I went up on my observation flight with Aaron Trodahl and James Crawford on the 29th of October. The plane we took up was N978WC, the Seminole. Being in the back seat of the Seminole was a whole new experience that really gave me a different perspective of the instructing environment. On this day Aaron was on his second lesson in the Seminole which was good for me because this gave me a chance to review a lot of the things I had learned in a more relaxed environment. Over the course of the flight James introduced an engine failure and restart procedure in flight and an ILS approach in the multi. Aaron also completed power on and off stalls, slow flight and short field takeoffs and landings.
Of these maneuvers that were completed I believe that the ILS approach was the one that gave me the most perspective. During this approach I noticed how Aaron stated everything that he was doing to his instructor to let James know and to reaffirm it to himself. I then tried doing it a bit more on my next flight and realized that it really helps me to complete the actions that I want to when I state them aloud and it also gives the insrtuctor a chance to give you better feedback at the end of the maneuver. Another maneuver that I found was quite helpful to observe from the back seat was the engine failure and restart procedure. During this introduction I really got to see step by step what was happening at all times instead of having all of the pressure put on me to go through all the checklists and just concentrating on what I was doing. I also noticed in this flight the importance of being on your airspeeds in the seminole for short field approaches. Aaron completed two short field approaches while we were out in Tooele and hit them within standards both times which was a great deal due to the fact that he had the airplane configured correctly at the right places and he was on his airspeeds during the whole approach.
Overall the observation flight was a great experience that I was able to use as a learning tool. Which raises the question why haven't I done this for other ratings? I believe that the observation flight could also be beneficial to all of the other ratings, especially private and instrument where it seems to the student like there is do much happening.
