It was time for my first zone transit request! I had tried to prepare for the RT the night before but it’s a lot of new phraseology!
My planned route was J28 -> Northey Island -> Sittingbourne -> J28. This required asking for a zone transit, as I would pass through Southend Airspace.
The weather was all over the place with forecasts showing CAVOK from 10AM, perfect for my flight scheduled at 10:30.. except by 10:30 there was still a lot of cloud, and other pilots landing at Stapleford were reporting bad visibility but Southend was reporting 2500 cloud base and it looked like it was clearing up – which was enough for us to go ahead with the journey.
I should leave Staplefords frequency when I have located the junction. I should think about my headings a little bit here, rather than just relying on visual. There is no need to rush to Southend, but I can change the frequencies and listen out. Feedback was that I was trying to rush this too much.
I found the junction and then began my nav.
G-ISMC,
Cessna 152
Stapleford to Stapleford via Northey Island and Sittingbourne
Approaching Maldon
At altitude 1700 feet
QNH 996 Hectopascals (when < 1000, hectopascals has to be used)
VFR
Request Basic Service and Zone Transit
G-ISMC,
Squawk 7052
QNH 997 Hectopascals
Basic Service
Squawk 7052,
QNH 997 Hectopascals
Basic Service
G-ISMC
Southend were not that busy and came back to me as I began my turn onto track, and I made a mistake with the squawk again as I had my nav plan over the top of the paper I had prepared for writing the clearance.
First call was good and then as I approached Northey Island, Southend provided clearance. I think that I didn’t read this back very well but I can’t quite remember what I did wrong (possibly needing FULL Call Sign before the read back).
Not sure what the actual call was as I was mentally overloaded:
G-ISMC, Cleared to enter Southend Airspace, routing Northey Island to Sittingbourne, Not Below 2000 feet.
<readback>
G-ISMC, Report Northey Island
Wilco, G-ISMC
As we turned from Northey Island for Sittingbourne, we received the call:
G-ISMC, Now entering controlled airspace, Radar Control
Radar Control, G-ISMC
As we continued our heading to Southend it became very clear that despite the possibility that the cloud base would be 2500FT over Southend Airport, we would be unable to pass through the cloud. We decided due to the weather to change direction to leave Southend Airspace and return to Stapleford.
Another aircraft was told about traffic and to change altitude. I thought they were talking to us. I replied to say “Not Above 1600 FT, G-ISMC” but I was corrected that it was not for us.
G-ISMC, Request routing change to leave Southend Airspace via Port Gateway due to low cloud base.
They were unable to approve this request, and this is where I am struggling to remember the RT. There was some back and forth between my instructor and ATC. Some of which I could have replied to but I was a bit confused.
G-ISMC Turn LEFT, Turn LEFT, to 210 degrees
Note: Most likely ATC said Turn Left, even though it would be a quicker right turn, as due to the wind direction the left turn would push me north more, clear of incoming easyjet a320 landing into Southend.
As we were faced with more cloud, my instructor changed to an IFR service and we requested a climb into the cloud to faciliate the required separation. This then allowed us to exit Southend Airspace at Port Gateway after approved by ATC.
We were told about some more traffic:
Looking for traffic, G-ISMC or Traffic in Sight, G-ISMC
As we were beginning to leave Southend Airspace:
G-ISMC, Leaving Controlled Airspace in 2 miles, Basic Service.
<we missed this call, it was later repeated>
G-ISMC, Leaving Controlled Airspace, Basic Service
Leaving Controlled Airspace, Basic Service, G-ISMC
As we were still in IFR, as requested a traffic service due to visibility:
G-ISMC Request Traffic Service
G-ISMC Traffic Service
Once we felt we were able to decrease our altitude and return to VFR, we needed to tell Southend:
<can’t remember the call>
Instrument Flight was good to try again, fun – and Sue mentioned that I did well at this. Just a reminder that when setting the instruments I should check the Artificial Horizon instrument dot is aligned with the horizon in case this is needed even if not planned.
Overall I was pretty disappointed with my performance in this lesson, considering that a number of radio calls were just reading things back. Everything is a lesson though and next time I’ll try to do better.
Some things to think about next time:
- Instrument checks
- Practice zone transit RT
- Be more prepared to write clearances at any time
- Route will be the same but sort out that RT!!
- Turn out of turns a little earlier, as a lot of overshooting happening
