating to human factors/safety (we researched in said class), except yours didn’t turnout to be an accident.
5. westjet757 liked this
6. jheath said: Smart self assessment in the debrief. It’s these kinds of mistakes that you live through by sheer luck that make the best lessons.
7. jheath liked this
8. imarealist93 posted this