I did my CPL with EFT in Florida, I would recommend them without hesitation. Remember a lot of what you get out of it depends on the work you put in yourself. I had a very enthusiatic instructor who I felt was working bloody hard for me. Most of the students felt the same.
I was going to do my ME and IR in England, however I'm shortly going back out to Florida for all this, plus the FIC course. I did hear of cases of people struggling during the UK section of the IR, but the guys I spoke to currently down at Shoreham didn't report any problems, and I'm very confident in the instructors down there. Again its not always down to the school, or the instructors - do your homework, know the differences!
Sorry, this wasn't supposed to be about EFT, but about Florida, so here are a few observations;
1) The weather is not always great, so you do have to make marginal wx decisions - ok I admit there are not as many rainy/cloudy days, but there are often strong winds, and sudden severe CB activity, so you DO have to plan for the WX properly.
2) The RT is slightly different, but why is this seen as a problem? I actually found that my RT sharpened up, especially flying around in the sort of busy airspace you can rarely fly in the UK. Anyway, as an airline pilot, we are going to have to learn and adapt to different terminology and procedures everyday - may as well get used to it early.
3) You dont have to pay approach or landing fees, so you can chip off to a airfield with an ILS/NDB and practice till your hearts content!
4) The burgers are choice!
I found not having the day to day distractions of home a big help, we all had the same goals, so helped each other and got on with it !
To be honest from what I have heard the airlines really don't care where you got these ratings, as long as you've got them - and first time preferably.
Good luck whatever you decide to do, if you go out there you will enjoy it.
PS; Not sure how to link to this, but type 'CPL Diary' into search, required reading if you're thinking of training in US.
Last edited by iainpoll; 14th April 2004 at 14:22.