This afternoon I completed my first Hope Air mission. It consisted of a two-hour flight to Sault Ste. Marie, pickup of two people, and immediately returning to Toronto. The clients were not familiar with little airplanes, but put an unconvincingly brave face on. I and my co-pilot (Nathan Myers, old flight instructor) tried to soothe their nerves on the ground during our brief stopover.

Both legs of the flight were pretty good by general aviation standards. The weather was largely nice, except near Sault Ste. Marie where a cold front was just arriving, and the mixing air produced some very light occasional turbulence and some low cloud. We flew under IFR for practice anyway.

The one moment of drama occurred during the flight when an idle left pinky finger belonging to me hit a major electrical circuit breaker, which instantly shut down the intercom, all our radios and avionics. I didn’t even notice for a few seconds, because the engines and primary instruments were (by design) not affected. We quickly restored all functions and I apologized for alarming our passengers, and offered said pinky up for punishment. My offer was accepted and said pinky was spanked. By this time everyone awake was relaxed and we were joking around quite a bit. The early anxiousness was gone.

The flight ended with a lovely night-time approach into Toronto, with poor visibility limiting the neat effects of city lights, but my landing was good. We all let out a little cheer.

Half an hour later, the grateful passengers arrived at their hotel room, and I was on my way home, looking forward to the next mission.