My direct aviation experience, at the moment, is limited. At the time of writing, I am just over 70 hours of logged time, in Stage 4 of my part 141 PPL training, and a PPL checkride just around the corner. I’ve been flying out of X51 – Homestead General Aviation Airport for all of my training, and have performed 250 landings, at least 230 of them are at X51. Embarrassingly, I just found something I should have found about 229 landings ago.

Operating Rules and Procedures for Homestead General Aviation Airport (X51)

Well, isn’t that fun. The county government, Miami-Dade County, owner and operator of X51, has published their own set of rules for the airport. Now, I have, in one form or another, been taught most of the rules pertaining to my type of flight, Powered-Fixed Wing, and we’ve followed them. However, the existence of this document was not commonly known around the airport.

Upon finding this document, I’ve shared it with everyone I know. We owe it to ourselves and others to make sure everyone knows the rules and procedures; and to keep ourselves out of trouble.

What did we know

I’ll run through, briefly, what rules we knew and followed. Our tribal knowledge did not fail us.

Parajumpers

X51 has parajumping operations at the airport, and the rules and procedures address safety for the jumpers. The jumpers utilize the southeast portion of the airspace for their jumpzone.

The instructors and FBO staff will inform everyone that passes through the FBO about avoiding powered operations (really operations in general) over the southeast corner of airport property.

But what about someone coming in who has never been there before? Over flying the airport to take a look at the windsock and traffic pattern markings can put an aircraft over the southeast corner. Looking at the sectional charts, and the directory supplement, we can see traffic patterns for runways 10 and 18 are to the right, and their inverses, 28 and 36, are to the left. We can extrapolate the info not to fly over the southeast corner with that information, but it isn’t laid out in specific terms.

You know where it is? In the Operating Rules & Procedures document from the operator! Section IV, subsection B, #15 specifies “Pilots shall avoid operating in or adjacent to the Skydiving Drop Zone, Aerobatic Box and the Ultralight, Glider and Paramotor Operations Areas.” Further down, either in Subsection F, #5, or in the diagrams of Exhibit A, we can see the drop zone is located in the southeast corner of airport property.

Back taxiing and turn arounds

X51 doesn’t really need back taxiing or on runway turn arounds. There are taxiways and runway transitions on the ends of both paved runways. However, if traffic is already on a taxiway, going the opposite direction, it could be tempting to take a runway that is not in use.

Back to our operation directives, Section 2, subsection B, #5 “Turn arounds and back taxiing on the runways are considered unsafe operating practices and are not authorized.”

Guess what, that shortcut could cause your quite the headache.

The ‘No Transgression Zone’

X51 has 2 northern runways; 9/27 Turf and 10/28 (paved). There are no authorized connections between the two, one is meant solely for the ultralight and glider operations, and the other is the east/west wind powered runway. The ‘no transgression zone’ is between the runways, marked with red & white markers.

But here is an interesting piece of information, X51 in in Homestead, FL where it rains year-round and the grass grows non-stop. It is impossible for all the grass to be cut all the time, and these markers disappear into the wilds of X51’s grass for most of the year.

Section 2, subsection B, # 10, as well as diagram Exhibit B tell and show us where the no transgression zone is, and what to do about it.

What we didn’t know

Admission time, but of course we aren’t admitting to actually doing anything. 😉

Operations on 9/27 Turf

9/27 Turf, to the unknowing airman, looks like a prime opportunity to practice a soft field take off and landing. Wouldn’t you know, Miami-Dade County has though about that, and probably the potential for an accident that would shut down the turf operations. Section 2, subsection B, #13 “Only existing paved surfaces are to be used for aircraft operations.. Glider Tow Aircraft and Tailwheel aircraft are the only conventional fixed wing aircraft currently allowed to operate on Runway 9/27 (Turf).” Sorry tricycle gear aircraft, no turf operations for you. 🙁

The Lesson

Today’s lesson is simple. You, as the pilot in command, must know everything there is to know about the airports you are operating within, the airspace, and the route. Local rules and procedures are part of the knowledge, and we as pilots should be looking for them. They not only tell us what can get us in trouble, but can also give us information on being a good aviator and neighbor.

The local rules exist, and we didn’t know they did, until I happened to stumble across them while looking up some other information. I now know to look for them.

I completed my first 40 hours just as I finished my Stage 2 checkout. September 7, 2023.

It’s funny to think about, the FAA only requires 40 hours experience for Part 61 student pilots, 35 hours for 141 student pilots, but with the maneuvers that require proficiency, plus the required checks insurance companies specify prior to solo, these numbers are basically not achievable for anyone without prior experience.

To be honest, we are better for it. The required knowledge and experience may seem like a lot for a student pilot, but it helps keep you safe. General Aviation accidents have been on the decline for a while now, and I think most of the decline is an increase in training. This isn’t the FAA or flight schools becoming more strict on ACS standards or something; it is an increase in the amount of knowledge before you are set free. Later down the road, every extra hour of experience still counts toward your future goals.

Before Flight School

Prior to starting flight school, I have always been an AVGeek. Both my grandfathers were airline people, Delta & Eastern. The Air Force was my goal for a long time (although Information Technology won out… sadly).

I joined the Civil Air Patrol in middle school, Florida squadron 280 at Homestead Middle School. This was one of the first squadrons from a new school program the CAP was developing to build their cadet program. After a year or so at Homestead Middle, the squadron moved to some charter school and renamed to 802 to fall in line with the number scheme for the school initiative. I transitioned over to squadron 279 out of Homestead Air Reserve Station… or Base… shortly after this move. After being heavily involved for years, I left the Civil Air Patrol around 2004-2005, and my interests in the Air Force with it. I did apply and investigate joining the AF and Coast Guard aviation units after high school graduation, but that didn’t pan out.

I always kept an eye on the flight schools at the airports, but the expense and time requirements were a problem. But one day my neighbor called and said he was joining a school at Homestead General Aviation Airport. I went a signed up; the money and time requirement I’d just need to figure out on the fly.

Ground School

I started with a night class ground school. There were 4 of us in the class, plus the instructor. After purchasing an ASA student pilot kit (~$250), we jumped in to the basics.

Apparently the ASA ground school book thinks the basics are all the math around flight and aerodynamics. Not things like the parts of an airplane, or who is the FAA, or basic understanding of medical and certification requirements. Nope… math.

We jumped to the back of the book to find who is the FAA and started there.

Classes ran for 2 hours, usually 3 nights a week, for about 3 months. So (3 nights x 4 weeks) x 3 months = 36 classes or 72 hours. We covered a lot, and it helped later down the road.

We were introduced to ASA Prepware for the written test prep. The school had a requirement for 3 90% or higher practice test grades to receive an endorsement to take the written. I completed my written in August, with a 92%.

The FAA Written Test

Every FAA Certificate has a written test component. The Private Pilot Exam, or PAR, is the first. The test requires >70% to pass, consists of 65 questions, and you are given 2 1/2 hours to complete it.

Unlike most other FAA writens, the PAR does not have a public question bank that are the exact questions you could see on the test. Rather, the question banks are similar questions. Therefore, you should not work on memorizing the question and answers, but rather the understanding around the question.

An example is determining the VOR radial you will need to be on to traverse from an area on the section map to the VOR. If you end up memorizing the radial, and not the understanding on finding the radial, you’ll find yourself answering the question wrong.

The best advice I can give is to read the FAA Airplane Flying Handbook and the Pilot’s Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge, as well as taking many many Prepware practice tests until you consistently score >90%. Be sure to learn the basic understanding of each question, and not the question. Also, brush up on Basic Med requirements… for whatever reason, I got a bunch of those.

Flight School

We finally get to the fun part, FLYING!

I started flying about 3/4 of the way through ground school. This is a nice place to start that I accidentally found as you have had many basic lessons on the ground, which help you get a running start in the air. But you also still have that last bit of ground where you can use your practical knowledge, that you’ll gain quickly while flying, to start to master the knowledge taught in ground.

Lesson 1: we taxied up and down Taxiway A at X51. I only had to do it once to show proficiency. We then took off and did a intro to flight lesson. Mostly straight and level flight, turns climbs descents. My previous experiences made this go by quickly, so my instructor and I jumped into stalls. After a handful of demonstrations, we walked through my first intentional stall and recovery.

Lesson 2 was a repeat of lesson 1, minus taxing. After lesson 2, my demonstration of slow flight was spot on, and my stall recoveries are becoming second nature… important knowledge to begin take offs and landings.

Lesson 3 I started learning take off and landings. I have a tendency to come in high.

Lessons 4 & 5 are nailing the maneuvers and knowledge from 1,2,3.

Lesson 6 & 7, Stage 1 review & check. A funny story is my instructor didn’t catch a change in the stage curriculums and thought Steep Turns were stage 2. Didn’t matter, I performed my Steep Turns within standard, on only the second attempt.

Lessons 8 – 14 are mostly pattern work, or flying circles over the airport in different configurations. Power off, no flaps, crosswinds, slips, etc are grinded until you remember each step by default. In the middle, we threw in night time pattern work for the night requirements, and flew the same night to KPBI (Palm Beach International) to meet the night cross country requirement; just for fun.

Lesson 15, it happens. SOLO! We are 28.9 hours in, with 135 take offs and landings.

At this point in my training, I am very knowledgeable about our home airport, X51 Homestead General Aviation Airport; the Cessna 172 checklists are very much routine now, but I still doublecheck I’ve remembered and completed everything with the paper list; and flying all the different situations are just another day in the office.

But here it starts to get fun, and technical.

Lesson 16 we begin Short Field & Soft Field maneuvers. It’s actually pretty easy to get confused since the names look and sound the same. I figured out a quick little saying for myself.

Short Field, climb out shortly (distance not time). Soft Field, get off the soft ground quickly.

To build a little on soft field, its not necessary to climb out quickly, but we want to be off the ground as soon as possible, since soft ground has bumps and holes. This reminds me to hold… well try to hold… the plane in ground effect until Vy (74K).

We also started ground reference maneuvers. I do not struggle with these at all.

The concept of ground reference is pretty easy, you want to draw the maneuver in smooth, easy lines with the breadcrumb feature on a GPS. Turns around a point should look like a perfect circle. S turns should look like S’s. The winds will push your airplane, and you need to account for these winds to make your maneuvers the desired shape.

Up to this writing, I’ve only had one iteration of these maneuvers that almost didn’t look proper. But then a gust of wind pushed the tail straight and I leveled the wings quickly, yelled “Nailed It!” into the intercom, and continued like it was planned. Maybe a little bit of cockiness helps.

On September 8, I passed my Stage 2 check out, at 42.0 hours, with a total of 172 landings, 2.9 night hours, 1.4 simulated instrument, and 1.9 hours solo time.

On to Cross Countries!