As the title suggests I'm a around 3 weeks into ground school now and it's already starting to get rather busy.
There are 7 exams which we are studying for in Term 1, these are:
Principles of Flight
Aircraft Systems
Instruments
Meteorology
Human Performance
VFR Comms
IFR Comms
We've made a start in all the modules apart from the comms ones, these won't be started until very shortly before the EASA exams. So far it's learning all the basic blocks that the rest of the course will be built on.
Up to now most of the technical type modules have just been building on the basics required to understand how the actual instruments and systems work. So covering ISA (International Standard Atmosphere) conditions and how they change with altitude, the Otto cycle (for piston engines), the gas laws, Newtons laws and the laws of thermodynamics (for pretty much anything involving a fluid, be that hydraulics or air over a wing). Even at this early stage though I can see it all starting to knit together and how it will be used to progress with subjects topics. We've also started going into the details of how different instruments and systems work that you find on an aircraft in a level of detail that isn't that far removed from that required for engineering! Though Meteorology does seem to be doing its best to try to turn us into weather forecasters!
The pace of delivery of the modules is incredible, in terms of shear volumes of information thrown our way I've never come across anything like it. Fortunately the instructors are all great and really know their subject matters and how to teach them. The fact that all of them have had years of experience in aviation (usually as military pilots) before becoming ground instructors means that they have some great stories and examples to share as the classes go on.
To give an example of the volume of work we currently taking on, a typical day consists of 6 1-hour periods. Typically 5 of these will be classroom based with one being computer based training. Sometime there's a computer based training session thrown in a period 7 as well just to nudge the workload a little more. Typically another couple of hours of additional study is then required in the evening to consolidate what we've gone over as we'll be moving onto new topics the next day and you really can't afford to get behind.
I'm enjoying it though as it's all interesting stuff. There are sombre times in the course however as we look back at examples where lessons have been learnt during the past. For example AF447 comes up quite a lot (the A330 that lost control and crashed into the Atlantic in 2009), as there's a lot of lessons pilots can learn from that one. Today we were looking at what is called the F100 Super Sabre Dance as a demonstration of how wing tip stall and ending up the wrong side of the drag curve can be very dangerous. You can look up the Sabre Stall on YouTube but I suggest you only do so if you've a strong constitution, it doesn't end well for the pilot's involved.
The next step will be the Test 1's which are at the start of week 6 (next week is the start of week 4), these will test our knowledge in the subjects we've studied so far and require a pass rate of 75% minimum to continue with the course. At the rate the ground school is going I'll be out in Phoenix doing the basic flight training before I know it assuming all the exams go well. There's a lot more to learn in the mean time however!
Thursday, 3 October 2013
Friday, 13 September 2013
Induction Day
So today this the day it all starts (Friday the 13th...), the last 5 months since I found out I had a place on the course have just flown by. Having moved into the hall of residence yesterday and meeting another 5 people from my course it was time to get started this morning at OAA.
The day started off with the usual meet & greet sessions with a chance to meet the rest of the course. There are 24 people on this course which makes it a fairly large one, with people split between the BA FPP scheme, the easyJet MPL scheme and some self funded students. After a quick health and safety brief it was then onto the bit of the day that everyone looks forward to, the uniform fitting. I managed a bit of a strange thing in that my all my uniform actually fitted without having to swap things around.
From there it was onto another room for a quick briefing then off to pick up the ground school books. We have 6 months to learn to content of these books and pass 14 exams in them, it's going to be a bit of a challenge to say the least! The pile of books is the length of my forearm and weighs about 20kg!
It was then off to fill in a load of paperwork for the rest of the day with an early finish and told to enjoy what it likely to be our last relaxing weekend for the next 6 months! So now it's time to enjoy the weekend before the ground school starts for real on Monday. The first subjects we'll be tackling are Aircraft General Knowledge - Airframes, Systems & Instrumentation. Roll on Monday!
The day started off with the usual meet & greet sessions with a chance to meet the rest of the course. There are 24 people on this course which makes it a fairly large one, with people split between the BA FPP scheme, the easyJet MPL scheme and some self funded students. After a quick health and safety brief it was then onto the bit of the day that everyone looks forward to, the uniform fitting. I managed a bit of a strange thing in that my all my uniform actually fitted without having to swap things around.
From there it was onto another room for a quick briefing then off to pick up the ground school books. We have 6 months to learn to content of these books and pass 14 exams in them, it's going to be a bit of a challenge to say the least! The pile of books is the length of my forearm and weighs about 20kg!
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| The ground school books - all 20kg of them! |
Monday, 26 August 2013
Getting Started
In just over 2 weeks I start on the first step of something I've wanted to do my almost my entire life, become an airline pilot. I thought I'd start a blog so that my friends and family could keep track on how I am doing and the process it takes to go from being sat in the back as a passenger to sitting in the right hand seat and flying a commercial airliner in around 20 months. On Friday 13th September (lucky for some!) I'll arrive at Oxford Aviation Academy to start my first step on this journey. I'm feeling very nervous about the challenge that's ahead of me and the shear amount of work there is to fit in but at the same time I'm very excited and looking forward to the end result of having a career that involves flying aircraft around the world.
I'll try to update this regularly when time allows and there's something interesting to update with. For the meantime I'll be finishing off my time at my current job (which after almost 5 years there I am sad to be leaving and will miss everyone I've worked, I've learnt so much in my time there that will be invaluable going forwards) and look forward to 13th September when I'll start this next chapter of my life.
So what's involved?
The training course is full time with a lot of elements to fit in, for those that are unfamiliar with what's involved to get a professional pilots licence I thought I'd quickly detail the main sections of the training course.
Ground School: The first stage of training is a 6 months of classroom based study for the 14 modules of the ATPL (Air Transport Pilots Licence) with 14 exams. To make life a little easier the ground school is split into 2 terms with 7 modules taught (and 7 exams taken) in each. I will admit this is going to be a bit of a shock for me since it's been over 5 years since I was last in full time education!
Basic Flight Training: For the next part of the course it's out to Phoenix, Arizona for 20 weeks for the basic flight training. This involves 110 hours in a single engine propeller aircraft (probably the Piper Archer) followed by 10 hours in a flight simulator and finally 10 hours in a twin engine propeller aircraft (either the Piper Seminole or Seneca). After completing all of this I'll then take my CPL (Commercial Pilots Licence) skills test and return to the UK as a licensed pilot. All the flying at the stage of training is VFR (Visual Flight Rules) which basically means flying outside of cloud where you can see the horizon, there's a little more to it than that but it'll do as a simple explanation.
Intermediate Flight Training: This stage teaches you how to fly on sole reference to instruments with no view of the outside world. It's split between around 30 hours in flight simulators and 20 hours in real aircraft (again a twin engine prop aircraft) finishing with the IR (Instrument Rating) skills test. The simulators can be set up with whatever weather the instructors desire for the training needs that day, for the aircraft training screens are used to block the view to the outside world so that you have no choice but to fly on instruments (the instructor can still see outside for safety reasons however).
JOC/MCC: The Jet Orientation Course with Multi-Crew Co-operation, this section of the course comprises of 44 hours in a 737-400 flight simulator learning how to fly jet and also how to work as part of a crew in a modern flight deck environment. From what I've heard the lessons start out simple enough with normal flights between airports as you'd expect in a normal airline environment. It soon starts to ramp up though as systems failures, ATC requests and other elements are introduced to increase the workload and teach you to effectively prioritise tasks to ensure the flight continues safely.
At the end of this stage I'll have a licence which is officially the CPL(MEIR), with MCC & ATPL theory credit... for simplicity it's referred to as the fATPL or Frozen Air Transport Pilots Licence.
After all this is complete it'll be off to an airline to complete a type rating and base and line training, although I'll go into these in more details nearer the time.
I'll try to update this regularly when time allows and there's something interesting to update with. For the meantime I'll be finishing off my time at my current job (which after almost 5 years there I am sad to be leaving and will miss everyone I've worked, I've learnt so much in my time there that will be invaluable going forwards) and look forward to 13th September when I'll start this next chapter of my life.
So what's involved?
The training course is full time with a lot of elements to fit in, for those that are unfamiliar with what's involved to get a professional pilots licence I thought I'd quickly detail the main sections of the training course.
Ground School: The first stage of training is a 6 months of classroom based study for the 14 modules of the ATPL (Air Transport Pilots Licence) with 14 exams. To make life a little easier the ground school is split into 2 terms with 7 modules taught (and 7 exams taken) in each. I will admit this is going to be a bit of a shock for me since it's been over 5 years since I was last in full time education!
Basic Flight Training: For the next part of the course it's out to Phoenix, Arizona for 20 weeks for the basic flight training. This involves 110 hours in a single engine propeller aircraft (probably the Piper Archer) followed by 10 hours in a flight simulator and finally 10 hours in a twin engine propeller aircraft (either the Piper Seminole or Seneca). After completing all of this I'll then take my CPL (Commercial Pilots Licence) skills test and return to the UK as a licensed pilot. All the flying at the stage of training is VFR (Visual Flight Rules) which basically means flying outside of cloud where you can see the horizon, there's a little more to it than that but it'll do as a simple explanation.
Piper Archer - Image from www.cae.com
Intermediate Flight Training: This stage teaches you how to fly on sole reference to instruments with no view of the outside world. It's split between around 30 hours in flight simulators and 20 hours in real aircraft (again a twin engine prop aircraft) finishing with the IR (Instrument Rating) skills test. The simulators can be set up with whatever weather the instructors desire for the training needs that day, for the aircraft training screens are used to block the view to the outside world so that you have no choice but to fly on instruments (the instructor can still see outside for safety reasons however).
JOC/MCC: The Jet Orientation Course with Multi-Crew Co-operation, this section of the course comprises of 44 hours in a 737-400 flight simulator learning how to fly jet and also how to work as part of a crew in a modern flight deck environment. From what I've heard the lessons start out simple enough with normal flights between airports as you'd expect in a normal airline environment. It soon starts to ramp up though as systems failures, ATC requests and other elements are introduced to increase the workload and teach you to effectively prioritise tasks to ensure the flight continues safely.
At the end of this stage I'll have a licence which is officially the CPL(MEIR), with MCC & ATPL theory credit... for simplicity it's referred to as the fATPL or Frozen Air Transport Pilots Licence.
After all this is complete it'll be off to an airline to complete a type rating and base and line training, although I'll go into these in more details nearer the time.
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