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Unusual attitude recovery training in Level D flight simulators is rarely practiced in simulator cyclic training for airline pilots. Occasionally it may take place on endorsement training. If so, it may be only once every three years and lasts five minutes at the most.
A37575,
In my experience, that largely depends on the airline, regulators are not much help, particularly CASA. Certainly, several airlines I worked for over the years had recovery from unusual attitudes every second cyclic training session.
Having said that, no simulator Level D is particularly realistic, stemming, as an oversimplification, from two areas.
(1) The manufacturer's data packages simply do not adequately cover the possible dynamic, what is there for attitudes beyond the certified flight envelope are very rough approximations, if anything is offered at all. One particular manufacturer is now considering withdrawing all but certified data, due potential legal liability.
(2) The physical limits of the simulator, which is unable to simulate the extreme loads involved. A modern simulator is a great device, but? I have seen many simulator "recoveries" that would have torn the wings off a real aeroplane.
As some of you will know, there is a lot of discussion on the subject right now, but no airline wants to contract people who do have suitable aircraft, for realistic upset recovery recurrent training, it's all about money.
Kosher airline cadet pilot training courses all include aerobatics, as well as in-air "upset recovery" in actual aeroplanes, but the cheapskate airlines cadet courses do not.
Sadly, despite how many "command hours" of "experience" they might have from GA, it is possible for an ex-GA recruit to an airline to never have done a full regime of stalls and recovery, or spin and recovery in training, let alone in recurrent training, much less aerobatics, never having gone beyond "approaches to the stall". This is not a good preparation for a for a "dark and stormy night".
Better still, try to practice the aeros under the hood and really improve your instrument scan
Couldn't agree more, although unaware at the time of the importance, I actually did my PPL at a school where that was part of the "extended" PPL course. Extended meant that you signed up for 10 hours instruments, on top of the basic PPL course, which included full spins and recovery (pre-solo) and basic aerobatics. Helpfully, the school allowed as much time as you wanted to spend in a D4 Link, and only charged for the instructor, one UK pound per hour (it was quite a while ago).
Tootle pip!!