Background
Ever since I was very young, I have always been fascinated by flying. Whether it be asking for a visit to the flight deck when we go on holiday, or playing Flight Sim on the PC. When I heard that my friend John had obtained his PPL at Elstree, it really made me begin to wonder whether I could acheive a similar thing!
I began to look around our local area and found Compton Abbas Airfield about 20 miles away from home. On their website I found that they offered something called an NPPL which requires less hours than the PPL... what's that I thought? A quick Google search and I had my answer- a Pilot's Licence which was valid for UK-registered aircraft in UK airspace. Perfect! Several Skype conversations with John later, and some thought about the cost and I'd made my mind up. I was going to book a 'trial lesson' at Compton and see how it went.
So I contacted the airfield, who were very helpful- and suggested instead of booking it as a trial lesson, that I actually join the flying club and benefit from the cheaper hourly rate of lessons. What a good idea I thought, as I think I knew even at that stage that this would not just be a one-off "flight experience"!!
Lesson 1, Hour 1
So this is it, my first lesson. Quite an occasion, so much so that I've brought several family members along to share the excitement with me. My mum, my brother and my girlfriend. Dad, if you read this- sorry you couldn't be there. Perhaps you'll be there for my first solo?
Anyway, after letting Ops know who I was, I was given a club membership form to fill out and asked to take a huge binder full of all the Club rules and read several relevant sections relating to insurance and personal injury cover.
After some time, the instructor came over and introduced himself and invited me to the briefing room for my first ground school session. With a big model of a plane, he demonstrated the different types of movement- yaw, roll and pitch. Also the control surfaces- ailerons, elevators and rudder and the effects of each one. He also described the secondary effects of the controls.
With the big poster on the wall he gave me a brief run through of the PA-28's flight instruments and then produced a large chart and asked where I wanted to fly for my first lesson. We decided on a route West towards Yeovil, then turn south towards Bridport and from there back over the Cerne Giant and back towards Compton Abbas. Once we'd settled on the route, we walked out towards the aircraft. This was it- it was really happening!!
As we walked towards the plane, he explained what I should be looking for- adequate room to manouever, any fuel/oil leaks on the ground, anything majorly amiss with the aircraft.
We put our things on the back seat and began the walkaround. He pointed out various items which I should be checking, control surfaces, fuel, tyres, lights, stall warning and so on. After the walkaround we got settled in the plane and went through some basic safety procedures, and then began the pre-start checklist. I was very pleased that I was asked to call each item out, while the instructor explained what it was and why we did it.
I don't want to become boring, so I'll skip forward a bit to the point when I first took control. "I have control" I said.. what a feeling! I was really flying, although I was only keeping it straight and level towards Westlands airfield, I was FLYING!!!
We did various exercises demonstrating the effect of the controls and secondary effects, climbing, descending, turning, yawing. Before I knew it, we were doing an overhead join and we were back into the circuit. I was allowed to make my first radio call as we turned towards runway 26, "Golf-Charlie Kilo, finals" - what a feeling!
We were soon back on the ground, taxiing towards the hard-standing. Once we stopped I was asked to run through the shutdown checklist, and then as it was the last flight of the day- put the cover back on the aircraft!
We did a quick debrief back at Ops, my instructor gave me a few things I needed to buy before the next lesson. Following this advice, I have now bought a checklist, logbook and first Air Pilots Manual - 'Flying Training' from FlightStore (who were conveniently having a sale!) It was a very proud moment filling in my first flight in my logbook, a 1hr 10mins local P/UT flight in a PA-28.
I also bid on a headset on Ebay, which I later won for £30 inc. P&P - I'm now waiting in great anticipation for it to arrive!
My next lesson is booked for this Sunday at 3pm, so fingers crossed for good weather!
Richard