March

Hi, I’m Emily.

I’ve always liked aircraft, even when I was very young. I once told my dad, when I was three, that I wanted to buy a helicopter (even though I only had about two dollars).

On my eleventh birthday, I had an introductory flight at the Darling Downs Aero Club – in this flight, an instructor takes you up and lets you have a brief go at handling the controls of the aircraft. I really enjoyed it, and when my mother asked if I wanted to do training, I said yes. So, for the next couple of years I worked on my skills, and got better and better until my fifteenth birthday, when I went solo. Even though I had flown for years and had over thirty lessons, I was super nervous when the instructor got out of the plane and left me in there by myself.

It took me a few seconds to gather my thoughts before I began to taxi to the runway for takeoff. My hands were shaking, but I lined up and took off. Before long, I slipped back into my routine and I wasn’t feeling nervous anymore, and I was confident I could complete my lap of the airfield and land safely. I had to make a critical decision to position myself for landing behind two other aircraft, one I had never made before, but I felt like I executed it well. My landing was perfect, and I felt relief and happiness as I taxied back to the Aero Club.