On the morning of June 5th, for my 8th flight, my CFI Nick was back from his family vacation. Under his supervision, I was able to successfully take off from the Leesburg airport without his assistance. I was so happy that I made another major milestone in my flight lesson journey. Then I had my high school graduation that night, and high school was finally over for me!
Then on Friday afternoon of June 6th, I had CFI Zack again since Nick had a schedule conflict. The afternoon weather was not perfect, and it was raining heavily when I arrived at the airport. I asked Zack if we needed to cancel the lesson. Zack checked the weather forecast and suggested that I practice my flight in the simulator for the first hour, and check back when the storm passed the area. I was glad that he made that suggestion, as I successfully landed my airplane without assistance that afternoon.
CFI Zack set up the simulator with the Leesburg Airport setting, and admittedly, the simulator was much harder to fly compared to the real airplane because it was very sensitive, and there was no motion turned on at the time. But it indeed prepared me very well for my landing practice.
After the storm passed the airport area, I was able to circle the airport to practice my flight control. There was not a lot of airplane traffic near the airport due to the past rainstorm, and when Zach felt comfortable, he gave me the permission to land the airplane.
After I successfully landed the airplane at Leesburg airport, Zach gave a big high-five and cheered for me, and he also took a picture of me with the airplane – Cessna Skyhawk 172N for my first successful landing without assistance.
A HUGE step forward. You are a pilot. Looking forward to the SOLO.