It doesn't do any good to put heat on an airplane so it will start when it is 15 degrees outside if the tug required to pull the airplane out of the hangar won't start when it is 15 degrees outside. It took me a long time and a lot of effort to get that tug started this morning bright and early, but once I did the plane itself started great. The morning passed uneventfully doing a high performance endorsement and airplane checkout initial flight, and when we took a break just shy of noon, I grabbed a sandwich and went right back out and promptly had a horrible time starting the tug again. This time Nathan hopped in the back and we headed over to drop him off at MIE.
We were only about ten miles out from MIE listening to a radio conversation between a student pilot and Muncie Tower, and the student pilot was a little lost, trying to find the airport and having trouble, and trying to report what he saw and where he was. The problem was, he kept reporting that he was right about where we were. Three people had heads on a swivel looking for the poor guy, and couldn't find him. Finally we were on a 5-mile straight in final for the runway, and he pipes up and says "Oh! I see the runway! I'm on about a 3-mail final for the runway." Considering how well people can judge their distance, I didn't like that at all, and had us do a left 360 degree turn to give the guy some space and try to find him. No luck for us, but the tower finally spotted him, he wasn't where we were at all, and we came in to land. The student came in to land shortly thereafter, and parked next to us, and he just sat in his airplane for a very long time-until after we'd left. I wanted to go over and tell him he did fine--he got to the right area, he asked for help when he needed it, and he made it in safely. He'll get more used to finding runways the more of them he sees, but even experienced pilots have to search to see runways sometimes.
Our trip home from Muncie ended on the runway back home a little differently than expected. Nathan was waiting to take off in another airplane, so when we touched down, and the plane started decelerating rapidly and vibrating, for a split second I thought the person in the left seat was hitting the brakes hard in order to get off at the nearest intersection. I said "Hey, get off the brakes, we're not in that big of a hurry." He said "I'm not!" at which time the plane decided to go right, and I took over and stopped. Since I knew Nathan was back there waiting to take off, I got on the radio and said "Hey, think I've got a flat." He taxiied up and took a look and confirmed it looked bad, so I shut her down on the runway. Within just a couple of minutes the airport folks had called it in and gotten the runway officially shut down and parked a truck with flashing lights on either side of the plane. (You'd think you wouldn't have to worry about Joe Pilot being too blind to see the airplane stuck in the middle of the runway, but you might be surprised.) Poor Jon and Nathan were out there in below freezing temps with a jack and some tools lying on the runway replacing the tire, and they had it back on the plane in under an hour. I really appreciated it too, and now I owe 'em a good one. I started it up and taxiied back to the hangar, where once again I had a horrible time starting the tug. I'm coming to actively dislike that tug.
I was in time to get Kaylee before after care ended, and we were supposed to head south this afternoon for a birthday celebration with Kaylee's grandparents. Unfortunately, that area is getting a pretty impressive snowstorm tonight. For awhile it looked like it would be forecast to be doable anyway, and then things started dropping down to minimum IFR and below, and Steve and I decided that another weekend looked like a much better option after all.
So, did anything go according to plan today? Ummmmm...nope! But that's life, isn't it? :)
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