Vancouver BC PPL training school?
 

Hi, was wondering if theres anyone from lower mainland area and richmond here?

I know there are alot of flight schools to get your private pilot license but anyone know of any that are good? And what is a "good" flight school?

Thanks all,
Daniel

I used to work at a flight school at ZBB (Boundary Bay).

There are about 4 good flight schools there, each has its pros and cons.

Canadian Flight Centre (Welcome to Canadian Flight Centre) is a great school, fantastic staff (somewhat biased) and a well maintained aircraft, though they are getting old. They've recently picked up some new aircraft but have a relatively small fleet. This may be a factor in the busy summer months when all the planes are booked up. Their main selling feature is the staff there. You'll be happy to go to class, and be looking forward to the next lesson. Ron, the owner hires cool people.

Pacific Flying Club (Pacific Flying Club - i think) is another good school there. Bigger fleet and facilities, though you'll be less noticed as a customer as a result. Well run operation with excellent maintenance. Good facilities. They do the flight training for a local college airline program, so they are well equipped. They have a really nice new simulator that is the best in the the lower mainland

Pro (www.proifr.com) is probably the best known, though not really sure why. They have a big fleet, lots of good programs but from the staff i've met, are not as personable. The owner talks like a used car salesman, which turned me off right away. Nothing personal, people like that irk me. While a student there, you can expect to make an appointment and have whatever instructor is available at that time to cover. good thing is that you will have better chances of going when it is most convenient for you, the con is that you may or may not have the same instructor, so you'll spend money and time at the beginning of each lesson recapping the previous lesson so the instructor can figure out where you are in your training. They have lodging available for foreign students, which is a nice touch.

Montair is the last but not least. They have good staff and decent fleet. The owner is a douche so be careful around him. Butted heads with him on occasion. Talks to people the way a drill sergeant would talk to a recruit. If you stand up to him he ususally backs down. They have some overseas contracts with China (or was it India) for airline training, so they can bring you from 0 hours through PPL, CPL, IR, Instructor and into a king air 100. They don't do charters from what I know, so don't dream of getting a right seat there.

There are also 1-2 flight schools in Pitt Meadows, Langley and Abbotsford. Boundary Bay is the closest to Vancouver, but one of the hardest to get to. There really isn't a very good transit system to get there from downtown. The other airports are easier to get to from their respective towns but offer less in flight training.
All in all, there is no wrong choice in flight schools. Just which one is best for you. All licenses/ratings/endorsements are the same in the end. Your potential employer will look at them all exactly the same, unless he/she spent time there themselves. The difference will be in the people you will be learning from. I encourage you to email them for information. See if they respond with a personalized "thank you for your interest" letter or a form letter. Are they as interested in having you as a student as you are in being one? If you can pay them a visit, that would be best. Go and feel the 'vibe' of the school. You'll know what I mean when you do it. I've walked into places and stood around for 10 minutes before being noticed. Other places I walked in and was greeted with a warm hello. Needless to say, I gave my money to the latter.

Hope this helps. Feel free to post or PM me if you have any further questions.

Cheers.

Im at Sealandair, and happy with that. They got DA20 and DA40. They are at Boundary Bay airport....send me a PM if you got any questions about it ;)

Danizer

Got my start with Pacific Flying Club, years and years ago. Good outfit back then and so I think you should look at 'em. Good luck and safe flying!:ok:

pity you can't hop over the water and go to VFC ;)
A fine club - an excellent airport to train from...

I might be biased though being from Victoria :)

Whatever happened to Centennial Flying school at ZBB?

I think they where bought out by Regency and then we all know what happened to Regency. The old office I think is part of the Pro IFR school now.

Thanks for answering.

Just out of curiosity, what happened to Regency? I haven't worked in BC since 1995.

I remember that 1 of the schools in ZBB had their airplanes repo'd around 1993/4. I think their office was in one of the hangers. Centennial was still in business then.

There where two sides of Regency the flying school and the "airline" I won't get into all the messy details but Regency was famous for charging its Co-pilots to sit right seat in there BN2 or Navajo's hauling freight around so you can imagine what this company was all about, old joke was that 121.5 was regency's company frequency. Anyway they changed there name to Sonic Blue because they had soiled the name regency but as the saying goes lipstick on a pig ................. so the final nail in Regency/Sonic Blue happened when a friend of mine flying their Caravan had an Engine failure going from Tofino to Vancouver couldn't make it to Port Albernie crashed on a hill killing the pilot and 2 others 4 others survived.

Wow!

I am sorry for the loss of your friend.

BC PPL Training
 

Avoid Montair if you can- owner is quite the weirdo

Wouldn't deal with Sealandair. I maybe biased because I work for a flight school at zbb, but seeing a DA20 take off with the flight instructor's headset hanging out of the door isn't exactly a safe thing to do.

I did all my training at Canadian Flight Centre, Ron Harcus is the CFI and runs a great outfit.

My vote goes to SeaLandAir as they have great customer service skills and well maintained airplanes. The CFI has lots of international experience and runs a great ship.

My (somewhat biased, seeing as I live there) advice would be to head across the Strait, and go to one of the schools in Victoria. Fewer schools, less traffic, easier airspace leads to a better learning environment, IMHO. You'll pick up the skills a lot faster if there aren't so many distractions..

Midgetboy: Great spotted! Last time I flew a Katana I dident see any door at all. How to close the Canopy with a headset hanging out, must have been a impressive sight! :DI have spent 2 months there, and got some great stories about Pro, PFC, CFC and Mountair aswell.

Im not very impressed with the schools at CZBB, the average for the PPL-student is very high there. Pitt Meadows is nice, shorter distance to Pitt Lake and Glenn Valley.

Icpl Trainign Centers........please Help
 

Hi there, am looking at a possibility of beggining my flight training in Canada in 2010. I have googled for schools with ICPL programs but only got a handful and to which some of the reviews I got from some of them are not the best either. Well, would someone kindly point me to a good direction here?? I am looking at starting somewhere around march or april next year. Thanks ..............

Explore: I have too, none of which were from my school.
Would have to agree with YPK though, that is a beautiful airport. Is the indian ATC still working there?

Well, its stories about every school. I think the important thing is to found a instructor that you like, because you gonna spend some hours together. Drop by every school, talk to a couple of instructors. Its like a job-interview!

Actually, I heard him at Langley the other day. So maybe works at both Pitt and Langley. But he is a nice guy!

Its sometimes hard to be a new student at CZBB, the ATC can be quite rude sometimes. But guess they get a little mad sometimes, with some of students that have "English" as a second language. Their patience gets tested allmost every day!

check out pro ifr they are great.. also check out www.myaviationschool.com