Mom on “Flight to Friday Harbor” (26 Jul 2010 (Mon) @ 6:45 PM (PDT))	Sounds like a great learning experience and fun to...
Mom on “New Front Siding” (15 Jul 2010 (Thu) @ 6:44 PM (PDT))	Wow -that looks amazing. Great job!
Lord Cheese on “Portland” (6 Jun 2010 (Sun) @ 10:38 PM (PDT))	Had a great time ..cant wait till next time. :)
Mom on “Portland” (6 Jun 2010 (Sun) @ 11:09 AM (PDT))	Wow - sounds like a great weekend. I can't wait f...
Jeremy on “About the Sun” (20 May 2010 (Thu) @ 7:17 PM (PDT))	And then his dad wonders why Calvin is so odd...

Sometimes the universe just conspires against you...

We arrived at the airport at 8am, and I had high hopes that we could get the plane ready and be off before 9, leaving us plenty of time for a leisurely breakfast in Hoquiam.

The first hiccup occurred when I was told the plane wasn’t actually at Glacier, it was being stored in another hanger. So after some time of waiting, we went down there and got the plane out. It was very very cold but I went through the preflight. I was concerned that the hangar the plane had been in wasn’t very warm and so we might have some cold start issues.

Because of substantial delays in getting down to the plane and getting to the plane itself, it was now past 9 before we were ready to start the engine. As I went through the prestart checks, I found no pressure on the left brake. I alluded to the braking system in my previous flight to Elma, but let me specify more:

Small Cessna aircraft have dual hydraulic disc brakes, one brake system for each main wheel. In an emergency, it is possible to use one brake alone to stop the airplane; however, this is dangerous because a single side braking action induces a strong turning moment when on the ground. In fact, many pilots use the differential braking to steer when taxi'ing. For this reason, even though we had a back-up brake and even though both runways are 5000+ feet long, I decided that if, in fact, there was no operation on the left brake, that we would abort the flight.

To test this, I decided to start the engine, roll gently and test the brakes (a standard procedure, but this time I’d have an emphasis on the behavior of the left brake, if any). Cold starts can be tricky; one danger is that if the plane doesn’t start, every subsequent attempt increases the risk of engine fire because you pumping more and more fuel into the cylinders without combustion to burn it away.

I made three attempts. After the second attempt, and when fuel sprayed out of the primer when I primed for the third attempt, I told Lisa that if the third attempt failed to start we would abort. Third attempt showed no signs of life, so I called for an abort.

The lineman came back out to help us back to Glacier (we were in a weird secured area that I couldn’t really get in or out of), I explained the brake problem. I was floored, stunned, when he said, “Oh yeah, I noticed the brake was going out a few days ago.”

How can you notice something potentially serious like that and not take action to fix it?

In addition to being patently unsafe, if the left brake is actually not working at all (I didn’t feel any pressure when I tried it, but I didn’t get to try it in motion) then it is actually illegal to fly the airplane until fixed! (The left AND right brake are separately mentioned are “required” in POH; I just checked. And FAR 91.213 states that flight with inoperative equipment is allowed under certain circumstances, but under the condition that “the inoperative instruments and equipment are not ... indicated as required on the aircraft’s equipment list”

By the time all this transpired, we were offered 8ZT but it was late enough that I didn’t think we could make it do breakfast and get back in time, so we declined. Sad day; the visibility is great. It would have been a beautiful flight.