Skyhawk 172/Cutlass 172
Communication Breakdown; Confusion; Distraction
Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT
Air Traffic Control Issued Advisory / Alert; Flight Crew Took Evasive Action
Human Factors
My student went up for a solo cross country with the departure airport takeoff beginning at around noon. Approaching the second airport my student was asked to 'follow the shoreline and report 5 miles out.' My student became flustered with the new command and pulled out airport diagram to evaluate the new situation and became distracted. To worsen the situation; my student had also set the wrong altimeter setting in his flight instruments so altitude was off. Slowly he began a descent down to 100 feet - 150 AGL before realizing the error outside VFR; and ATC contacted and told him to climb immediately. Situation resolved with correct adjustment of altimeter and evasive action back up to Traffic Pattern altitude (800 feet). Student and I had a debriefing on the ground about the incident. There we discussed possible ways to avoid staring at the instruments too long; reasons and ways of learning the correct altimeter setting; ways of being prepared for any situation PRIOR TO entering the airspace; and single-pilot resource management.
A flight instructor describes an incident that occurred while his student was on a solo cross country. The student became distracted while looking at the airport diagram and descended from pattern altitude to 150 feet AGL before the error is detected.