Radio Navigation

Over the last ten days I have been quite lucky to fly in the gaps in bad weather and complete all of my solo circuit lessons in the Cessna. Many of the people on the course have not been so lucky as the rain and the wind has hampered any progress while making the grass significantly greener.

As I have been fortunate with the weather, I have now done the next three simulator sessions in which we start learning how to fly in IMC (instrument meteorological conditions, essentially bad weather) using radio navigation aids such VOR's (Very high frequency Omnidirectional radio Range), NDB's (Non Directional Beacons) and GPS. These simulator sessions have been great fun as they gave a chance to start using some of the more procedural aspects to flying and navigating using departure, approach and arrival plates. In my GPS lesson, the instructor had me set up an entire Instrument route between Auckland and Hamilton  which I subsequently flew, executed a missed approach at Hamilton due to fog, and returned to land at Auckland.

Plate for Standard Instrument Departure from runway 23L at Auckland Airport

It has been really good learning how to use navigation aids and procedural plates as it gives much more of a sense of what we will be doing day to day in the jet we will eventually be flying. As much as the basic flying up to solo standard has been enjoyable, its this next stage that really starts to build some excitement in us as we are here to be airline pilots, not just hobbyists flying light aircraft on weekends.

A few of us were also lucky to not be scheduled at all during the Easter weekend so a couple of us managed a touristy trip to Auckland for some sight seeing. It's a really laid back city with some fantastic views in the right places. We spent a day walking up the volcanic island of Rangitoto, the reward being a superb view across the city, the harbour and the Hauraki Gulf.

The view from Rangitoto Island

Having completed the simulator sessions the next thing coming up is navigation in the Cessna, with more emergency procedure training. Until then, or whenever I have something interesting to write about, cheerio.

Oh, and for those of you that are interested in the MPL program, easyJet and CTC will be opening their MPL course for applications in the near future, so make sure you keep an eye on the CTC website for updates. I can't believe that his been a year since I applied and went through the selection process. How time flies eh!

First Solo

Although I have taken an aircraft to the skies on my own before, yesterday was the first time I flew a powered aircraft (a Cessna 172) solo, and the first solo of my professional aviation career. So quite a momentous occasion really.

At the start of the day I didn't think that I would get to do my solo as it was raining for most of the day and many people had had their flights cancelled, but after an hour or so of waiting around at the airport, the rain showers stopped and the cloud cleared enough for me to go up for my check flight. The check went really well and it was quite evident that everything had come together nicely. Radio calls are now not so daunting and my flying is significantly better than when I started three weeks ago. I wasn't at all nervous beforehand, but when the instructor got out and left me to it the realisation of having to do it all on my own without the metaphorical safety net (instructor) suddenly made me quite apprehensive. I suppose it didn't help that I had to wait a while for two Air New Zealand aircraft to land and depart. That is actually one of the cool things about learning to fly here in Hamilton is that we have to contend with commercial air traffic. It's great waiting at one of the runway holding points and have a Dash 8 Turboprop land or take-off right in front of you.
 

Taking off past an Air New Zealand Dash 8

It was a great experience but a little anticlimactic. Doing one circuit and being in the air for only a few minutes didn't really give the feeling of something special, and no congratulations from the tower like some of the others on the course received!

In the last couple of weeks a few of us also managed to get a trip to the control tower. This was a brilliant experience to get a feel for the air traffic controllers job and put a face to a voice. I also found that it helped with my confidence of making radio calls as they gave us some tips and made them feel friendlier, rather than just the people that tell you what to do.

So what is next? Well there are a few more solo circuit lessons before starting some navigation training. This inevitably means more time in the simulator and some more classroom based learning. But for now I'm off to the cadet function laid on by CTC to celebrate cadets achievements in the preceding few months.