An instructor once told me that pilot applicants typically make about three mistakes during a checkride. Depending on the context, severity, and relation to the Practical Test Standards, those mistakes may or may not lead to failure. My Instrument Rating checkride took place March 25, 2003 at Cherry Ridge Airport in Honesdale, PA. I got my money’s worth out of my three mistakes.

    I arrived for our 3:00 appointment about 45 minutes early and laid out the paperwork and other materials that would be needed. The examiner, Mark George, arrived exactly on time, and we settled in to begin paperwork and the oral exam.

    Since I had previously earned my Commercial Pilot’s certificate, this was to be my third checkride. This being the case I knew how to prepare the paperwork, and these chores were completed much faster than on my earlier tests. My logbook numbers checked out, the various instructor sign-off’s required for the test were easily located, and I had brought the aircraft's engine/airframe logs to prove it was legal for IFR flight. That done, Mark leaned back and said, “OK. Tell me about yourself.”

    I gave him my background and spoke of my goals in aviation. Mark then did the same, explaining he had been around airplanes since childhood. He had experience within military aviation as well law enforcement, flying both fixed wing and helicopters. This interested me greatly, and I was sorry we didn’t have time to go into his experiences.

    Mark then explained his philosophy for giving flight tests. He believes in tailoring a checkride to the applicant, and especially in making it applicable to real world situations. Although we would of course be following the PTS standards, he said he would attempt to make the oral and flight portions of the exam as practical as possible. For me specifically, being a Commercial pilot already, we would dispense with questions about the basics and focus on real world IFR flying, keeping in mind that I might be doing so professionally at some point.

    We then proceeded with the oral exam, with nearly every question being related to an actual situation that could happen. He seemed equally interested in my judgment as with my knowledge of the rules. For example, Mark first asked me to list the various minimums for IFR takeoffs and approaches. Then he asked me what I personally would be comfortable with. Would I attempt a zero-zero takeoff? If so, what information from the instruments would be crucial? What would I do if I were flying at the Minimum Enroute Altitude and encountered icing? Mark knew that I had recently flown into Kennedy International. Using the departure procedure I was given that day, how would I determine my airplane was capable of the climb necessary? By what means had I planned today’s flight? Were they typical of my usual pre-flight planning process?

    After we completed the oral portion he said we would go fly now, beginning with the cross-country I had planned, but with a diversion to another airport. After my pre-flight inspection we climbed in and arranged ourselves in the cockpit. Guessing it wouldn’t be necessary, but taking no chances, I asked Mark if I should give him a standard passenger briefing. “Nope. This isn’t a Private checkride.” He also explained that he would take the controls briefly while I pulled out necessary charts, but that otherwise everything was up to me.

    I fired up the plane and went through my checklist. After stopping at the hold-short line for my run up, I blundered into Mistake #1. My checklist says simply, “Adjust flight instruments”. This encompasses the attitude indicator, altimeter, and directional gyro. I got the first two, but for some reason forgot the heading indicator. That’s nearly inexcusable, and I can’t think what made me forget it. Mark pointed it out just as I was about to begin the takeoff roll, and I mentally cringed. I adjusted the instrument, and made a mental note to change our checklist to make it more specific. Frankly, I felt he would have been justified in terminating the test right there.

    Although that mistake was incredibly careless and highly irritating to me, I determined to let it go and continue - just as I would have to if I made the mistake while actually flying IFR. You can’t just throw your hands up and quit.

    There was an Airmet for moderate turbulence below 8000 that day, and the plane was buffeted a bit as we climbed out. I slipped on the foggles to limit my view to the instrument panel, and then put us on course to our first fix. We quickly intercepted the radial to the Wilkes Barre VOR as it was just about on our takeoff heading.

    After a few minutes of watching me fly Mark asked me to contact Wilkes Barre Approach and request the runway 22 ILS. There was a lot to do at this particular moment. I was climbing the plane to a specific altitude, re-tuning the radios, identifying the VOR we were flying to, and starting to talk to controllers. I leveled off at 4000 just as Wilkes Barre assigned us a heading and transponder code. Mark handed me the plates and I began the approach briefing.

    This is where things began to happen VERY quickly. Rather than doing the full approach, we had requested vectors. No sooner had I tuned the radios and identified the localizer than we began to intercept the approach course. I saw the needle moving just as Mark began to point out that we were about to fly through the localizer, and I began my turn.

    After a correction to center the localizer needle the glideslope began to come in, and I reduced the throttle to stabilize our descent. The localizer and glideslope stayed centered fairly well, and I felt the approach was stable. Just as I felt I had things well in hand Mark asked me, “So ah, do you know where you are?”

    I did - we had just passed the outer marker, and I said so. Mark leered at me and said, “Really? Are you sure about that?”

    I felt a horrible sinking feeling. Could I have made a grievous navigational error? I frantically scanned the instruments and the approach plate, cross checking my position. Then I pointed at the approach plate and said with certainty, “Yes. We’re here, just past the Dumor marker.”

    “Oh! Yes. Yes, you’re right. Sorry.” Although I was very convinced at the time that he was genuinely mistaken, I’m now quite sure Mark knew all along exactly where we were and had deliberately challenged me. I laughed with relief and continued flying the ILS. As we got close to the runway I had to maneuver a bit to keep on the glideslope, but the approach remained stable. Just before decision height Mark said I could look up, and there was the runway as nice as could be. I initiated a go-around and keyed the mic to inform the controller we were beginning the missed approach.

    Rather than fly the charted missed approach procedure, the controllers gave us vectors to come around for the NDB approach. I attempted to do an approach briefing, but was interrupted every minute or so by the controllers giving me a new vector. During one brief lull Mark asked me to identify our position. I consulted the ADF needle and then pointed to the chart. It seemed they were setting us up on a 45° angle for the final approach course.

    Then we were told to remain at 4000 feet until established on the approach course. I misinterpreted this instruction, and this led to Mistake #2. Things were happening so quickly on this approach that I missed intercepting the bearing. Not realizing my mistake until too late, this meant that I had also failed to descend at the appropriate time. Compounding the problem was the fact that we had a nearly direct tailwind. This produced a high groundspeed, which meant everything was accelerated. By the time all of this became apparent we were already over the airport, and still at 4000 feet. There was nothing for it but to declare missed approach.

    I thought that was going to be the end of the test, and still thought so when Mark asked me what happened on that approach. “I’m of two minds about what just happened,” I said slowly. “Obviously I missed something there, but they did say maintain 4000 until established on the final approach course. I didn’t have course guidance yet, so I didn’t think it was safe to descend.”

    Then thinking I had nothing to lose, I said, “I feel pretty good about how I fly NDB approaches. If that hadn’t happened so quickly with such little time to prepare, I think it would have gone differently.”

    Mark nodded thoughtfully and said, “Hmmm. All right. Tell them we want the VOR approach back into Honesdale.” I made the request to the controllers, we received a vector, and I set up the approach. To my considerable surprise, the test was apparently going to continue.

    The VOR radial for the approach didn’t come in as quickly as I would have liked, so I corrected a bit more into the wind. Soon the needle moved toward the center and the approach was stabilized. There was considerably more time to set things up, as the Cherry Ridge approach is rather long.

    Once everything was stable Mark pulled out an instrument cover and placed it over the attitude indicator. Time for partial panel. I modified my scan appropriately and the VOR needle remained centered. After reaching the final approach fix and beginning my descent, Mark moved the cover to  the heading indicator. He then asked for a new heading, which meant compass turns. I entered a needle, ball, and airspeed turn to the left and rolled out on the appropriate heading. Mark asked what constituted a standard rate turn and I immediately rapped out, “Three degrees per second.”

    “How long to turn 180 degrees?”

    “One minute.”

    “Do it. Left turn.”

    I noted our heading on the compass, rolled into the turn, and started my stopwatch. All the needles stayed where they were, and at the fifty second mark I looked up from my watch, counted ten out loud, and began the rollout. After the compass stabilized we were about 8 degrees past our intended heading. I turned in the opposite direction, counted two seconds and rolled out on heading.

    Mark then took the cover off the heading indicator and grabbed hold of the yoke. “My plane,” he said. “Put your head down in your chest and wait for me to tell you to recover.”

    I acknowledged the change of controls and put my head down. I’m confident with unusual attitudes, so I wasn’t worried about this. Mark jinked the plane around long enough to disorient me and then said, “Recover”. I looked up to find us in a climbing turn to the right. I returned the plane to level flight, and Mark again took the controls. When told to recover we were in a steep descending turn to the right. I dropped the throttle to idle, leveled the wings, and gently pulled up into level flight before bringing back the power.

    Mark said, “OK. Take the foggles off and take me back to Cherry Ridge.”

    The airport was close by to our left. I was glad to be looking out the window again, but still wondering what my status on this test was. I keyed the mic to alert traffic in the area of our position, and this was Mistake #3. After my announcement to the local Cherry Ridge traffic I was treated to the sound of the Wilkes Barre controller asking who the heck was transmitting that nonsense on their frequency. Dumb. I quickly fumbled for the switch, apologized, and changed radio frequencies. Although it was the least of my mistakes, it was very embarrassing to me at this point.

    As I entered the landing pattern for runway 17 Mark pulled back the throttle and said, “Let’s see what happens if we do this.” I instantly reverted back to my training and the emergency procedures that have become so ingrained since I began flying. Trim the plane for best glide, judge the landing, then attempt an engine re-start (simulated in this case). I misjudged the wind somewhat as I turned base, and had to monkey with the flaps to assure a landing on the runway. Then I put the plane into a hard slip. This particular airplane has a rudder linkage to the ailerons, which makes it hard to cross control.

    As we got down toward the runway Mark suggested I leave the slip in all the way to touchdown, which was a technique new to me. He showed me what he meant and I was surprised to feel us touchdown on an angle, but quite softly. I was expecting a big side load. “That could keep you out of the trees someday,” he said.

    After taxiing off the runway I shut down the engine and blew out a big breath, waiting for the verdict. I knew that examiners were supposed to terminate the test immediately once an item wasn’t completed successfully. So I was confused about my fate, not quite sure how we had arrived at this point.

    Remaining in the cockpit, Mark began to de-brief me on the checkride. “OK, Jason. Let’s talk about that NDB approach. Here’s what happened: They cleared you for the approach. So you could have descended because you were ALREADY ON THE APPROACH COURSE. But you missed it when the bearing came in. There was a tailwind, and you intercepted the course so fast that you didn’t see it come in. You don’t move the ADF card, do you?”

    I shook my head. “Aha. Well you should. If you had used that moveable card the way it’s intended you would have caught that. So that was YOUR fault.”

    I nodded. He was right. I had always kept the card centered, and it had always worked for me. But this kind of situation had never come up before. I was screwed.

    Mark continued, “But having said all that… you fly quite well. A few bad habits, but you obviously know what you’re doing. You had a terrific oral exam - you were well prepared, and obviously knew your stuff. Then we went out and you flew a good ILS. Now one bad habit you have is keeping your approach chart down here on your knee. You do a lot of moving your hand back and forth and looking down and looking up. Frankly, I was a little surprised you were able to fly the ILS and hold headings and altitudes as well as you did while looking down at the chart like that all the time.”

    I was listening intently to this critique, because I hadn’t even realized I was doing that. It was just how I flew. I volunteered, “I use the bound NOS charts. Maybe I need to change to the looseleaf bound charts so I can put them on the yoke.”

    “Maybe you should,” Mark replied. “Because that would free up your right hand to do other things and you won’t be hurried. And you wouldn’t have to keep looking down into your lap.”

    “Now I told you that I believe in tailoring a test to the applicant. You came here well prepared and able to fly well. So I put you in some situations that could very well happen. Things DO happen fast out there and you can get rattled. Most of it you handled quite well. After watching you fly, I’m confident that if I had let you do the whole NDB approach from the beginning, without everything being so hurried, that you would have done it with no problem. You had no problem with the VOR approach, partial panel, and did great with the compass turns and unusual attitudes.”

    He then smiled and said, “So, congratulations: You pass!” He stuck out his hand and I shook it, still dazed but getting happier by the second.

    Mark had more to say, and I continued to listen intently. “Another thing to keep in mind is that these non-precision approaches are exactly that – not precise. With an ILS you know exactly where you are. With a VOR you mostly know where you are. With NDB’s you don’t know where you are. But sometimes they’re all you’ve got. If you go down to the islands for example, you’ll find that’s all there is.”

    “Jason, you’ll be a fine pilot. You did a good job, I feel good about passing you. And besides, you strike me as the kind of guy who is going to go home and research this stuff about moveable ADF cards and the other things we’ve discussed. So let’s go in and we’ll type up your new license and send you home.”

    With that we climbed out of the plane and went to finish the paperwork. As he typed out my temporary license, I reflected on what an intense experience this checkride was. I spent a lot of it quite rattled, but stayed with it enough to show what I could do.

    I’m a teacher by trade, and I know good testing procedures when I see them. Mark’s philosophy is one I agree with completely, and I think I would feel that way even if I hadn’t passed the checkride. He has the experience to conduct what educators call “authentic assessments”. Mark knows how to discern what a person can really do in realistic situations. And he’s right – I most definitely will be doing more work on my NDB procedures, and changing my chart habits.

    Before leaving with my new license, I asked Mark if I could write about the checkride on my web site. “No problem!” I asked if he was certain, because other test applicants might read it and find out his tricks and methods. “Impossible,” he said, “I tailor checkrides to the individual.”

    Sorry folks. If Mark is your examiner you’ll just have to go well prepared, and hope for headwinds when you do the NDB.