[ConcordeBA]

After flying some IFR circuits at London Southend Airport, it was time to call end to a wonderful evening; but not without error. The previous part of the flight was flown IFR and it was time to make a VFR flight back to Stapleford. If you would like to watch the earlier part of the flight. Click here

During the IMC training, I was taught that at decision height you'd change to landing flap. When I learned to fly in the DA40; nothing was different other than my experience of IFR flying grew as I ventured with a better equipped aircraft. I was always curious as to why airliners are configured at 1000ft as per company SOP but in GA, it was acceptable to configure in the most critical part of the approach (usually the last 200ft).



I prepared for a normal approach and completed my pre-landing checks. On passing 500ft I assumed that my high airspeed would bleed off, and that it was likely down to the windy conditions. That's problem one. Never assume.

As I approached 20ft, I decided to go-around. I retracted the flaps but I realised that I had actually placed them into the fully up position. This wasn't normal. The previous two approaches both had low approaches requiring me to retract the flap to take-off before retracting fully at a safe altitude. After a sluggish climb to 1200ft I admitted my mistake to my friend and that I realised I made an inappropriate aircraft configuration which caused a go-around.

This may have something to do with the fact that on the previous two approaches that day, that I didn't select flaps till the decision height for the ILS approach. I believe I simply just forgot and did not have a reminder such as 200ft/500ft on an IAP. On my future flights, I plan to use a decision height for all approaches weather it be visual or IAP that I must be fully configured or in the case of an instrument approach, configuring for landing so that this never happens again.

So hopefully we can all learn from this mistake. Enjoy the video!