I Learned About Flying From That: A Wave From Above

Adam Alpert

Thursday, December 18, 2014 at 01:26 AM ET

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Key Takeaways:

The author successfully passed their sailplane checkride, immediately embarking on a celebratory wave flight.
During the flight, the weather rapidly deteriorated, trapping the author's sailplane above a solid cloud layer at high altitude, despite lacking instrument training.
Facing an emergency, the author performed an improvised spiral dive through the clouds, successfully breaking out and landing safely near the airport.
The experience served as a critical lesson on the rapid and unpredictable changes in mountain wave weather, reinforcing the importance of situational awareness.

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I had to land within 200 feet of the white mark to pass the last phase of the checkride. Easy, I thought, as I turned the Schweizer 2-33 sailplane onto final. I’ll show this guy how good I am. I’ve got to hold 45 knots, 300 feet — that’s a little fast; let’s apply more dive brakes. Beautiful, I’ve got it. Shushhhh, down, and within 100 feet. Not bad! He’s going to pass me.

John Machone, Warren-Sugarbush Airport’s sailplane examiner, sat behind me. “Congratulations, Adam, you are a sailplane pilot.”