Conquering the tailwheel

By STEPHEN QUINN

Master, mags, throttle quarter of an inch, carb heat cold, mixture full rich…Breathe…“CLEAR PROP!”

The engine cranks as it spits and coughs to life, letting out an intrinsic roar. Holy crap! I’m back.

“Ok, Steve dial in the ATIS,” my flight instructor says.

ATIS yes…hmmm.

“135.675 Steve,” he says, answering my long thought.

“Right. Thank you,” I reply.

“You think you can do the radios?”

“I’ll definitely give it a shot,” I say hesitantly.

After some consultation and a bit of finesse, he did, in fact, convince me that I was more than capable of making the radio calls. After repeating the initial call over and over in my head, I finally keyed the mic.

“Punta Gorda Ground, N313CE at the North Ramp ready to taxi with Juliet.”

I could hear a different tone in my voice, a different kind of confidence, more like swagger.

That was despite not knowing what I was getting myself into that morning as I began flight training in a Citabria 7ECA, an infamous “tailwheel.”

In the realm of modern aviation and according to the generation of aviators I belong to, I had just saddled a devastating beast. It is the machine every CFI warned us about: The “ground-looping-pilot-killers!”

Regardless of the warnings and assumptions I was pelted with early on, I strapped it on willingly and joined the “club of the crazy taildraggers.”

About six years after my most recent flight and nearly 10 from when I was actively pursuing a private pilot certificate, I figured I would make my own observation of the infamous “tailwheel.”

And so it began that sunny Florida morning and, with my total lack of experience in such a siren, I was smiling ear to ear, because I was back in the cockpit and ignorantly at the reins of a unicorn.         

Aviation Interrupted

Like many who reach for the skies, it starts at a young age, and it gets in your blood.

When I was just six years old I was drawn to the aerobatic and military displays at air shows and my eyes and head have not left the clouds since.

I started flying shortly after I got my driver’s license. I had been working part time and had a little money saved up when I took a drive to a local airport.

Without a clue how to go about it and just running off pure curiosity and adrenaline, I slowly circled the airport perimeter looking for a sign, any sign, the universe might throw my way to launch me down this path of wild and crazy adventures.

The romanticized version of me being an aviator was clouding up my head as cars continued to drive around me because I was driving so slowly peering through the perimeter fence looking for anything.

I daydreamed of diving from the clouds, an open canopy with a scarf flying in the wind as my Boeing Stearman banked and danced through the skies. Then I was, quite literally, ejected from that daydream when a private jet roared overhead, forcing me to regain my focus on the road.

As I shifted my eyes from the sky and continued my scan back on the ground, I finally found the sign. I chuckled because it was not so much a universal sign or other worldly message bestowed upon me — it was, quite literally, a sign that read, “Learn to Fly Here!”

I parked the car and walked in. As the door opened and the bell clanged, I remember just taking it all in.

Imagine an outdated office with the stale smell of coffee, cheap laminate wood walls, 1970s-era metal chairs with thick yellow leather cushions, dusty phones and computers, and piles and piles of paperwork. I have made it, I thought to myself. To the hall of the greats!

A gentleman came out of one of the offices and greeted me. Before I knew it, I was climbing into a Cessna 172 for my first discovery flight.

Flying on the weekends before work through the rest of high school, I followed the dream and pursued an Aviation Management degree in college. After receiving an Army scholarship, I graduated and received an officer’s commission.

However, life got in the way in flying. I had two major foot surgeries that took me out of the flight program. After I graduated from college I did not think I would ever get back into flying.

After working several aviation-related jobs through my 20s, including a wild three years working at an airfield in the Middle East, it finally dawned on me as I was sitting in a Toyota Hilux at the hold short line watching F-16s takeoff for a mission. Before I could drive on and complete a runway inspection at an airfield in the middle of the desert some 7,000 miles away from Punta Gorda Airport (KPGD) in Florida, I promised myself that when I got back to the U.S. I would finish my ratings and get back to the sky. 

The First Day Back

The window is open and it is a gorgeous Florida day. The prop wash is keeping the cockpit nice and cool as we strut down the taxiway behind a row of Airbus 320s patiently waiting to be filled to the gills with sunbaked tourists. Snowbird season is ending and the mass migration to the north is underway.

Taxiing along, we are dwarfed by these giant tin cans. The tightly wrapped, nose high, fabric-covered, 115-hp tailwheel catches the attention of many an onlooker bustling around the ramp. I hear one of the major leaguers chirp up on the ground frequency. In his coolest airline voice, he requests his push back from the gate and IFR clearance to his destination.

“You know those guys on the flight deck? I’d be willing to bet they wish they were sitting where you are,” my instructor says.

I smile.

He explains that with my previous flight experience, we were just going to work on directional control for the initial lesson and do — what turned out to be — an uncountable number of high speed taxis down the runway.

Fair enough… I got this… Just breathe.

We get down to the approach end of Runway 4 and go through the run-up. Everything checks out. After being cleared to take the runway, we make our way to the centerline.

“Alright, Steve remember ‘Happy Feet, Happy Feet, Happy Feet!’” the instructor repeats from the seat behind me.

“Full power and stick forward?”

Stick forward!… Are you nuts? Who puts the stick forward to take off? I start to sweat.

“Yep full power and let’s get this little stinker going,” he says unsettlingly cheerfully.

The engine roars as I push the throttle to 2500 rpm. The white centerline begins to creep into a crawl before beginning to walk and gradually gaining to a full sprint under the belly of the plane.

The tail of the airplane and, by direct association, its tailwheel are now both airborne and I am effectively on two wheels (the mains) and immediately the nose goes hauling to the right. I moronically look at the centerline veering to the left side of the plane. Crap…Crap… CRAP.

A quick stomp on the left rudder pedal and the plane quickly accommodates and starts barreling across the centerline to the left. Even more perplexed, I now frantically watch the centerline drifting to my right! What in the heck is this sorcery? I sweat more.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” the bellowing laugh comes from the back seat. “Welcome to tailwheel Steve!”

Oh, dear what have I done? This maniacal man has effectively reduced me to zero.

Blocking the right and left extremes of my old habits, the instructor joined in the waltz to save my life and had such a good time with it he had us taxi back to lather, rinse, and repeat.

We taxied back for another go. Same thing. Crap, I am going right again… Oh crap! Now left… Over and over I repeated this insanity.

As if heel brakes were not enough of an adjustment, I now could not comprehend what was happening in my eyes, feet, hands, and overall soul — my desire to be a pilot was being tested!

Shanking each and every botched attempt at taking off I could not help but be in awe of the one who made sure we made it out alive: Barry Sutton, the CFI sitting in the back of the airplane.

My logbook says one takeoff and landing for that day. I will tell you I do not remember getting airborne. All I remember was my thighs were exhausted from stomping on the rudder pedals and my pride was hiding in some corner with its tail between its legs.

I left the airport humbled, intimidated, and motivated. I had found where I needed to be, and I knew I wanted to see what was on the other side of this.

It took over 13 years for me to get my private pilot certificate and when I finally did, I showed up to the check ride in a tailwheel.

Since earning my certificate, I haven’t looked back. I’ve completed my IFR check ride in the tailwheel, and I am planning on doing the same for commercial, CFI, and every other rating I can in it.

I am truly happy to be in the taildragger club!