How Not To Die In A 1958 Cessna

(among other things)

This is an excerpt from an essay I wrote when I was 13. Please excuse the questionable grammar 🤣. Hope you enjoy!!

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Something was very slightly off about the plane’s controls. I knew it ever since I started taxiing, but went against my better judgement and said nothing. As soon as I pulled onto the runway, I paused, waiting for my instructor to give me the final green light before taking to the skies. I scanned the gauges one last time, checking oil pressure, engine temps, amps, etc. My instructor did the same before turning to me and throwing a final thumbs up my way. I pushed the throttle in, and the plane began to accelerate...

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One hour earlier... I was on my way to the airport at 7:30am. It was my fifth flight lesson, and as always, I was super excited. The flight lesson began at 8am; and I was going to be doing my first landing that day. As we pulled into the airport, I laughed to myself: “Wouldn’t it be funny if I caused an emergency on landing?” Turns out, I wasn’t that far from the truth. Looking back, I probably jinxed the flight with that thought. Anyways, I walked into the little school built into the side of a hangar, taking a moment to say hello to the other two instructors. After a lengthy brief on our flight, me and my instructor walked out to the plane, a 1958 C-172 with worn leather seats and a door that never worked.

I completed an uneventful preflight¹ while my instructor chatted with a few other pilots, keeping an eye on me. I washed the oil off my hands in the FBO² and returned to the plane, beginning the engine start checklist. After an unnecessarily loud and earsplitting “CLEEEAAAARRRRR PROP!!!!!!!” I started to taxi out. My first mistake on that flight-to-be was turning too sharply onto the yellow line and barely missing the plane parked next to me with my port wingtip.

Yikes.

I could practically hear my instructor cringing. I made a mostly normal turn out of the ramp onto the taxiway before noticing that the radio was on strike. I mentioned it to my instructor, but he blew it off and said that it hadn’t been working for the past few lessons. He pointed out that they were ordering a new one. Technically, we weren’t doing anything wrong because our airport was “Pilot-controlled” (official designation). The FAA likes to use the unofficial term: Common Traffic Advisory Frequency Uncontrolled Airport (CTAFUA).³

Right then and there, I thought about going back to the ramp and nixing the lesson. Even though flying without a radio wasn’t illegal...(technically), I didn’t want to tempt fate. However, I ignored common sense and kept taxiing.

As soon as I reached the run-up⁴ area, there was a slight pause in the proceedings while we tried to get the radio working one last time. It was not to be. After a normal runup, I taxied to the hold short line and stopped momentarily, scanning the skies for any other aircraft. Luckily, there was no other poor soul around to witness my biggest taxi failure.

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Back to the beginning...The plane began to accelerate. I kept a hand on the yoke and glanced from the window to the speedometer. First, I slowly passed 10 knots, then 20, then 30, then 40. Just as the needle was creeping past 55, I noticed the plane was off the centerline. Remember earlier when I mentioned the plane felt a little off as I was taxiing? Back then, I was going about 5 knots (7-9 m.p.h.), and the change was barely noticeable. On the runway at 60 knots, the change was magnified by 1100%. (Yeah, I did the math).

Anyways, I think you can put the rest together. Because of the change, I overcorrected. Everybody knows that when you’re in a car and overcorrect the steering going out of your driveway, nothing will happen because your speed is so low. But what happens when you overcorrect the exact same amount going 70 mph on a highway? Your car may just go flying off the road. That, mixed with the already messed up steering, resulted in a sharp swerve and the nosewheel⁵ vibrating the whole plane. My instructor misinterpreted the swerve, (thinking it was my bad steering) and jerked the controls out of my hand to abort the takeoff and steady the airplane. He cut the throttle and pulled the plane to full-pitch up attitude⁶, maximizing the AOA⁷ (angle of attack) and increasing drag. We carried out the abort flawlessly, and by the end of the runway, the plane had taxied off onto an empty pad and come to a complete stop.

So let me give you a bit of perspective.

We had just aborted from a bumpy 4700 ft (about .8 mile) runway with very high hills on both ends, directly in front and on both sides of the runway, maybe a quarter of a mile away. There was a residential area immediately to the left of the taxiway we were parked on, and my instructor had aborted halfway down the runway. On top of that, the radio wasn’t working. There was no way to alert anyone of our situation should the abort have failed. Sure, someone might have seen it — but this was early in the morning, and the whole airport was deserted.

So, you’re probably wondering right now: “What’s the big deal? We already established it was Carson’s fault, and even then, this was no engine failure, just a faulty nosewheel and a naïve student pilot.”

I wish that was all there was.

Right after aborting, we smelled exhaust in the cockpit. That’s normally not an issue to worry about because my instructor always kept his door open during takeoff⁸, and any exhaust which came back from the engine would have been caught in the slipstream and carried behind us. Problem is, it was cold and windy out that day, and the door was closed. Not to mention the fact that there was actual smoke and exhaust coming from behind the engine wall.
Sooo... exhaust in the ‘pit? Not good. Anyways, we did a few high-speed taxis down the runway, which resulted in only more exhaust/smoke in the cockpit and a shaking nosewheel. The cherry on top was the fact that, for some reason, there was no CO detector in the cockpit. Exhaust and smoke both put out carbon monoxide. In a closed, tight environment like that, carbon monoxide is fatal.

Looking back, I wouldn’t be surprised if we’d died on that flight. The nosewheel shaking and my royal screw-up on the runway was what saved us. A whole part of ground training in aviation is devoted to recognizing the signs of CO poisoning from the air in the cockpit: blurry vision, slow thoughts, slurred speech, inability to understand simple sentences, etc.
And remember, the radio was broken. There wouldn’t have been any way to communicate an emergency to anyone who could help. I wish our plane was fancy enough to have built in WiFi or something so we could call with our phones…..but 1958, remember? So in case anyone was wondering…..it’s a glaring example of the providence of the Almighty.

Anyways, to summarize: We taxied back to the ramp and shut the plane down. My instructor consulted the local mechanic, and the result was that the aircraft was grounded, and our lesson was cancelled, pro bono.

So, lessons learned:

1. Always, and I mean always, keep a CO detector in the cockpit. It may just save your life one day.

2. Listen to your gut. When something feels wrong with the plane, don’t tempt fate.

3. Fly the plane to the end. (Not really a lesson learned, just part of a cool quote I like). “Never quit. Never give up. Fly it to the end.” - Chuck Aaron

Finally, a picture.

This is the actual runway I aborted from. We were taking off from the far end of the runway, coming towards the cameraman’s position.

1. Preflight is when you walk around the plane and examine everything to make sure the wings are still attached, you have adequate fuel, the control surfaces are clear of obstruction, etc.

2. An FBO (or Fixed Base Operator) is a little building at almost every small airport that has bathrooms, food, a lounge, maps, phones, airplane fuel, rental cars, and the occasional attendant.

3. This is an attempt at comedy, if you couldn’t tell :)

4. Run-up is like preflight, but the engine version. You basically taxi the plane onto a little concrete pad next to the runway, lock the brakes up, and push the engine to max power and back, simply to make sure the engine, fuel & oil pressure, and all the gauges are working alright before the flight

5. The nosewheel is the front wheel on the plane.

6. Essentially raising the nose to increase drag and decrease speed.

7. The angle of attack (AOA) is the angle at which the nose of the aircraft strikes the air. The higher the AOA, the more drag and the slower the aircraft will go. The lower the AOA, the less drag and the faster the aircraft will go.

8. To anyone who’s never been on a small plane, this might be shocking. It’s actually pretty common in small planes, though. You want the doors open especially during a crash landing so you’re not trapped inside the aircraft when it hits the ground.