TSS Problem 10 - Kick it up a notch

Published: August 3, 2016

"Bam! Kick it up a notch!" That’s what Don, our lead instructor, told us today (famous words from Emeril). Boy was he right! Holy smokes.

Our traffic count went from high 40s to high 50s today in problem 10. I started off on local (which means I got 3 local runs today, yay!) and it was a big jump from yesterday’s easy problem! It started out pretty slow, felt like a typical level 8-9 problem, with a few IFRs and a VFR in the pattern. Then suddenly, call after call of VFRs, small, fast, 4 mile gaps on the IFR final, and a go around put me behind the eight ball.

Okay, I’m exaggerating, it wasn’t THAT bad, but that’s what it felt like in the moment. Poor planning on my part caused a double go-around on Twin Cessna N1388V for 28L before I could finally plan ahead far enough to get the poor guy (or gal) in.

The three VFR jets didn’t help the situation either, one popped up on the ILS (IFR), another right next to it on the straight in for 28L, and another to the south (the faster one, who would undoubtedly beat the straight in, slightly slower Gulfstream). Man I was swamped!

Slowly but surely, I got the planes on the ground and worked through it, and launched my IFR departures in the small gaps approach control had left me with (curse that bloody computer!!). That was just problem 10, variant "A." My instructor (who I’d never seen before) didn’t have much feedback, and acknowledged it’s designed to be an @$$-kicker problem. She gave me a few pointers, and I was on my way.

My next problem was a monitor run, then a ground run. That was sure awkward. The local controller was my A-lead instructor, who was showing off to a group of 3 students monitoring his run. My instructor on ground with me was one of the instructors I’d heard about, but not actually worked with yet, let’s just say, for the sake of public internet, that was interesting (and the stories I’d heard were mostly true).

My next local run went much better, much less complicated set ups than the A version of the problem I had run earlier. I didn’t have any major issues, and my instructor was mostly quiet and didn’t have much negative feedback, besides mistakes I knew I’d made.

My next runs were monitor and ground again (nothing special here) and then a final local run to finish off the day. I killed the local run, besides one almost major mistake, which was saved in time, thankfully!

Overall, I really enjoyed today. It was fun, the most fun I’ve had since I’ve been here, mostly because it actually felt like I was working a problem, instead of just playing a game. I didn’t find myself constantly looking at the timer saying, “ugh, another 20 minutes…” and so on.

At the end of the day, we had our class roundtable, and were almost ready to leave when our lead instructor said, “well, I guess no placement folks…” and was interrupted by the door opening. Everyone got really excited, for a second. Now, I KNEW it wasn’t the placement folks walking in, since hours ago they had just completed the placement info for the class ahead of us, who graduated yesterday. There was just no way they had a list prepared for us…and I was right. It was just someone looking in the wrong room thinking it was unoccupied. HA!

In all seriousness, hopefully we get our list before the weekend. Tomorrow we run problem 11, and Friday we run 12. Monday is 13, and Tuesday starts our PAs. Msot of us have 7-8 local runs left in our time here at the academy, and then on to the PAs, how exciting!