Page 16 - September21T

Similarly, make a good review of the AFM/POH Supplement for your airplane’s autopilot system and the number one navigation device (usually a GPS/COMM). You shouldn’t need an excuse to review these occasionally, but if you do need one, here it is...you’re returning from hia- tus to the cockpit.
Reset Your Personal Minimums
Don’t try to be a hero. For at least the first few flights back in the left seat, be extremely conservative with your personal minimums. If at all possible, get a few flights under your belt in visual conditions before at- tempting any IMC alone at all. You can file and fly IFR (assuming you’re still current or just earned an IPC), but do so in clear air to help ease you back into the system. When you do resume f lying in IMC, hold yourself to higher minimums until you are fully comfortable and competent back in the clouds.
Return Flights
As you return to actual flying, focus on these techniques to restore your f lying skills:
Checklists: Use your check- lists like you were taking your Airline Transport Pilot checkride. If anything, exaggerate your use of printed checklists. Checklists do three things. Checklists reinforce:
• The actions you take for each change in airplane configuration and phase of flight, in other words, what you do when;
• The sequence of those actions, that is, the order in which you do them; and
• The pace of your actions in each operation or f light-phase change – how quickly, or more often, how deliberately you perform those steps.
Checklists can be used to attain and retain skill. You don’t need to do checklists as challenge-and-response, read-a-step, do-a-step. In fact, that’s
a strategy for failure in a single-pilot cockpit as it distracts you from your primary job of flying the airplane. But once you have the skills don’t throw the checklists over your shoulder onto the back seat. Take the actions you’ve learned, in the order and at the speed you’ve learned them, and then as time permits, reference the printed checklist to ensure you haven’t forgot- ten something – which is even more critical when you’ve been out of the cockpit for a while.
One more thing about checklists. One of their greatest benefits is of- ten overlooked, especially by expe- rienced pilots who are very current in the airplane they fly. Checklists protect against complacency, with that last quality control check to catch when you miss something precisely because it’s all so familiar to you. So as you use your checklists to help you regain your f lying skills after some time away, commit to continuing to use them like a professional to guard
14 • TWIN & TURBINE / September 2021
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