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F-GBKB (more commonly called Kilo-Bravo): she was my first aircraft. An easy-flying 110HP powered training aircraft, a Morane-Saulnier 110ST.
Sadly, she was disassembled for spare parts at the end of 1998, while still in perfect flying condition. On this aircraft, I recieved my -to date- highest aeronautical awards : The Silver-Skippy-Cup for the year 1997 for a record (on this type of aircraft) of 5 landings following a single take-off (meteorological emergency conditions excuse was unfairly discarted by the jury :-D) |
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F-GGIK (India-Kilo): Aerospatiale TB-10 "Tobbago" confortable, stable, but so slow... Its name, repeatedly pronounced in a untranscriptable
manner (starting with the French phonem &OEtilde;), made me known to the air traffic controllers as "indian tonic", a nickname I eventually
found more appealling than the above mentionned "skippy" nickname. I also made the penultimate flight (3 minutes on flight due to a fuel pump failure) of her elder sister F-GCEB, which nearly broke apart during her next (and last ever) flight. |
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| F-GIRV (Romeo-Victor): A very common Piper PA28, heavy " stable, as I love'em. But why the hell did their designer assumed an height-footer pilot! This means that under strong sidewind conditions, landing is either very rought (I can't push the pedal to endcourse) or blind (if I push the pedal to the end my eyes are below the instrument board). I also flown their sisters F-GIEQ and F-BLYP (I should say the grand-mother for the latter) the Yankee-Papa having the interesting feature (from the human-machine interface viewpoint) of the roof located horizontal crank for the trim (clockwise = nose up, counterclockwise = nose down). |
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| F-GMHH (Hotel-deux fois): An interesting Robin HR100 with extended range capability (could fly 6 hours on a single tank, but the flight instructor didn't have the same autonomy, I had to perform an emergency procedure known as PPI - for "Pause Pipi Instructeur" :-o) and variable pitch propeller. It only lacked retractable gears, but she died so young... a few steps away from the runway... life is a bitch ;-( I didn't event took a picture of her, you can see a few square centimeters of its right wing above the Morbihan Gulf (France). |
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| F-GIKP (Kilo-Papa) and its twin F-GORQ (Romeo-Quebec): Also very common (at least in France) Robin DR400, light (cloth-and-wood technology) and sober, I'd rather them heavy and stable, because you definitively can't have a nap on flight with this one. But, as a whole, it is a kindly little machine. |
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| F-CHCN: this is a legacy moto-glider SF25. All wood and cloth, with an increadible ergonomics (I never succeded in reducing the pitch, and nearly landed her on her nose at the first flight due to both wheel and air brakes sharing the same lever!). Weird plane and weird glider... but soooo funny. I love her! |