Reclaiming Currency and Relearning Discipline

Well, I found myself in two new situations I don’t care to repeat this week.

Let’s start with the first: It was a lapse in proficiency and currency I’ve spent a decade building. For the first time since my first tailwheel flight in July 2015, I realized I had gone six months without being the sole manipulator of a tailwheel aircraft. 

From soloing in an Aeronca Champ at 17 to being checked out in a WACO UPF-7 last year, I have always taken great pride in having almost an equal amount of flight experience in both conventional and tricycle-gear airplanes. 

But, oh, how the tides have turned.

For me, it all came down to access. When I was living in Montana this past year, I was able to rent a flight school’s Cessna 152 and 172. Although I was thankful to be flying, they were a stark difference from the Cubs and Cessna 170s I would hop in back at my home strip. 

As my network developed in Montana, I was eventually offered the opportunity to exercise a straight-tail Cessna 182. Don’t even get me started on that bird, or I’ll be enthusiastically chattering away about it for days on end. 

However, most recently, my flight time has been spent in a new type, a Cirrus SR20 that I am training in for my instrument rating. As a result, I unintentionally let my taildragging fall to the wayside. 

Luckily, Tres Clinton, the owner and founder of C3 Air, in Burnet, Texas, was one text message away from helping my feet remember how to delicately dance on the rudder pedals. 

After a game plan was devised, we took off from the Burnet Municipal Airport (KBMQ) in the Carbon Cub EX and headed west toward Red Sands Ranch (1XS4) in Mason. 

With an uneventful tailwheel takeoff behind me, Clinton and I were chitchatting away as we approached the ranch’s grass strip. As we neared the runway, I noticed an object flying past the right wing of the yellow Cub. Initially thinking it was a bird or a shadow, I couldn’t believe my eyes. 

This leads me to my second first of the week: Less than a quarter-mile away, a T-38 Talon raced past our wing at blistering speed. 

Once my brain (and Clinton) allowed me to believe what I was actually seeing, my stomach dropped. My immediate thought was, “I didn’t check NOTAMs.” 

Thinking I had just flown through a restricted area or TFR, I was struck by a wave of panic— how did I let this happen?

Clinton quickly reassured me that the T-38s are a common sight, as they fly daily missions out of San Antonio’s Randolph Air Force Base.

“There’s typically a second one. Let’s get low and keep an eye out,” he said.

After an immediate altitude correction, a quick zoom out on the Garmin G3X to look for the wingman, and a frequency change to 121.5, I finally breathed a sigh of relief. I wasn’t about to be shot down or escorted to Joint Base San Antonio.

Although I wasn’t expecting to see a T-38 on this tailwheel proficiency flight, it was an exciting and memorable sight. But it was a much-needed wake-up call. 

I had become complacent. 

Clinton had done his preflight planning, but I didn’t ask, and I certainly didn’t check ForeFlight. After all, this was a simple flight in the airplane type in which I had spent a couple hundred hours. Checking NOTAMs was the last thing on my mind. 

Fortunately, I walked away from the Cub after an uneventful three-point landing, with nothing more than a cool story and a vital lesson learned. It was a humbling reminder that no flight is too simple for proper preflight planning. 

At the end of the day, don’t let complacency kill or show up off your wing in the shape of a modern fighter jet.