The Job Starts and the Blog Ends #61

The time has come for me to write my final post. After just under 2 years of hard work I've made it into the right hand seat of an Airbus, flying paying passengers around Europe.

Before I started on the line I had to do 2 days on the jump seat observing normal crews. It was really helpful just sitting back and watching/listening. It's amazing how much extra stuff there is to do that isn't covered in the type rating, such as fuel and time checks, ops messages, printing weather and digital clearances, foreign controllers and so on. I learnt so much in just those 8 sectors and the crews made it look so slick and easy! Definitely something to admire and aspire to.

views from the jumpseat

After 3 days off over Christmas it was my turn. 3 days of 4 sectors with a training captain, and a first officer in the jump seat as a safety pilot. Basically an extra set of eyes to make sure I don't do anything stupid. On the 1st day we went to Bordeaux and Zurich, 2nd day was Nice and Toulouse and 3rd day was Bordeaux and Luxembourg.

Parked on stand

It was an extremely weird feeling getting into the aircraft and turning left and even more so when passengers started boarding. It was so much fun but really hard work and by the end of each day I was absolutely knackered. The learning curve is huge and with short sectors there's barely time to think. Because it's all so new it uses up more capacity just doing the standard things that will eventually become second nature, so add the new information on top of that and suddenly there's very little capacity left. It's really draining and there's a lot of pressure but it's great! So far the trainers have been excellent - really calm, patient and helpful. They're well aware you're going to be a bit slow to start with and are going to need a bit of guidance, otherwise they wouldn't be in a job.

Spotted

Line training lasts about 50 sectors which sounds like a lot but when you're doing 4 sector days it really doesn't take long. As I said, the first few days are done with a training captain and a safety pilot, then the rest are just you and a training captain. At the end of those 50 sectors you have your line check which is just like another normal flight and if all goes well then you're signed off and free to fly the line with any captain, and if not then it's probably just a few more sectors under training to iron out any issues. Reports are written by the trainers for each day and are viewed by the next person so they can track your progress and know what to keep an eye out for.

A special passenger on my 1st day

A standard day runs like so; turn up to the crew room (either north or south terminal depending on the flight number) about an hour before the scheduled departure time. Trainees are encouraged to get there 75 minutes before departure time and I make an effort to get there 15 minutes before that, giving me plenty of time to check in, print the necessary pages, look through the flight plans and find out which stand our aircraft is on and whether we have a scheduled slot or not. You'll meet the captain and go through the flight plans, weather, defects etc and decide how much fuel to take and who's flying which sector. At the same time the cabin crew are on an adjacent table doing what they need to do. When you're all ready you meet each other, exchange the important information and make your way to security then to the aircraft. You then don't leave the aircraft until the end of the day which can be about 12 hours depending on the route, delays, weather and so on.

There are staff car parks dotted around the airport. Mine is car park X, right at the far end of 26L. It takes me about 30 minutes from home to get there, then I need to get the crew bus to the south or north terminal, which adds about an extra 10 or 15 minutes. It takes me about 50 minutes door to door which isn't too bad to be honest.

awesome crew on day 1

I'll briefly mention how the pay works with CTC flexicrew;

Up until 500 hours with easyJet I get paid about £32 per hour and get a decent allowance for standby duties and night stops. As your hours increase, the pay increases. Apparently we're expected to fly around 750 hours in the first year which should come to about £30,000. For a 20 year old just starting out and being able to stay at home, I'm very happy with that indeed!

After one year you're eligible to apply for a permanent contract with the airline. If you're unsuccessful then you go back to doing the same job as before but still on flexicrew and can re-apply 6 months later. I'm not entirely sure exactly what that interview is like, something to look into in due course.

Beluga parked up in Nantes

As a pilot you're constantly under pressure to perform, and to make sure high standards are achieved there's a number of tests to carry out each year; 1 class one medical, 1 online technical test every 6 months and a 2 day sim check every 6 months. Right now that seems like a lot and a bit of a drag but as a passenger it makes me confident that the pilots know what they're doing and as a pilot it may just save my life one day.

That's about all I can think of! I hope you've enjoyed following my journey and hopefully it's given a good insight into what it takes to become a pilot and maybe even inspired a few people. As ever, I'm happy to answer questions so don't hesitate to email me at harryinnesclark@googlemail.com.

Finally, I'd like to thank all the people who made this possible, from the instructors and staff at CTC and easyJet to my supportive friends, course mates, girlfriend and especially family! Without all of them this would still be a dream and not a reality. I've had a lot of luck along the way but also put in a serious amount of work and dealt with a lot of pressure to get where I have within 2 years. It just goes to show what you can do if you put your mind to it!

Base Training #60

It's fair to say that base training was absolutely incredible and a once in a life time experience! I took control of an airbus A319 for the first ever time.

A very happy boy having just flown the airbus for the first time

Come rather a long way from this

There were 11 of us on the 3 day course along with 2 training captains and a training first officer. We each had to complete a minimum of 6 take-offs and landings. We started off at Gatwick and due to the average weather conditions across the UK had to go over to Chateauroux, France for the day to get everyone's circuits done before heading back up to Liverpool for the night.

Group walk-around

It just so happened that I was first up which was a bit daunting but I was so excited and so keen to get into the right hand seat that as soon as the offer was made I was straight in there. The trainers did the departure from Gatwick then when we were in the cruise over the English channel, one of them pops out and says, "right mate, you're in!". It's hard to describe the feeling I had when I sat down in that seat, looking out the window whilst at 30,000 feet, travelling at mach 0.75. I thought to myself, "wow, is this really happening to me?" It took me a few moments to settle down and actually realise that I was in control of a £40 million piece of machinery. I flew the arrival from the cruise down to about 500 feet where the instructor took control and demonstrated the first landing. He then gave me control on the roll, applied full power and off we went into the circuit.

It was a very nice day in Chateauroux so the weather wasn't a challenging factor. I settled into it quite nicely, repeating what I'd done in the sim a few days before and made 6 smooth approaches and landings to my relief and that was it, full stop, change of crews and signed off. I have to admit I wasn't getting out of that seat without a fight, I absolutely loved it and I cannot believe I'm going to be paid to do this job.

How often do you see a cabin this empty?

Me by a pretty big engine on a cold, wet and windy walk around in Liverpool

For the next 2 and a bit days I was just a passenger down the back, chatting to my friends, reading over a few manuals, watching some shows on my iPad and tucking into the crew food supplied to us, ducking into the cockpit every now and again to see what was going on.

During the transit back to Liverpool on the first day I managed to get myself in the jump seat which was really fun and very interesting to see how a crew operates a proper sector.

Observing from the jump seat

It was that good I got a promotion.... 

We spent 2 nights in Liverpool and every day ended up going to France to do the circuits due to the dodgey English weather, finishing up in Gatwick at the end of day 3. The next morning I had to go to the CAA to get A320 officially stamped on my licence - a very proud moment indeed.

I have 2 days of jump seating normal line flights next week and then just after Christmas it's my turn to show up to work and start transporting passengers around Europe. The dream becoming reality!

Who said there's no leg room on easyJet?

Induction #59

Awarded our wings on day 1 of induction

I've now been working for easyJet for 2 weeks and I'm really enjoying it. The first week was spent at easyJet's new training academy at Gatwick airport. It's very modern and has an A320 cabin simulator, which is used for smoke drills, door operation and so on - very realistic.

The first day was very adminy. We met a few people from the company who explained various things to us, filled in some paper work, got our air side ID and got measured up for our uniform which was very exciting. The rest of the week was basically an abbreviated cabin crew course, run by cabin crew trainers where we learnt fire and smoke drills, wet drills, safety and emergency procedures, first aid, aviation security, door and slide operation and customer focus. The last day was a CRM day which included being shown round the crew rooms in the north and south terminals at Gatwick and what we'll have to do when we're on the line. It was all very helpful and interesting and so exciting!

Smoke Hood

Fire training

Wet drills @ 6 AM

The second week consisted of 2 days of line training ground school (LTGS), which again was really interesting. Although there wasn't much new information, it was good to review the important things that we're going to be needing on a day to day basis from now on. Then finally, 2 sim sessions; one LOE (Line Orientation Evaluation) and PBN (Performance Based Navigation) and 1 pre-base sim. Both were good fun and a few new things were introduced in the LOE sim, such as RNAV procedures and unreliable airspeed. The rest of it was just a review of what we'd covered in the type rating. Then the pre-base sim was simply practice for base training; 2 hours of circuits in different conditions to get the landing and take off technique fine tuned for the real thing. They were the last sims I'll have to do until my recurrent check in 6 months time.

Final sim

The next step is base training which will be the first time I get my hands on the real thing, I cannot explain how excited I am!

First time in uniform. Worked extremely hard for this cheeky number

easyJet Type Rating Part 2 #58

Another stage of training complete! And this perhaps the most significant. 

Myself and Ben having just passed our LST (Licence Skills Test)

The second stage of the type rating was the simulator phase. I was lucky enough to do all the sims at Quadrant Systems in my home town which was convenient. There were 13 sims to complete; 1 full motion pre-sim, 6 fixed base sims and 6 full motion sims, the last two of which were the LST (Licence Skills Test). These sessions were spread out over 22 days, each lasting 4 hours with a 1.5 hour brief before hand a half hour de-brief afterwards. 

Burgess Hill VFD

As you can imagine, the sims were pretty intense and there was a great deal to learn. It was indeed a very steep learning curve and required a lot of preparation to keep up to standard. All that said though, it was thoroughly enjoyable! Sitting in an airbus cockpit with the realistic graphics and full motion was amazing! 

The sweat box

After a few sims of normal procedures only, various emergencies started being thrown in such as engine fires and failures, decompressions, cockpit and cabin smoke, windshear, collision avoidance and so on. Towards the end if you had a phase where everything was operating normally, you felt nervous because it was almost too good to be true and you knew something was going to fail soon! 

easyJet ToughPad for calculating performance, weight and balance etc

The LST was spaced over the last 2 days. Day 1 was basically run like a proper flight and we were given a few issues to deal with. There was very little input from the instructors, they were just observing and making notes, ticking boxes etc. Although stressful, it was actually quite fun. The 2nd day was very different and much more disjointed. Due to the sim having a few issues, we lost about an hour of the time which wasn't ideal. We had one more approach to get signed off for the LST which we didn't have time for the day before, then the instructors went into instructing mode and started showing us various low vis ops scenarios. There were several situations to see and deal with and get signed off. It wasn't part of the LST but more stuff that has to be completed and signed off before we can be released to easyJet. They told us both as soon as we finished the test that we'd passed successfully which was very good news and a massive relief! 

I thought I was going to feel a lot more nervous than I actually was. I think because we'd done all of the possible scenarios we would be tested on several times, and with no problems, it just felt like another sim. That obviously helped hugely with the performance because I was relatively relaxed. Plus the instructor was very nice and calm and made us feel comfortable and relaxed.

The standard of training was really excellent throughout the course and it's no wonder that CTC and easyJet pilots are so highly regarded in the industry. 

What I didn't mention in my last post was the cost of the training. You're charged £30,000 for the 6 weeks and it has to all be paid up front. If like me, you had to take a big loan for the initial training with CTC then there's no chance of getting another loan for the type rating. I was very fortunate to have a few generous family members who managed to scrape some money together to lend me but it certainly wasn't easy! easyJet then bond us for £10,000. That takes the total cost of training to about £140,000!!!  So it's definitely not cheap and not easy but hopefully it'll be worth it! 

I have a few days off now and officially start with easyJet on Monday. I have a week of induction stuff at Gatwick, then a couple more sims to do, 3 days of base training and 2 days in the jump seat before Christmas, then my first actual flight with paying passengers is on December 27th. I'll be shuttling people between Gatwick, Bordeaux and Zurich. I'm so excited and can't wait to get my hands on the real thing and can't believe this is actually happening to me. The dream is getting more and more real! 

easyJet Type Rating Part 1 #57

The first stage of my type rating was the ground school phase at CTC Aviation - Southampton, lasting 17 days (weekends included). There were 10 guys including myself on the course, most of whom I knew well from my course at CTC. I stayed in an excellent B&B called Heatherdene, just up the road from Dibden Manor which meant I was nice and close to the training centre.

Having had a fair bit of time off between being selected and starting, I was predicting being smacked in the face by the highly demanding workload - how right I was!

The first hour or so on day 1 was the standard introductions and paper work etc. The instructors then said, "Right then, off you go!".

Before we started we had been given a number of files to download, such as the A320 CBT (computer based training) app, easyJet's crew training manual, relevant charts, QRH (quick reference hand book) etc. On the CBT are a number of topics that we had to cover in the limited time available to us and we would eventually be tested on it. In just about 2 weeks we basically had to learn all about the systems of the A320 plus learning the easyJet SOP's (standard operating procedures). There were a lot of topics to get through, some much more complex than others, for example; ice & rain, doors, lighting (pretty standard and doesn't take long to complete) and flight controls and auto flight (much more complicated, takes hours to complete and longer to understand).

We were also given our allocated bases a few weeks before we started which was very exciting! Out of the 10 of us, 5 were placed at Gatwick, 2 at Stansted, 2 at Bristol and 1 at Luton. I was so so happy when I was told that I'd be based at Gatwick! Having lived 20 minutes from the airport for the last 17 years, I couldn't have asked for a more perfect base - Chuffed!

One of the slides from the CBT

We were given a daily schedule of which topics we were expected to cover that day and it was up to us when we did it and how long it took. The CBT lessons are really good, you just set your iPad up, stick your headphones on and watch the virtual lesson on the app. It has animated graphics and a voice taking you through it, which you can pause, play and replay at your own leisure.

As well as doing the CBT each day, we all had a 2 hour VFD (virtual flight deck) session with an instructor in groups of 3 or 4 at some point throughout the day. And finally, there were a number of questions (ranging from 40 - 70 each day) on the topics for the day which had to be answered and then reviewed/discussed the following morning. As I'm sure you can imagine, there wasn't much spare time in the day at all.

The VFD's were great for familiarizing yourself with the A320 cockpit and easyJet's procedures. It's a few screens laid out to represent a cockpit and everything is touch sensitive, so you set it up exactly how you'd set up the real aircraft. We had 9 of these sessions and for the first few I thought I was never going to learn the procedures but about mid-way through the second week I started feeling much more comfortable with them from cold and dark to top of climb. We briefly looked at the descent and landing in the last couple but I wouldn't say I'm that confident with that phase of flight yet. The instructors seem to expect you to be fairly switched on and familiar with the procedures by about session 4 so if you go into it having not learnt the procedures, you look very silly and it reflects badly on you. This obviously just adds to the stress and workload, as if trying to learn all the systems wasn't tricky enough. Anyway, somehow everything started coming together, thanks to many many hours of hard work.

My sim partner, Ben packing up after a late VFD session

Each day would start at 9 am and most days I wouldn't finish till about 7/7:30 pm. I was absolutely shattered by the time I got home. Just about enough time to change, eat and go to bed.

In the second week there were 2 progress tests (20 questions each), one on the Monday and one on the Thursday, with an 80% pass mark. These are just internal tests to see how you're coping but obviously you don't want to fail it because that gives the instructor the impression that you're either not putting in enough effort or not up to the task.

There were 2 tests in the final week, one on Tuesday and one on Wednesday. Monday was a revision day with the instructor which was really helpful! Tuesday's exam was the big technical one, consisting of 112 questions, made up of several sections. The pass mark for EACH SECTION was 75%. For example, getting every question in the paper right besides 1 section where you got 70%, would not be a pass, even if it was an overall 95%. So having a weakness in one particular area wasn't really an option. It's marked on the spot and the results are revealed almost instantly. I'm very glad to reveal that I got 96% for that one. The whole class passed first time with marks ranging from 96% - 98%.

Once we'd had a chance to have a quick look through to see where we went wrong it was straight into powerpoints with an instructor, readying us for the next test. The second test was on performance and was only 32 questions, again with a few different sections with the same rules as above applying. This tested us on things like various low vis ops rules and situations, determining certain landing distances, weights etc from given graphs and circumstances. Most of it was OK to be honest although I genuinely thought I messed one of the sections so was delighted to discover I'd only got 1 question wrong in the whole paper! Someone was clearly looking after me that day!

The final day was a CRM day with a current easyJet pilot which was really good because he had a lot of excellent and current information to pass on. You knew that what he said was bang on because he does it on a regular basis. We had plenty of discussions about what we will be experiencing on the line along with positive and negative actions in various scenarios. We then had a few other people come to talk to us about the flexi-crew situation and what to expect in the first few weeks at the airline and what to do to prepare for the sim phase in a few days. It ended up being quite a long day but there certainly wasn't a lack of golden information.

I have to say that the Airbus is an absolutely incredible piece of engineering! It's so well thought out and has so many redundancies built in. It seems to be so user friendly and built to clear as much capacity as possible to increase the safety of the flight. I cannot wait to start flying it for real. Not long now!

If only!

Joining Team Orange! #56

My next aircraft!

The new office!

I've just been given the news that I will be flying the A319/20 for easyJet. I can't believe how quickly things have happened and it really goes to show that hard work and determination does pay off. easyJet was the airline I've wanted to fly for since the start of my training so I'm sure you can imagine the jubilance when I got the good news!

It took three days for my AQC report to be written and to be told I had a place in the holding pool. Just three minutes later I received an email saying I had a selection day with easyJet in a weeks time. So I started work straight away and worked solidly for the next few days making sure I was well prepared for the interview.

I spent a lot of time on the easyJet corporate site, researching the current fleet, orders, routes, bases, values, ambitions etc. I read plenty of articles online to see what was new in the press with the airline and rival airlines and what issues were going on in the world that may effect the industry and easyJet specifically. I also made sure I had a good selection of examples to do with work ethic, challenges, risk-taking, teamwork, communication, leadership, failures, initiative, pressure, decision-making, flexibility, conflict, customer service, SOP's and complex situations.

There was plenty to do but I felt well prepared going into the selection day.

The selection day was held at Dibden Manor. There were twelve on the selection and I knew all but three or four of them which was good because it meant we all felt a bit more comfortable. The day started with a presentation on easyJet and we were asked to contribute a bit and show off what we'd learnt about the company.

We were then split into two groups of six for the group exercises. We did two group exercises and we were asked to not reveal the information from that so sorry! But what I will say is make sure you've done your research on the company and just like applying to CTC in the first place, make sure you constantly stay involved and find the right balance between contributing and listening.

The day was then topped off by a one on one interview which lasted about fourty minutes. Having prepared well, thankfully there weren't any questions that caught me out. I was able to recall the examples I'd been practising and made sure I expressed how passionate I was about flying and flying for easyJet in particular.

All the recruitment team were really nice and did their best to make you feel as relaxed as possible.

Three days later I received the wonderful email confirming that I'd passed and wow what an amazing feeling that was!

I should start finding out when and where my type rating is soon and I will keep the blog going throughout that and the line training.

I'm certain I'm going to be very happy at easyJet and can't wait to start flying for them!

I'd just like to express how grateful I am to my family, friends, course mates and all the people who have helped me along the way. What I love about aviation is that everyone seems to be friendly and willing to give you as much information as possible to help. I definitely wouldn't have got this far if it wasn't for them!

Airline Prep

AQC #55

So that's it, my training is at an end. 18 months of hard work and determination. There's been plenty of ups and downs, I've met some great people and seen some amazing things. It's also quite scary taking a step back now and realising how far I've come and what I've achieved in such a short space of time. A few years/months ago I didn't think it was possible but here I am as professional pilot!

My course was topped off with the three week AQC (Airline Qualification Course). It was certainly hard work but quite enjoyable too. It was great getting into airline-like operations and flying a 737. We were all based in Dibden manor which was the best accommodation we've had throughout the course. It's maintained to such a high standard, everyone has a room with a nice bed, en-suite, plenty of desk and wardrobe space. You're given three meals a day and the rooms are cleaned and beds re-made every day apart from weekends. It's absolute luxury!

The first week was spent in the classroom, consisting of two days technical and two and a half days CRM (crew resource management). The technical wasn't like AGK with loads of power points on systems and electrics etc (thank God!), but was going through each phase of flight (profiles) and learning the order of events, standard calls, checks and so on.

Dibden Manor

View from my room

My Room

I really enjoyed the CRM course. There was so much useful and relevant stuff, such as how to effectively deal with emergency situations, how to brief crew, make PA calls, avoid/prevent dangerous situations from happening etc. It's great being taught something where you can genuinely see how it will effect you on a day to day basis.

What is a little disconcerting though is you have reports written about you for the technical and CRM course and although you're learning and taking in lots of good, new information, you're very aware that all the time you're being watched and assessed. It just makes things a bit tense and uncomfortable, it almost feels like a five day group assessment.

The plane we're supposedly flying!

When I first saw how much we had to learn in such a short space of time I felt quite overwhelmed and thought, "how the hell am I going to learn all of this!?" but my crew partner, Richard, and I sat down on Monday evening in front of the 'cardboard bomber' and started working away at all these checks, scans and calls. We spent almost every spare moment during the week and weekend doing this, gradually building it up and putting it all together and by the end of the weekend we felt pretty confident and were running through visualised flights from start to finish, including a few emergencies fairly smoothly.

Cardboard Bombing. Many many hours spent in front of this thing

We spent some time practising PA announcements, crew briefings and decision making in a range of hypothetical situations using the skills given to us during the CRM course. It's surprising how tricky it actually is to make a good PA announcement without saying something wrong that might upset someone and not sounding like a fool.

Digi-Bombing

Week two is the MCC phase and is spent in the 737-300 fixed base sim. There are five four hour details where you're introduced to handling, SOP's, autopilot, multi-crew operations, procedural flying, non-normal situations (fires, failures etc), single-engine handling and two LOFT (Line Orientated Flight Exercise) flights, one of which is an assessment.

Me after the first sim

These flights are flown mostly on auto-pilot which makes you think it should be easy with two of you working together in the cockpit, however, it's far from easy. Things happen so much quicker and are very very different to what we're used to. You need to know the 'profiles' and SOP's off the back of your hand and always be switched on and thinking ahead. As Rich and I found out in detail four, if you get behind or lose your situational awareness for a moment then it's very difficult to prevent it going badly wrong.

The 737-300 sim

The last week is the advanced handling phase and is done mostly without autopilot or auto thrust, which means you need to know the correct attitudes and power settings for all stages of flight and be able to fly them accurately (easier said than done). Being able to trim properly is essential! Otherwise you spend the whole time trying to fly straight and level and it saps up all your capacity. There are four four hour details, also in the 737-300 sim, with two LOFT flights again and the final one being an assessment.

Practising a rapid depressurisation or for when the captain lets one rip!

To ensure that each detail goes well, a lot of work and preparation is required! There's so many things to think about and be aware of and you need to constantly be thinking about and monitoring these whilst travelling between 180 - 300 kts. The profiles and SOP's have to be instinctive.

Each detail is marked as Normal+, Normal, Slow or Review. There are a number of categories (SOP's, Technical Knowledge, Automation, Manual Handling, Monitoring PM, Co-operation, Leadership/Managerial Skills, Situation Awareness & Decision Making) that you are assessed and marked on out of these four options and then given an overall grade. Most people go through with normals and obviously a normal+ is excellent and a slow is bad news. To get a slow you need to get two separate slows from the detail and that basically comes from lack of preparation. I've heard that if you get just one overall slow then that means you aren't eligible to apply for Easyjet. So although there's no official exam or test, there's a great deal of pressure riding on every lesson because of that thought and fear of a slow in the back of your head.

The next step for me is getting a job (scary stuff). I need to wait a week or two for my AQC report and overall course report to be written and then have confirmation that I'm in the hold pool. I'll then be waiting for an airline to recruit. I've heard the hold pool is more of a puddle at the moment. Four people on my course who were on the AQC ahead of me have been told they've got interviews with Easyjet in a couple of weeks which is very exciting. I don't know if my training report will be done in time for me to get on that selection but hopefully there'll be another one shortly after. Who knows what will happen with aviation though....

I must say that the standard of instructing throughout the course has been absolutely fantastic and if it wasn't for the many excellent staff at CTC in Southampton, Bournemouth and New Zealand then I wouldn't have got this far, so I owe them a great deal of thanks and would recommend the course to anyone who's thinking of pursuing a career in aviation.

I'm going to keep the blog going through the type rating and line training and then will draw it to a close. Hopefully it won't be too long until the next update!

My UK CAA Flight Crew License arrived. Worked very very hard indeed to get this little beauty!