Is this a good path to become a pilot?

[Protoman2050]

Hi! For several years I've been interested in aviation, as my Dad is an insurance surveyor for the transportation industry, and deals with aircraft day-in-day-out, along with cargo ships, rail transport, etc. I also enjoy talking with the pilots I meet while waiting at the gate while at the airport, reading about aviation, etc. I especially enjoy the navigation aspect, as Dad used to be a supertanker captain, and taught me how to plot courses, adjust for wind, take bearings using a sextant, dead reckon, use RNAV, etc., and even though his info was for marine navigation, much of it is applicable to air navigation. I was thinking about becoming a mariner like he was, but then I realized it would be way more expensive and longer than training as a pilot, injury risk is too high, I'd be away from home way more than I'd like (I'm okay with being away for a few days or a week, but not months), and I could only travel to areas with a seaport.

Currently, I'm studying for a BSc in Microbiology with Immunology at University of Leeds in the UK. I picked that course because it's a field that interests me, and I'll have great career opportunities if being a pilot doesn't work out. After I get my first job with that degree, I plan on getting a class 1 medical certificate (hopefully I can get a SODA for my amblyopia due to retinopathy of prematurity; left eye is BCVA 20/20, right eye is BCVA 20/30; and according to an FAA medical website, my asthma shouldn't result in a problem, as it's mild and never required hospitalization) and get my PPL, to make sure I enjoy flying. If I do, I'll get my IR, CPL, and MEC, and join Alpine Air's First Officer program so I can gain the PIC hours for an ATPL. Then I'll fly for them for a while to make back my tuition, and then hold myself out as a contract pilot, get a job as a corporate charter pilot, or maybe get enough money to lease a Beechcraft Super King Air 350iER and start an air taxi service (my Dad knows a lot of freight forwarders that I could advertise myself to).

How do you think the aviation industry is looking? I know the recession is putting a dent in it, but we'll always need pilots to transport people and freight.

Thanks for all your advice.

Oh, and here's a few questions for you:

1. On September 10th, I'll be taking a flight from LAX to LHR. Would the pilot get on an initial heading of 341 after taking off, and then follow a great circle to LHR?

2. Since I know a good deal about flight instruments and the like, I'm worried that I might scare my CFI by keeping my head glued to the panel, never looking outside. Like, once my CFI believes I'm competent enough to pretty much fly the plane, but before s/he signs me off to fly solo, let's say we make a flight from LGB to LAX. After taking off, I'll tune into LAX's VOR on 111.10, set my HSI's heading bug to 101 (the radial connecting LGB and LAX) to remind me of the aircraft's course, and use my flight instruments to keep on the radial. Then I'll contact LAX's ATC when 5 nmi away, and request landing clearance, and follow their instructions to land.

3. Related to the above, let's say the aircraft has a TAS of 150 kts, and there's a 20 kt cross-wind at 045, causing our heading to be 095, causing the CDI to move 3 dots to the right. Would I apply right rudder to turn six degrees, and get the CDI centered again?

4. Let's say we were flying under NVFR, something caused the runway lights to go out, and we're running out of fuel. Would the proper procedure be to squawk 7500, inform LAX ATC we are almost out of fuel, and request an emergency ground-controlled approach landing?

5. Interesting question: since you can take-off, fly, land, and navigate an aircraft using only air charts and flight instruments, why does the FAA and military have a distance vision requirement? TCAS will help you avoid air traffic, so there's no real reason you should ever have to look beyond the instrument panel.

[Piltdown Man]

May I suggest you go for a trial lesson? Afterwards, reconsider the questions you have raised. Also, you won't scare any CFI by looking at the clocks. You'll just spending hours making little progress learning nothing but they'll still be paid. It's your bank balance that will get scared.

[Protoman2050]

Yeah, when I return to the States next summer for vacation, I'll schedule a Discovery Flight at California Flight Center (right at our local airport, which is only a few minutes away from my house).

Thanks for the advice, but I'd be really grateful if you could give me a formal answer to my list of questions. I'll also bring them up with some of the guys at my university's aviation club, which I plan on joining. Even though they're under JAA and not FAA, they still should be quite helpful in planning my career.

BTW, can you credit student flight time in a foreign country towards a FAA PPL?

[BEagle]

1. No - much as they'd like to. Route would be something like KLAX SID DAG J100 LAS J146 HBU J10 OBH J100 OBK J547 FNT J94 ECK J546 MAVOD J579 YUL J509 YQY J575 YYT NATS GISTI DCT SLANY UL9 KENET STAR EGLL i.e. Jet routes in the US/Canada, then NAT across the pond, then airways to London Airport. Initial great circle true track to London Airport would be 034°, incidentally, not 340°. The practical airways/NAT/airways route is about 350 nm longer than the impractical great circle route.

2. Any worthwhile instructor will insist that you fly the aircraft with reference to visual attitude and that you lookout of the cockpit - the litany being Lookout, Attitude, Instruments. If you attempt to fly with your head glued to the panel, you will NEVER be signed off solo.

3. You won't be flying such radio navigation routes until you've learned to fly VFR. In the case you describe, the aircraft heading is adjusted by co-ordinated use of aileron and rudder so that it maintains the correct radial.

4. Under such circumstances you would divert to your alternate aerodrome rather than trying to kill yourself.

5. Very few light aircraft or military fast jets have TCAS. In any case, the requirement for distance vision is because under VFR you are responsible for 'see and avoid' collision avoidance.

An aeroplane is not a ship, things happen in three dimensions and much more quickly. You will be taught to fly using visual techniques long before you start navigating by use of radio aids.

[Protoman2050]

Thanks so much for the answers!

During training, I'll do whatever the instructor says in order to get my license. It just that I tend to get fascinated by technological devices. And I also have this thing about being precise and not wanting to guesstimate based on falliable human perception, and rather trust the slightly-less falliable instruments. But I'll get over that quickly, I'm sure.

Oh, and why is the great circle route "impractical"? My flight is a direct one, so I don't see why they wouldn't fly it from LAX to LHR; isn't a great circle the shortest distance between two points on the globe? Is it one of those situations where shortest distance doesn't equal shortest time?

I wonder why they don't make TCAS or the cheaper PCAS mandatory for all aircraft; it'd significantly reduce the chances of collisions.

[AlexDeltaCharlie]

Hi Protoman,

You seem to have a lot of prior knowledge- my experience is that it's best to put it out of your head when you start training. I had my first trial lesson in 2007, and went into it convinced that I could pilot an A320, an illusion created by a lonely childhood spent on MS Flight Simulator! The result was that I approached the lesson as an opportunity to impress the instructor with my 'amazing knowledge', and ended up struggling to keep the aircraft straight and level. I could tell the instructor what an NDB was, but I couldn't select and hold an attitude!

Since then I've decided to approach flying with an open mind, and discard my patches of self-taught knowledge as most of it has turned out to be incorrect (I'm not saying that your knowledge is 'patchy 'or 'incorrect', mind). Don't just 'do what the instructor says' to get your licence, listen to them and learn. They're the one with the experience, remember.

Please don't take any of the above as being criticism- far from it! I'm only halfway through a PPL so I'm not exactly in a position to criticise anyway, but I would thoroughly recommend it as a way of gauging your interest in flying.

Best of luck from a fellow wannabe!

[EGGD]

In theory it could be a good 'path', but experience dictates that what you plan for will be far from what eventually happens. The questions you ask are irrelevent and as Alex Delta Charlie touched on, you have to walk before you can run. Having a grasp of certain concepts is useful, but sometimes a grasp is all it is and very far removed from reality.

Enjoy a trial lesson, some people jump into an Integrated zero to hero flying course and after a couple of hours realise they actually hate flying. If you have fun, go from there and get a PPL. Have the plan in your mind but expect it to change, expect it to cost more than you think too. But if you do have the passion for it, keep working at it and you will get it. It may take a lot longer than you might think.

[Protoman2050]

When I said "do what the instructor says", I meant "they have far more practical experience than you have theory knowledge, so if what they say differs from what you think, do it their way, and you'll be a much better pilot."

LOL, I don't think I could fly anything right now...my current knowledge is limited to navigation. So I could probably be a pretty-bad-but-better-than-nothing PNF, but a horrid PF.

And unlike you, I have no flight sim experience, so at least I don't have any semblance of experience that could cause me to make stupid mistakes. So I have an open mind with regards to actually learning how to fly the plane. Likely I'll probably insist on RNAV routes instead of visual navigation, because if we tune into the arriving airport's VOR from the departing airport, we can fly a straight line from KLGB SID to KLAX STAR, and not have the potential of getting lost because we can't see, e.g. the 405 Fwy or the Raytheon building.

Hopefully I can get the CFI to appease me by at least letting me tune in, and using the CDI as a check to my visual navigation, just to make sure that I don't go wildly off course onto a aerial sight-seeing adventure.

[Protoman2050]

I totally agree. It might very well turn out that I end up loving my biotech job, and decide to earn a PhD, or go to med school. But I plan to at least take a trial lesson, see if I like it, and then, if I really develop a passion for it, go slowly up the chain of licenses and certifications while maintaining my day job as a research assistant.

If it turns out I don't like flying, I'll have a few other excellent careers open to me, like biotech scientist, clinical microbiologist, medical doctor, patent agent, or biotech analyst.

And yes, I know my questions are irrelevant for me right now. I just enjoy getting the knowledge for its own sake.

Oh, and BTW, with the eye condition I listed in my OP, do you think I could get a Class 1 medical, albeit with a SODA? My opthalmologist's brother is an AME and fellow ophthalmologist, and works right next door to him and his optometrist partner, who've been my eye doctors for several years.

[citationdos]

NO,definetly NO

[AlexDeltaCharlie]

'' I'll probably insist on RNAV routes instead of visual navigation, because if we tune into the arriving airport's VOR from the departing airport, we can fly a straight line from KLGB SID to KLAX STAR, and not have the potential of getting lost because we can't see, e.g. the 405 Fwy or the Raytheon building.''

This is my point- concentrate on learning the visual navigation- there's a reason for it being in the course. I know it's tempting to show your enthusiasm by demonstrating your knowledge, but empathise. Your instructor may not take too kindly to a student pilot 'insisting' on using RNAV, especially on a lesson about VFR nav. I suspect that the first instructor I flew with found me rather arrogant for my 'been there, done that' responses, and personally I don't blame him. You'll no doubt get on better with an instructor if they see you as trying to be an enthusiastic student rather than trying to be a copilot.

I'm sorry if I've come across as hostile in this thread, but I can't help but feel that you're better off going into ab-initio flight training with an open mind and no need to 'insist' anything. Don't feel pressured to demonstrate your know-how, just go in with the right mindset, ask plenty of questions and your natural enthusiasm and aptitude will shine through soon enough.

Good luck and enjoy your flying!

[Bealzebub]

1. On September 10th, I'll be taking a flight from LAX to LHR. Would the pilot get on an initial heading of 341 after taking off, and then follow a great circle to LHR? No, not unless he/she is planning on flying to Alaska! What you have done here is to enter the route in a "Great circle mapper" and then mis-read the track of 034.1 degrees as 341 degrees.

Since I know a good deal about flight instruments and the like, I'm worried that I might scare my CFI by keeping my head glued to the panel, never looking outside. Like, once my CFI believes I'm competent enough to pretty much fly the plane, but before s/he signs me off to fly solo, let's say we make a flight from LGB to LAX. After taking off, I'll tune into LAX's VOR on 111.10, set my HSI's heading bug to 101 (the radial connecting LGB and LAX) to remind me of the aircraft's course, and use my flight instruments to keep on the radial. Then I'll contact LAX's ATC when 5 nmi away, and request landing clearance, and follow their instructions to land.

Based on your first question, your knowledge of "flight instruments and the like" may not be quite as "good deal" as you first thought. You will (as others have said) be taught to fly visually. That means using your eyes and keeping a good lookout. In fact, in that part of the world an excellent lookout. There have been some of the worlds worst mid air collisions in that small part of the planet, caused by pilots who failed to do just that (San Diego 1978, Los Cerritos 1986.)

If you take off from LGB - LAX with a HSI heading bug of 101 degrees, you will be flying almost in the opposite direction as the course inbound is 300 degrees.

3. Related to the above, let's say the aircraft has a TAS of 150 kts, and there's a 20 kt cross-wind at 045, causing our heading to be 095, causing the CDI to move 3 dots to the right. Would I apply right rudder to turn six degrees, and get the CDI centered again? Possibly if you were in a boat. Aircraft use rudders to co-ordinate turns not to initiate or maintain them. I am not sure what you mean about the CDI, but then I suspect neither do you?

4. Let's say we were flying under NVFR, something caused the runway lights to go out, and we're running out of fuel. Would the proper procedure be to squawk 7500, inform LAX ATC we are almost out of fuel, and request an emergency ground-controlled approach landing? Well I suppose you are near "Hollywood" and presumably this scenario is from a movie you have seen. The controller would certainly be interested on the assumption that you have also been hi-jacked!

5. Interesting question: since you can take-off, fly, land, and navigate an aircraft using only air charts and flight instruments, why does the FAA and military have a distance vision requirement? TCAS will help you avoid air traffic, so there's no real reason you should ever have to look beyond the instrument panel.

TCAS helps you avoid a collision, it isn't a navigation aid. Distance vision? Well, remember those two disasters I mentioned, and all the other comments about keeping a good lookout.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, and this is very little knowledge. If you are serious about aviation as a career then do as has been suggested and have a trial lesson with a view to starting the learning process towards a private licence.

Are you really 20?

[Protoman2050]

1. Yeah, I guess I did misread it. Thanks for the correction. Stupid me, forgetting a decimal point and causing a massive deviation.

2. Thanks for pointing that out. When actually beginning my lessons, I of course will maintain situational awareness using everything available: my eyes, ears, and instruments. Also, I guess I forgot that when navigating to a VOR, you need the reciprocal of the radial, as VOR radials are numbered from the VOR. But wouldn't my heading be 281, since I'd need to fly the 101 radial to LAX's VOR? I would be quite horrible if I was so engrossed in radio-navigating that I end up into a near collision because I didn't see a 747 coming right for me. So yeah, avoid collisions first, then navigate.

3. The CDI is the needle on the HSI that picks up the VOR signal, and moves from right to left to indicate how many degrees you are off from the signal. Correct me if I'm wrong. And now I know that you use both aerilon and rudder to make turns, as if you use just the rudder, you might precipitate instability.

4. Yeah, that was a stupid question.

5. It'd do me very well to not get into the unsafe habit of prioritizing instruments over my eyes and ears. It's a good thing that students fly in no-frills Cessna 172s that don't have T- or PCAS, so I'll be forced to become an excellent lookout.

As I have already told you all, I do intend on taking a trial lesson, and if it turns out I truly enjoy it, I'll go on for my PPL, where all of my mis-information will be quickly beaten out of me by my CFI in ground and flight training.

I guess I used the wrong word here, "insist", I meant more like "It'd make me a little more comfortable in making sure we end up where we're supposed to if you could let me tune into LAX's VOR, just so I can check my visual navigation."

First thing will be learning how to take-off, fly, and land the airplane safely, then learning visual navigation, reading air charts, and VFR flight planning, and then IFR and radio-navigation. In that order.

I'll keep an open mind, and make sure I come off to my CFI as a student who is willing to learn.

I commend you all for giving me excellent advice. Thank you so much.

[EGGD]

Do not worry too much about what you will be learning and when, all flight training courses are structured to ensure a natural learning progression. It will be down to your ability how quickly you progress through any training that you do but you will go through the same steps that everyone else does.

I'd concentrate more on basic Maths and Physics than the intricate details of Radio Navigation as that will be much more worthwile if you do embark on the long and tortuous road to a career in Commercial Aviation..

[Protoman2050]

LOL, that's the exact same thing the admissions tutor for my Microbiology with Immunology course told me "don't worry about what we'll teach you, just relax, you'll be trained well."

I'll brush up on my math and physics, good advice.

Oh, and why isn't the weight of the aircraft taken into account when making wind triangle calcs? Should a heavier aircraft be more difficult for the wind to turn? Or does the TAS variable take that into account?

[captainsuperstorm]

Should a heavier aircraft be more difficult for the wind to turnno. weight affect only rate of descent, take off, climb...not even stall as plane can stall at any speed.

turn and gliding distance not affected by change of weight.

if you fly planes fully loaded. you will feel it. this come from its inertia and need extra power on the engine as extra weight is pulling the plane down.

less drift when airplane is faster.

weight affect only captain salary.:E