Dgamble
Well Known Member
Air Facts, formerly a magazine and now a web site moderated by Richard Collins (formerly of Flying magazine), published a vastly shortened article that I wrote a few years ago (a decade, maybe) when I had become fair;y well acquainted with my RV-6:
http://airfactsjournal.com/2016/09/learning-formation-flying-hard-work-worth/
It starts thusly:
"About a year after buying an already-built Van’s RV-6 and spending a very hot July earning a tailwheel endorsement, I thought I knew the airplane well enough to attend a formation flying clinic being hosted by the Ohio Valley RVators at the not-too-distant Parkersburg, West Virginia, airport. As interesting as it sounded, the very idea of it caused me quite a bit of stress. Attending the clinic would entail two nights away from home base (which is, of course, two nights longer than I usually stay out, and the issue of inclement weather possibly stranding me somewhere is always a stress event for me) with the even more stressful fact that this would be my first time ever at the controls of an airplane that had been deliberately placed just a handful of feet from another airplane.
It helped that I had done all that I could to prepare myself with the book knowledge that would be required, but I still had my doubts. The book knowledge mostly had to do with the procedures and signals that are critically important in formation flying, the very act of which is difficult enough when everyone is singing from the same hymnal but nigh on impossible if even one participant is winging it, so to speak. The procedures themselves were easy enough to comprehend and retain, but the signals used to direct various formation changes were simply befuddling to me."
http://airfactsjournal.com/2016/09/learning-formation-flying-hard-work-worth/
It starts thusly:
"About a year after buying an already-built Van’s RV-6 and spending a very hot July earning a tailwheel endorsement, I thought I knew the airplane well enough to attend a formation flying clinic being hosted by the Ohio Valley RVators at the not-too-distant Parkersburg, West Virginia, airport. As interesting as it sounded, the very idea of it caused me quite a bit of stress. Attending the clinic would entail two nights away from home base (which is, of course, two nights longer than I usually stay out, and the issue of inclement weather possibly stranding me somewhere is always a stress event for me) with the even more stressful fact that this would be my first time ever at the controls of an airplane that had been deliberately placed just a handful of feet from another airplane.
It helped that I had done all that I could to prepare myself with the book knowledge that would be required, but I still had my doubts. The book knowledge mostly had to do with the procedures and signals that are critically important in formation flying, the very act of which is difficult enough when everyone is singing from the same hymnal but nigh on impossible if even one participant is winging it, so to speak. The procedures themselves were easy enough to comprehend and retain, but the signals used to direct various formation changes were simply befuddling to me."
