ASRS Reports

At about 1,200-1,300 feet, I noticed the elevator controls were resisting my inputs to climb and saw the airspeed reading 23 knots. I knew this was wrong because the plane was flying normally.

My conclusion is that the student accidentally leaned the mixture while attempting to adjust carb heat, power, and flaps while abeam the landing point. Since I reached for the throttle when I observed the issue, my view of the mixture knob was obscured, and I failed to notice it in the lean position.

With the brakes out, the windscreen obscured, and no autopilot to lean on, I nearly lost control.

Most disturbing is this pilot came back to the airport several days later and I spoke with him, indicating I was his near midair the other day. He made light of it and lied, stating he was trying to look for the windsock.

Not an emergency, however asked the other plane for priority to land with this problem. The other pilot said “no” to my priority request and stated, “You just think you should have priority because you are faster,” or words to that effect.

I believe I became complacent, trusting nothing will go wrong. I need to be proactive and preventative rather than reactive.

Spoke with Ground/Tower. Great Controller but clearly working solo on a very busy day. He was clearly overworked. He missed my clearance request, which I restated. It was clear he was working alone and handling Clearance/Ground /Tower solo.

As we were rolling down the runway I looked behind us to discover the other aircraft on the runway at the same time as us (within 500 feet) and moving faster than we were.

Approximately halfway through the takeoff roll the student suddenly put in hard left rudder. Instructor commanded student to stop, but the student continued hard left rudder while saying “what’s happening?”