Mooney Flight Training 2010 - Notes on an extraordinary event
by Bernd Hamacher
Returning home from this year’s Mooney Flight Training in Donaueschingen I´m still impressed with what we have experienced during these days. This event was really a benchmark in EMPOA´s history and probably a milestone for an
ambitious community. When Thomas and I initiated this Mooney Community in 2002, we soon realized that Fly-Ins and get-together of Mooniac´s are enjoyable events to attract Mooniac’s in Europe, but on the long run there is a need to organize events that challenge Mooniac’s to a higher level of airmanship. How to achieve this was not clear to us initially, but when we joined the MAPA-Convention in 2006 and heard the presentation of Bruce Jaeger on the MAPA Safety Foundation, we immediately felt that this would be a cornerstone for us European Mooniac’s. In the following summer Thomas could convince the MAPA Safety Foundation to organize a first seminar in Germany and 16 Mooniacs took the chance to improve their proficiency. As I described on a former Pilot-Report, which you will find on the Mooney-website, I felt that this first training event was of great benefit to our community, but as Thomas told me last fall that he was planning another training seminar for this year together with Bud Johnson and the Safety Foundation, I frankly admit that I simultaneously felt happy and hesitating. Happy as the Safety Foundation obviously enjoyed their stay last time and felt that their work has beenappreciated by the European Moonics - and hesitating whether a sufficient number of Mooniacs would sign up to repeat the event. Fortunately, we underestimated the European Mooniacs willingness to invest in their proficiency and Thomas could tell me already in march that there was a long waiting list of Mooniacs who would like to attend. But this immediately leads to the question, what is Mooniacs driving to spend time and money to attend such a training seminar? Of course additional knowledge and skills are reasons to attract people. But this won´t be the full answer. According to my impression the dignity and seriousity of the personalities who came together was the key for the attraction. As an experienced Mooney pilot, it makes a huge difference, whether there is an instructor sitting next to you having thousands of hours experiences on a Mooney, rather than sitting next to a checker, who is just formally entitled to perform a check ride with you, but has personally no substantial experiences with Mooneys. And we all know, that our birds are very special animals and that we are eager to master these airplanes. Thus, getting advice rooted in long experiences is somewhat, Mooniacs are obviously looking for and this has something to do with personality, responsibility and airmanship. Isn´t that alone impressive in these days?
But let me come back now to the details of the last weekend: When we arrived thursday afternoon in Donaueschingen, our American friends have already arrived and Bruce Jaeger together with Jack Napoli welcomed each arriving crew. It was a
hot summer day and soon after, relaxed Mooniacs were sitting on the hotel’s terrace at the airfield, observing the arriving Mooneys. In the evening an impressive line of 24 Mooneys from 6 European countries were sitting on the apron. Later that evening, the group moved into the hotel´s restaurant to have a get-together in form of a social dinner. It was this exciting mixture of Mooniacs, who first attended an EMPOA event and Mooniacs knowing each other from former events within the community. It is really fascinating to me, that all our events always attract new Mooniacs and this shows, there is the special atmosphere of an open minded community, welcoming new participants every time with a lot of interests, rather than behaving as a conceited and narrow-minded group.
For the next day ground school was scheduled and Bud Johnson opened the course in the conference room of the Concorde Hotel. During the day, the participants learned in different sessions the benefits to ”fly by numbers”, refreshed the knowledge on airport signs and marking and discussed emergency procedures and accident prevention. In the afternoon participants were assigned to their instructors, who perfomed the briefing concerning the flight training sessions for the next day. During this first day, my job was, to conduct a pinch-hitter course for a small class of three ladies. In the morning we did a theory session on flying and emergency procedures and in the afternoon we practiced that in a Mooney. Believe me - this was pure fun to me. I never welcomed so talented and focused student pilots like these three ladies before onboard of a plane. They all were so enthusiastic and eager to learn flying, that within two hours, they already succeeded in performing a safe landing on their own. And this on a plane, which is mostly very famous to be very hard to land. Congratulations! I was really impressed how smooth and quickly these three ladies learned not only the basics of flying, but also how to apply “pitch and power” to perform a straight approach for landing. Wow!
In the evening we went to the lovely town of Donaueschingen, where we had a guided tour through the Fürstenberg brewery, one of the oldest breweries in Germany followed by a dinner at the restaurant of the brewery. Here the group relaxed from the learning exercises of the day and again stories about Mooneys and Mooniacs were told among the tables. Later in the evening, some participants continued their conversation at the hotel bar, but as the flight training was scheduled for the early morning of the next day, the majority of participants decided to have an early night. I was scheduled for the first block at 8:00 o´clock on the following morning and John Pallante was my instructor. It was a beautiful summer day when we entered our Mooney at exactly 8:00h, but very soon our American friends should learn, that departing from an airfield on an early morning in Germany is not that easy. The tower was not yet occupied at this time and we had to explain to our surprised instructors that in Germany it is not allowed to take-off from an airfield until this airfield has been formally opened by a representative of the airport owner. Our instructors were baffled that infringements are not just treated as a minor
breach of the law, but as a crime. These laws go back to World War 2 and for someone, who is used to the total freedom of flying like in the US, it is really hard to understand, that these laws are still valid in our modern times. Fortunately, Thomas managed to get hold of one of these representatives, so that the airfield could be opened and John and I climbed out high above the mountains of the Black-Forest to perform some exercises along the limits of the flight-envelope of my Mooney. There was a lot to learn from an experienced instructor like John, with such a great repertoire of tricks and proven procedures from his thousands of hours of Mooney experience and we also had a lot of fun during this session. After my lessons I handed the plane over to my son Thomas to continue with Bruce Jaeger and for the rest of the day I observed the continuous stream of incoming and outgoing Mooneys from the terrace, accompanied by very excited faces of Mooney pilots. I talked to returning pilots, who were completely enthusiastic about what they had experienced during their training session. This is astonishing enough, as the scope of the participants reached from complete beginners to experienced pilots. Mooniacs, which just transitioned to a Mooney to pilots who already have hundreds of hours on this type. But literally everyone I spoke to, was satisfied and even enthusiastic about what they learned and experienced. This wonderful day has been finalized with an excellent Gala Dinner at a Golf Hotel nearby and a content group returned to our hotel later that evening, eager for the second block of training sessions on Sunday.
But the next day started different as expected. Opposite to the forecast, which promised a warm and sunny day like the day before, the sunday presented solid IMC-conditions in the morning. It was really a pity, as the evaluation of weather reports turned out, that the bad weather was just in the vicinity of Donaueschingen, whereas most of the airports in the region showed pure VMC. But the disaster of the situation was, that we could not return to Donaueschingen as the weather there was below minimum. Therefore we had to arrange an alternative schedule. But even in this situation our American friends showed an impressive flexibility. Bruce Jaeger instantly held a presentation on accident prevention, John Pallante presented how to exploit the functionality of a Garmin 430/530 for IFR flight and our Dutch friend Robert Jongen gave a presentation about his ideas concerning formation-flying with Mooneys. After lunch the weather improved a bit, so that some crews could continue with their IFR-training, but due to lost time and weather it became impossible to finish the training for all participants. Especially for those, who had to go VFR. But surprisingly for me, there were no complains at all among the participants. None at all! Even on of our Swiss friends, who donated his own session the day before to another participant and was now faced with the situation that he could not fly at all within the training weekend, showed no grudge. What an attitude! Would you expect this from a any other plane-owner? Probably not. I emphasis this, as exactly these experiences of personality and sovereignity within our community have impressed me in the last years. This attitude of Mooniacs shows, that these are very special pilots and people and empowers us to bring the community forward and makes the effort worth..
Again opposite to the weather forecast, monday morning showed good VFR-conditions. So the small group of remaining participants, who stayed until monday, were able to do some further training. But at lunch time everyone had to leave. So Thomas and I and my old friend (and new Mooniac) Manfred checked out and prepared for our flight home and after slightly more than two hours flight, we returned happy and satisfied to our homebase. An all in all very successful event was finished and now already history.
Finally, I would like to give great thanks to the following people: First of all to the directors and instructors of the Mooney Safety Foundation for coming over with 6 instructors to teach us how to fly our Mooneys better and to provide us with their knowledge, experience and skills. It was a pleasure to have you had here in Germany and we would be happy and willing to do it again. Further I thank my son Thomas for all his effort to organize this event and all the trouble-shooting during these days. Without his effort, we wouldn’t have had these opportunities and would have missed a wonderful experience. I also thank the participants for the patience and supportive attitude on any inconvenience they encountered. Finally I thank my pinch-hitter students for their trust in me and the enthusiasm to learn how to land a Mooney. This was a lot of fun and encouraged me to continue as I found this most rewarding.
I am looking forward for the next event!
Bernd Hamacher
Some comments from the participants:
“I didn’t get the chance to say good bye as I didn’t want to disturb the ongoing workshop when I left. As far as I am concerned the meeting was very successful and I enjoyed every minute of it. As a new Mooniac, I was pleased to note that aside from being experienced pilots, Mooniacs are also good company and I wished I had spent more time with people that I only met briefly. Maybe I’ll get another chance?
With regards to the flight training I was very impressed by the ease with which John Pallante managed to improve my knowledge and understanding of the Acclaim and Garmin 1000. Both VFR and IFR sessions were extremely valuable and pleasant. Thanks to you for the flawless organization of all this
Best regards”
“Thank you so much for the weekend and the excellent organization at the Donaueschingen Airport. I really enjoyed it, although my VFR-Flying went down the toilet on Sunday morning (…but instead of VFR I made some exciting experiences [a future option maybe….] in IFR-Flying with Hermann on our way back to Zurich Kloten, LSZH).
Please say “thank you” to all people (pilots, instructors, pilot girl friends, pilot wives and so on) I had the pleasure to meet in Donaueschingen and let them know my home- and my email address.
So, thank you very much for the wonderful days and I hope to see you folks soon”
“Nochmals besten Dank für die Organisation des PPP sowie Deiner Bemühungen um meine Teilnahme daran!
Das Airwork mit Bud und dessen flight by numbers Ansatz hat mich voll überzeugt und fliegerisch einen großen Schritt weiter gebracht.
Auch der Theoriepart am Freitag und der Blick unter die 231 Cowling am Samstag zusammen mit Bruce waren für mich sehr aufschlußreich und richtungsweisend (bei mir steht alsbald ein Engine OH an).
Ebenfalls sehr eindrucksvoll war für mich die Tatsache, daß wohl alle Moonicas (weltweit) irgendwie gleich ticken - man versteht sich sofort, man spricht eben dieselbe Sprache.
Viele Grüße und bis bald”
Please have a look at our gallery to find some more pictures of this event.