Posted for "Chat Daniel" <cdaniel@fnbsouth.com>:

For what it's worth...I did the same thing with different results.
Three years ago I made the maiden flight of N678RV, my RV-8.  The first
flight was uneventful but thrilling.  After removing the cowls and
inspecting everything looked good...so I put the cowls back on and
thought I'd do a little pattern work.  Sooooooo....on the second time I
had ever flown this plane, I blasted down the runway, left terra firma,
and was climbing aggressively, when I finally looked at the airspeed
which read 40 mph.  I must be climbing too steep, I pushed the nose over
and tried to give it more power (no luck since it was already wide
open)...got the nose level and looked again...40mph.  Now it occurs to
me, I didn't remove the pitot cover.  Soooooo...on the second time I had
ever flown this airplane, I had to land it without an airspeed
indicator.  We all are capable of being careless in airplanes.

Chat
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