Solo flight courtesey

Wheelsup23

Wheelsup23

Well-Known Member
Curious on your thoughts.

You hear a student pilot call the tower for their first solo flight and you will also be remaining in the pattern as a CFI giving a lesson. Is it not professional courtesy to give way to the student pilot to a certain degree? Now I was making three full stops and taxied back to approach, so I would be entering the pattern in different sequence but there was only two of us in the pattern. I had to extend a couple of times because he requested stop and go's, plus he was flying a very wide pattern. I just felt him knowing I'm on my solo, do a 360 and let me get in ahead of you, I sure would if I knew a student was soloing behind me. I was successful and do not have a problem maintaining my position in the pattern, it just seems professional courtesy should be extended in a case like this. We were both in 172's

Bucket list checked! Solo complete.
 
I would move if I thought the student was having a hard time. Dealing with other traffic is a good learning experiance and bought you some more solo time.
 
Fly_Unity said:
Why? Is this because a policy your school has made? Or because your instructor had that rule for you so you do the same for your students?
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It was a school policy, but I was in agreement with it. I can't recall if I was endorsed for touch and go's or not since it's been 11 years... Im pretty sure it was full stop only.
 
mastermags said:
Stop and go's as a solo? I never endorsed anything but full stops.
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Ugh.

mastermags said:
It was a school policy, but I was in agreement with it. I can't recall if I was endorsed for touch and go's or not since it's been 11 years... Im pretty sure it was full stop only.
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Double ugh. My flight school made that policy change without telling the local ATCT. You should have heard the astonishment in the controllers' voices when they found out. "Oh really? N***AB, please get us a copy of that memo, runway two-six, cleared to land." In fact, aforementioned flight school now only does stop and go landings even for rated pilots. (More accurately, Company policy there calls for a "slow and go", stating, "there is no need to actually stop the aircraft" :eek::oops::rolleyes: ...)

In most training airplanes, it just isn't that hard to maintain directional control while retracting the flaps to some takeoff position, and setting the elevator trim (if required). I'm just not a huge fan of stop and goes for a few reasons that include tire and brake wear...but I've also owned an airplane and had to replace tires and brakes.

BajtheJino said:
How do you endorse full stops?
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Not a CFI, but an instructor may place limitations on a solo endorsement, including the types and kinds of operations, weather conditions, and so on, that the student is authorized to conduct or operate under.
 
Fly_Unity said:
Why? Is this because a policy your school has made? Or because your instructor had that rule for you so you do the same for your students?
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And what happens when the tower tells you to go around after you touchdown? Or there is emergency traffic behind you? Or some idiot rolls onto the runway in front of you?

In light pistons, good to treat every landing like you might have to gun it and go around...
 
IMHO, a roll-and-go is a more useful training tool than a stop and go. The only thing the stop and go shows you is that you can take off again in the remaining 3-6k feet or so of runway. Great, the POH also told you that. A roll and go simulates aborting a landing (aka go around) which is actually useful experience. I have aborted 3 landings in the last 6 months for wind-shear and tailwinds (thanks tower), wake turbulence, and an anti-skid caution. I was above 100 kts on all 3 when I firewalled the throttles. Having an idea of the distance it will take to get airborne at various speeds is an important bit of knowledge to have when it comes to deciding whether to go around or just stick with it when a landing goes poorly. There may be some other safety considerations playing into the SOP of having students full stop only, but I think there is almost no value whatsoever from a training standpoint in doing full stop and gos.
 
///AMG said:
I'd say that is good advice for any type of airplane. It ain't over until you have cleared the runway for the taxiway.
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It's not over until the aircraft is stopped, the chocks are installed, and the engines are shut down and propeller rotation has stopped (as appropriate) :)
 
Autothrust Blue said:
It's not over until the aircraft is stopped, the chocks are installed, and the engines are shut down and propeller rotation has stopped (as appropriate) :)
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Very true, I was just speaking to landing/runway environment considerations. There is still plenty of room between the runway and the FBO/gate/hangar to goon it away though!
 
As a solo student we were not allowed to do touch and go's. All my training was in tailwheels so our tricycle gear students may have had it differently. We did plenty of T&G's with instructors, but not solo.
 
///AMG said:
Very true, I was just speaking to landing/runway environment considerations. There is still plenty of room between the runway and the FBO/gate/hangar to goon it away though!
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Surface operations, especially in non-movement areas, are "interesting".
 
Autothrust Blue said:
Not a CFI,
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If you were you might understand why a school would do this. Liability issue are no fun. I have had students essentially "raise the flaps int he flare" as a result of a negative transfer of touch and goes. Had a student do a go around and his first action was to bring the flaps full up without adding power. He seriously was doing the "touch and go" flow instead of a go-around flow in the air.

The student still gets the experience of touch and goes with the CFI anyway. At least my school only limited it to student pilot solos.
 
drunkenbeagle said:
And what happens when the tower tells you to go around after you touchdown? Or there is emergency traffic behind you? Or some idiot rolls onto the runway in front of you?

In light pistons, good to treat every landing like you might have to gun it and go around...
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A) You say "unable"...
B) You give way
C) You go around

I taught at one of the busiest GA airports in the country so there was no shortage of unusual scernarios... in fact when I was instructing there were no fewer than 7 flight schools on the field, plus three major FBO's, and two of the largest fractionals in the country had bases there. I did touch and go's all the time, but the theory was you never have to land and you never have to take off. If a CFI is not in the airplane and you land, you're going to taxi clear.
 
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