NATS interview process

[jenga-jen]

natnat25 there's scrap paper provided for the diagramming and the numeracy tests for you to do rough work on if you need it

[natnat25]

jimmy780 and jenga-jen thank you for reply !

[jimmy780]

Stage 1 result

Got the email saying ive passed stage 1 again !! Thank god for that, roll on stage 2, booked for Tuesday 13th April, anyone else on this day ???
Things seem to be a lot quicker this time round, all credit to NATS HR team !!! Saves the agony of waiting !!!

[jenga-jen]

Congrats jimmy780, if that's the 13th of April in Fareham then I'm heading over there as well! (from Dublin, really wish they still did expenses )

First time for me so have a mild case of the fear, hope it goes well for you

[K_ShowMe]

Some Numerical info you must know for the test

Question 1
(1) A plane is traveling at 350knots how far did go in 90 mins ?


Solution:

distance = speed x time but if you do 350 x 90 you will get the wrong answer.

Precaution: you need to convert 90 min into hours by dividing 90 by 60 (1.5)
So your answer will be 350 x 1.5 = 525 miles ( nautical mile)

Also it’s worth knowing that
(1) to convert minutes to hours divide by 60
(2) to convert hours to minutes multiply by 60


Question 2:

An Airplane has a ground speed of 911 knots. How far will it travel in 2 hours 22 mins ?

Solution : Convert 22 mins into hours and add 2 to the result to find the time you need to use for the calculation.
So answer = 911 ( 2 + 22/60) = 2156 nautical miles approximately

[Avoiding_Action]

That's a pretty fast plane or a huge tail wind.

[goldfish1]

Skytest disc

Hi Ginnersam,

Would you be interested in selling your disc? lol

[goldfish1]

first stage 13/5/10

hey,

anyone else booked for bournemouth 13th may? I was going on 7th but think its wise to take max revision time!

[piqla]

-

Or there is another possible solution: you know that the plane is travelling at 350 knots so in 60 minutes it's travelling 350 nautical miles; the half of 350 is 175 (30 minutes is an half hour, big surprise) so just do some quick math and voila... As I know there are 4 possible answers so you do not even have to do very exact calculates.

It's true for the second example too: speed=911 knots for 2 hours=1822 miles + 22 minutes (which is 1/3 hour, so the 30% of 911 is around 303-304) so all you have to do in your head is not too complicated: adding them! And you will be very happy to finish the math part before everybody else.

And everybody has to watch out: there might be funny switches between nautical and "normal" miles.

[CJShields]

@ jimmy780 and jenga-jen or anyone that cares to answer:

I have my Stage 2 on April 9th. I was wondering; are you two preparing for it in any way?

I have read a lot of this thread and from what I remember, you can't really prepare for Stage 2. I feel a bit uneasy though, rolling in with no preparation, especially as travel is so expensive!

I'm currently writing my dissertation which is due in 2 weeks so I'm not sure how much time I could commit to preparation anyway...

[jimmy780]

Cjshields

The previous posts are correct in that there isn't much you can do to prepare. I would have a look at the skytest website about this disc. The screenshots and descriptions are accurate compared to what you will face at stage 2. I don't think it's worth buying as it's expensive and it all is to do with how you perform on the day. The pressure and stress you are under whilst taking the tests will be different to at home. More cubes and more maths involved but not in great detail. I would concentrate on your degree in case this doesn't work out. All the best for both though.

[Murphy23]

Dunno if it's any help to anyone but when I sat my stage 2 in Feb sometimes the questions would be coming at me so thick and fast that I easily got confused as to what I was doing. Didn't know if I was answering the question I thought I was or the one that had just popped up so I paniced and it threw me which meant I didn't have time to look at the next question and when I answered that the next had popped up etc....

I found sometimes you have to "Step back" a bit and re-focus yourself, ignore the mistakes you make and re-focus on answering whatever is in front of you. Although you will only have about 3 seconds to do this in.

The most important bot of advice I can give is psyche yourself up and prepare for a bombardment of questions before the test starts but when it does try to remain as calm as you can.

[CJShields]

Stage 2

Some old posts say that there is a second cubes spatial ability test at stage 2. Am I right to assume this is outdated?

[conc1845]

Hi,

I've got my Stage 1 booked for Wednesday April 7th, 9:00am at Fareham and felt compelled to post here since this thread has been very useful but still have a question of my own.

The documentation we're supplied with concludes with a few pages of various Aircraft and their capacity, flight level, speed etc. Do we need to memorise these or are they included to take up valuable real estate in the brain?

On the bright side, I'm not nervous (at the moment) just very excited at this prospect. Not so much the 300+ mile drive down on Tuesday. Hopefully be in high spirits for the return journey after the tests though

[jimmy780]

Cjshields and conc1845

Cjshields - yes I believe there are more cubes in stage 2

conc1845 - this has been covered before, have a basic knowledge of size , speed and destinations. I uploaded a couple of documents that may help in a previous post.

[conc1845]

My apologies. I must have missed that page but thanks for re-directing me back there. Certainly seems to be of use. Guess I'll be taking my laptop down with me afterall.

[jking101]

stage 1 Aircraft Info

i put a post quite a while ago about the stage one aircraft information so luck me up. Yes they do require you to know that information, though it is only included in about 5% of the test so you could still pass the test without learning these facts. Although you will be required to learn in even more detail about more than 50 aircraft in their pre-learning material of which you will be tested on during the course so if you learn all you can now it will be far easier for you in the long run.

[conc1845]

Aircraft Info

Cheers jking101. With a pass at 75%, that 5% or so on the aircraft could prove valuable so I'll be boning up on those regardless now. Besides, as you said I'll need them at later stages/college anyways. jimmy780's "Top Trumps" are very handy for that I must say

[Banana81]

Tests

I have my test tomorrow and am worried about the maths tests, what are the climb and descent rate calcs and are they different from the time speed distance stuff?

[Banana81]

Testing

reposting this as its soooo useful!!

1. Info on stage one and Basic Checking Tests: http://www.mattieb.110mb.com/nats.php
2. S D T Questions: http://www.speeddistancetime.info/
3. A/C Recognition; http://www.airliners.net/quiz/
4. Possible S D T; http://education.qld.gov.au/learningplace/cx/index.html
5. NATS Practise Leaflet: http://natscareers.co.uk/docs/NATS_Practice_Leaflet2.pdf
6. S D T; http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/education/bitesize/standard/mathsI/number_gen/dst_rev1.shtml
7. MATS 1: http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/33/CAP493Part1.pdf
8. Personality Test: http://www.airways.co.nz/careers/atc_quiz.asp
9. Everything: http://www.airways.co.nz/careers/what_it_takes.asp
10. Checking; http://web.archive.org/web/20041209192522/freespace.virgin.net/at.co/atco/resources/Checking.htm
11. Mental Arithmetic: http://web.archive.org/web/20060128180335/freespace.virgin.net/at.co/atco/resources/mentalarithmetic.htm
12. Numeracy Exam: http://web.archive.org/web/20040816075851/eugrad.jpmorgan.com/content/context_gen.htm?content/content_6.htm
13. SHL Tests: http://www.shl.com/shl/en-int/candidatehelpline
http://www.shlgroup.com
14. Quantas Psychometric Exam: http://www.qantas.com.au/infodetail/about/employment/QTests.pdf
15. Spatial Ability: http://www.psychometric-success.com/practice-papers/Psychometric%20Success%20Spatial%20Ability%20-%20Practice%20Test%201.pdf
16. Diagrammatic Reasoning: http://www.psychometric-success.com/practice-papers/Psychometric%20Success%20Diagrammatic%20Reasoning% 20-%20Practice%20Test%201.pdf
17. Data Checking; http://www.psychometric-success.com/practice-papers/Psychometric%20Success%20Data%20Checking%20-%20Practice%20Test%201.pdf
18. http://www.psytechltd.com/shltrials/
19. http://www.psychtesting.org.uk/index.cfm?EBBB1D95-CF1C-D577-9D29-9D271A5AD8E3
20. http://www.ase-solutions.co.uk/goto.php?sess=x38100|u18899|p158|n144|c18899|l0|g0 |d0&pg=Take_a_practice_test#
21. http://www.shef.ac.uk/careers/students/gettingajob/psychometric.html
22. http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/planarity
23. http://www.psychometric-success.com/aptitude-tests/diagrammatic-reasoning-tests.htm
24. http://www.assessmentday.co.uk/inductive/Free/Inductive-Reasoning-Test1.pdf
25. http://www.wikijob.co.uk/wiki/diagrammatic-reasoning
26. http://www.docstoc.com/docs/1670177/GMAT-Abstract-Reasoning--Test-1
27. http://www.wikijob.co.uk/wiki/spatial-visualisation


Question 1
(1) A plane is traveling at 350knots how far did go in 90 mins ?


Solution:

distance = speed x time but if you do 350 x 90 you will get the wrong answer.

Precaution: you need to convert 90 min into hours by dividing 90 by 60 (1.5)
So your answer will be 350 x 1.5 = 525 miles ( nautical mile)

Also it’s worth knowing that
(1) to convert minutes to hours divide by 60
(2) to convert hours to minutes multiply by 60


Question 2:

An Airplane has a ground speed of 911 knots. How far will it travel in 2 hours 22 mins ?

Solution : Convert 22 mins into hours and add 2 to the result to find the time you need to use for the calculation.
So answer = 911 ( 2 + 22/60) = 2156 nautical miles approximately

Or there is another possible solution: you know that the plane is travelling at 350 knots so in 60 minutes it's travelling 350 nautical miles; the half of 350 is 175 (30 minutes is an half hour, big surprise) so just do some quick math and voila... As I know there are 4 possible answers so you do not even have to do very exact calculates.

It's true for the second example too: speed=911 knots for 2 hours=1822 miles + 22 minutes (which is 1/3 hour, so the 30% of 911 is around 303-304) so all you have to do in your head is not too complicated: adding them! And you will be very happy to finish the math part before everybody else.

And everybody has to watch out: there might be funny switches between nautical and "normal" miles.
Question 1
(1) A plane is traveling at 350knots how far did go in 90 mins ?


Solution:

distance = speed x time but if you do 350 x 90 you will get the wrong answer.

Precaution: you need to convert 90 min into hours by dividing 90 by 60 (1.5)
So your answer will be 350 x 1.5 = 525 miles ( nautical mile)

Also it’s worth knowing that
(1) to convert minutes to hours divide by 60
(2) to convert hours to minutes multiply by 60


Question 2:

An Airplane has a ground speed of 911 knots. How far will it travel in 2 hours 22 mins ?

Solution : Convert 22 mins into hours and add 2 to the result to find the time you need to use for the calculation.
So answer = 911 ( 2 + 22/60) = 2156 nautical miles approximately
Absolutely!! but the basic principles remain the same - find examples below:

An a/c is flying at 540mph at FL320, and starts descending at 800feet per minute. How many miles will it travel before it reaches FL250?


Ok, work out the time first, FL320 (32,000 ft) to FL250 (25,000 ft) is 7000 ft. Divided by 800 ft per minute descent is 8.75 minutes. 540 mph is 9 miles a minute (540/60), so distance would be 9*8.75 = 78.75 miles.

First work out how long it will take to descend to the flight level shown:

The aircraft will descent 7,000ft at 800fpm so it will take 8 min 45 sec.

Now you have to work out how fat it'll travel in 8min45sec (or 8.75)

So 540 (speed) / 60(minutes) = 9miles per minute

The aircraft will travel 9 miles across the ground every minute.

so 9 x 8.75= 78.75 nautical miles (nm)

remember "distance over speed times time"

d
s x t

Aircraft 40 nautical miles away, at 30,000 ft descending at 3000ft per minute and travelling at 240 knots.. can it make it? 30000/3000=10 minutes 240 knots is 4 miles per min distance is 10*4 = 40 mins 240/60=4 4 miles per min so 4*10 = 40 miles


-An a/c is flying at 540mph at FL320, and starts descending at 800feet per minute. How many miles will it travel before it reaches FL250?
-Aircraft 40 nautical miles away, at 30,000 ft descending at 3000ft per minute and travelling at 240 knots.. can it make it?
240 knots = 4 miles per minute, which means 10 minutes to get the 40 miles to the airport.
3000 feet per minute for 10 minutes means a descent of 30,000 feet. He could make it.

-a/c doing 420 knots/mph, how far will it fly in 20mins...
-a/c flies 40 miles in 10 mins, what speed is it doing...
-a/c needs to travel 120 miles, is doing 480mph, how long will it take...
-If a/c flies at 420kts for 40 mins how far will it travel?
-If a/c flies 60 miles in 10 mins how fast is it moving?
-If point A and point B are 50 miles apart and a/c is doing 200kts how long will it take?