Following on from yesterdays lesson I was back up at the school for PPL lesson 24: Solo Circuits.
My instructor wanted to get me up to 3 hours of solo time so I had to do 1.3 hours of circuit time today which was quite long and just like yesterday I learnt a lot today.
After doing my A check and starting the plane I then did all my other checks, taxied and lined up on the runway.
I had take off clearance so I turned the landing light on and set max power for take off however around 40kts the passenger side door opened!
I tried to close it to no avail and was forced to slow down and stop on the runway.
ATC obviously noticed something was amiss and contact me to ask if everything was ok.
The good thing is if you don’t know what the correct radio call is you can just say what is going on.
So I advised them that the door had come open so I had to stop. He asked me if I wanted to taxi to park or backtrack to take of again.
I told him that I believe the door was now secure so I would like to backtrack and line up back on 03 to take of again, to which he advised me to report ready for departure.
So back at 03 I got take off clearance and thankfully there were no further issues.
My friend happened to be filming on their phone so you can actually see me stopping and the following take off in the below video.
I did around 8 touch and go’s which were all pretty uneventful. There were a few aircraft in the area so I had orbits to do for spacing issues and two times I was number two so I had to spot traffic.
Another pilot in the local area had issues with receiving ATC communication so another pilot had to relay messages to him.
After this mammoth session I landed and parked at customs which is right next to the school.
Next lesson I have been told is PFL (practice forced landings) so I will have to do a bit of reading up about them during the week.
