I should start a list

Of things that ATC has tried to bounce me into. As well as the Hearn Stack, and medevac helicopter we can now add another Cessna to that list.

Seriously this incident scared me a little bit. It all happened in quite a weird way, but suddenly I found myself really really close to another plane.

Due to the winds and angles and stuff this plane just seemed to be hovering there. Any direction I moved it seemed to follow.  So I’m trying to analyze what happened , what I did wrong, what I did right and what I should have done to avoid the situation in the first place.*

What went wrong:

·         ATC turned me  prematurely and put me in a situation where I was coming up behind a slower plane

·         I accepted the instruction

·         I hesitated in taking corrective action to avoid coming up behind it

What went right

·         I was shaken but didn’t panic. I was still responsive and in control of myself

·         Once I was out of immediate danger I was able to think through a plan of action (in this case climbing because I was out over the lake)

·         I still managed to ace the landing!

What I should have done

·         I probably shouldn’t have accepted the instruction from ATC in the first place, without having the traffic in sight

·          I should have had an escape plan as soon as I saw had that plane in sight

Still I have learnt a very very important lesson. I absolutely 100% CAN NOT rely on ATC to keep me safe. I must not rely on them to keep me from colliding into things. Maybe I've gotten a little too complacent about traffic spotting.
 

I'm the one responsible for that plane. I need to act like it

* I wrote this post before Bob and I had time to go over what had actually happened. As i explained to him. I really didn't have a good grasp on what went wrong. The next lesson we spent a good few minutes analysing the evnts. A lot of it was to do with the crosswinds pushing me over and slowing the other plane down even more. Both Bob and RTH agree that if I came away with the underlined phrase firmly in my head then it was a valuable learning experience.