Narrative:

I was practicing take-offs and landings in the closed pattern at lincoln park airport (N07); the runway 19 was in use at the time. While taxiing for take-off I heard a student pilot's initial announcement on the CTAF frequency (122.8) that he was 6 miles out to the north of the airport coming in to land. Since there was nobody else in the pattern at the time; I departed from runway 19 announcing my departure and calling my turns to every leg of the pattern on the CTAF (to the crosswind; and to the downwind). In the process of departing; I also tried to contact the student several times on the CTAF frequency to confirm his position; since his initial announcement and his intentions weren't clear. I got no response to any of my calls. Shortly after my turn from crosswind to downwind; when I was at the traffic pattern altitude (tpa) of 1;200 ft MSL; I observed the traffic coming quickly at me from the right (at my 1:30 o' clock) with the traffic being in the left descending turn; which was his apparent evasive maneuver to avoid me. Since my airplane is high-wing; and the student pilot was apparently descending; I didn't see him in my field of view until he was already a short distance away from my airplane and till he was already taking his evasive action. When back on the ground; I spoke to the student pilot (who apparently was on his 2nd solo flight; coming back from practice area to the airport) and his instructor. Student claimed he heard my calling out the legs of my traffic pattern (but not my calls addressing him!); and then he got disoriented while looking for me in the pattern. At the time of the incident; student pilot stated intention was to enter downwind for runway 19 with 45 degrees entry; but instead he was flying as if about to join the downwind at 135 degrees; almost opposite the direction of traffic; and at the tpa. His proper entry should have been flying wide keeping to the left of the pattern (from his perspective) and then doing a course reversal to join downwind at 45 degrees angle. So basically; at the point where he was; he should have been flying much higher than the tpa; and then only descending to the tpa while making sure he's safely away from the pattern and after already having reversed his course to join the downwind. My other concern has to do with his instructor asking the student whether he took evasive action to the right. The suggested turn to the right would be obviously incorrect in this case and would more likely lead to a disaster. Even after my explaining the situation and drawing the diagram; which showed that the student's evasive action to the left was the appropriate one; instructor seemed to keep thinking (and instructing his student) that evasive turn to the right would be the appropriate action. This apparently shows lack of understanding on the part of the instructor that evasive action to the right is only appropriate in head-on and near-head-on approaches; but not with the angled approach paths as we were engaged on. Had the student mindlessly taken the right turn (as he was most likely drilled) he would end up flying into the path of my airplane or end up hitting me from the right at the 90 degrees angle. So the lessons to learn here are twofold: 1) apparent lack of understanding of the proper pattern entry at the uncontrolled airports; resulting in being too low (in this case right at the tpa) while overflying the pattern and prior to having joined it. 2) lack of understanding by the instructor of the proper collision avoidance maneuvers; and insistence on drilled course of action ('always turn right') as a universal recipe for his students; which is completely inappropriate as a universal recipe.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A light plane pilot reported an NMAC with another light aircraft flown by a student pilot in the pattern at N07.

Narrative: I was practicing take-offs and landings in the closed pattern at Lincoln Park airport (N07); the Runway 19 was in use at the time. While taxiing for take-off I heard a student pilot's initial announcement on the CTAF frequency (122.8) that he was 6 miles out to the north of the airport coming in to land. Since there was nobody else in the pattern at the time; I departed from Runway 19 announcing my departure and calling my turns to every leg of the pattern on the CTAF (to the crosswind; and to the downwind). In the process of departing; I also tried to contact the student several times on the CTAF frequency to confirm his position; since his initial announcement and his intentions weren't clear. I got no response to any of my calls. Shortly after my turn from crosswind to downwind; when I was at the traffic pattern altitude (TPA) of 1;200 FT MSL; I observed the traffic coming quickly at me from the right (at my 1:30 o' clock) with the traffic being in the left descending turn; which was his apparent evasive maneuver to avoid me. Since my airplane is high-wing; and the student pilot was apparently descending; I didn't see him in my field of view until he was already a short distance away from my airplane and till he was already taking his evasive action. When back on the ground; I spoke to the student pilot (who apparently was on his 2nd solo flight; coming back from practice area to the airport) and his instructor. Student claimed he heard my calling out the legs of my traffic pattern (but not my calls addressing him!); and then he got disoriented while looking for me in the pattern. At the time of the incident; student pilot stated intention was to enter downwind for Runway 19 with 45 degrees entry; but instead he was flying as if about to join the downwind at 135 degrees; almost opposite the direction of traffic; and at the TPA. His proper entry should have been flying wide keeping to the left of the pattern (from his perspective) and then doing a course reversal to join downwind at 45 degrees angle. So basically; at the point where he was; he should have been flying much higher than the TPA; and then only descending to the TPA while making sure he's safely away from the pattern and after already having reversed his course to join the downwind. My other concern has to do with his instructor asking the student whether he took evasive action to the right. The suggested turn to the right would be obviously incorrect in this case and would more likely lead to a disaster. Even after my explaining the situation and drawing the diagram; which showed that the student's evasive action to the left was the appropriate one; instructor seemed to keep thinking (and instructing his student) that evasive turn to the right would be the appropriate action. This apparently shows lack of understanding on the part of the instructor that evasive action to the right is only appropriate in head-on and near-head-on approaches; but not with the angled approach paths as we were engaged on. Had the student mindlessly taken the right turn (as he was most likely drilled) he would end up flying into the path of my airplane or end up hitting me from the right at the 90 degrees angle. So the lessons to learn here are twofold: 1) apparent lack of understanding of the proper pattern entry at the uncontrolled airports; resulting in being too low (in this case right at the TPA) while overflying the pattern and prior to having joined it. 2) Lack of understanding by the instructor of the proper collision avoidance maneuvers; and insistence on drilled course of action ('always turn right') as a universal recipe for his students; which is completely inappropriate as a universal recipe.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.