Skyhawk 172/Cutlass 172
Flight Crew Private
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 5; Flight Crew Total 750
Confusion; Communication Breakdown; Situational Awareness
Conflict Airborne Conflict; Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
General None Reported / Taken
Airport; Procedure; Human Factors; Airspace Structure
Due to the bad weather on the north of the zone; we decided to change our planned destination and aim for another airport to the east before the departure from our base. We checked NOTAMs and rapidly prepared the navigation log.Once arriving in the vicinity of the destination airport; we heard one airplane landing on Runway 28. We decided to enter the traffic pattern in downwind directly. Thus we positioned our airplane in the left traffic pattern for Runway 28. We did 2 touch and go using left traffic pattern. On the third left downwind; we departed to the south for some maneuver practice because one IFR arrival was on a 5 mile final and we didn't want to turn in final just in front of him. After 5 minutes; we came back to the airfield and entered in a left midfield traffic pattern. We were doing our radio calls and monitoring the CTAF/UNICOM frequency. At this point we thought we were alone and that no other airplane was in the traffic pattern. We announced our self in base and then on final for Runway 28. At this point; a Piper Cherokee who was on final in front of us did a go around and said it on the CTAF/UNICOM frequency. There were no risk of collision as the Piper was approximately 1 km in front of us but we didn't expected to see any airplane on the final because we heard nobody on the radio. We continued our approach and did a full stop landing.In the end what we understood/ Contributing factors:The Cherokee pilot did his message with 'Cherokee X; downwind/base/final runway 28; Covington' Because there is another airport named Cherokee (CNI) 30 nm North West of the field with a similar TAF/UNICOM frequency I thought this airplane was actually doing traffic pattern at the Cherokee airport and not at Covington. Thus I didn't paid much attention to the messages starting with Cherokee and missed that the Piper was not operating from Cherokee but at Covington.Because we were flying the left traffic pattern (due to the convention in most airport and lack of preparation of our navigation/destination airport); the Piper Cherokee flying the traffic pattern wasn't able to locate us visually despite our radio called (I didn't say 'left downwind/base' but just 'downwind/base'). The situation was not dangerous because:-We always kept our eyes outside; and once on final we identified the airplane in front of us just before he made the radio call after we announced ourselves in final and I totally understand his decision because we were not able to see us since the beginning. In fact we were 1km behind him but he couldn't know.-We got lucky and didn't arrived in front of each other; me in base and the Piper on final. Corrective actions: -I will prepare better my navigation and especially the arrival on an unknown airport. I will especially look for the little sign for an unconventional (right) traffic pattern.-I will pay attention to the radio calls even if they don't start with the same location I am operating from.-I will try to incorporate 'left/right' before saying down-wind/base in my radio calls.
GA pilot reported an airborne conflict with an aircraft on final in the pattern after missing the other aircraft's position calls.