Yesterday was the 9th anniversary of the day I passed my flight test and got my private pilot’s license (PPL). It was also, coincidentally, the longest straight-line distance I’ve flown in a day, 930 nautical miles (1,722 km) from Winnipeg to Ottawa. When a fellow aviator made a comment about Ground School on Google+, it got me thinking about how stunningly different flight training was from actually flying after I got my PPL. Here’s my comment, based on my first 9 years and 860 hours …
I’ve met new pilots whose instructors have taught them that it’s “cheating” to use a GPS. Is it cheating to use the VOR receiver, then? What about the printed charts? I guess the trim wheel is cheating too, since it makes it too easy to hold the yoke. Pilotage and dead-reckoning are useful skills to learn and practice, but they should be maybe 10% of the navigation training for your PPL, not 90%. The 1930s were a long time ago.
You’ll always use a GPS for long cross-country flights, with or without backup from land-based navaids and your own pilotage (I still look out the window and mark my position and time on the VNC when I cross landmarks – it’s good to stay aware in multiple ways). You’ll use your GPS more than anything else in the plane besides the yoke, rudder pedals, and throttle; in fact, you’ll use it more than the throttle, which you might not touch for 4 hours on a long flight.
You’ll never sit down before a trip and put together a navigation log with the winds and groundspeed for every leg — that’s just a waste of time with modern flight-planning websites and applications. Instead, you’ll spend all that time worrying about your fuel stops: How late will the attendant be there (or will the self-serve pump actually work)? Are you cutting it too close for time/distance? If they’re fogged in, how far is the next one? Are there landing, handling, or ramp fees? Will the washroom be locked after 5:00? Can you get a taxi into town? Is there cell phone reception? How will you close your flight plan? Is there anywhere to get food?
You will learn to respect the weather like a medieval monk fearfully respected his God, and after many painful experiences over a few years, you’ll know more about weather than any ground school ever tried to teach you. At first, you learn to read what’s in the forecasts (GFAs, FDs, TAFs, etc.); eventually, however, you learn to read what’s not in the forecasts (“that much moisture north of Lake Superior means Marathon might be fogged in, even though it’s not forecast”; “I bet there will be a break in the storm line over the cool water of Lake Nippissing”; “I don’t trust the storms not to build up earlier with the winds blowing that way over the hills”), and that’s when you start flying well.
I didn’t get taught a single iota about the GPS in my ground school. However, the attitude (at least in my personal experience) wasn’t that it was cheating.
I agree with the fact that you need to know pilotage and dead reckoning. These are important skills you need to know IN ADDITION to knowing how to operate a GPS. I had to learn how to use it on my own (and I still mainly just do “direct to”).
One resource that I use that I discovered on my own are the weather manuals that Nav Canada publish about each region in Canada. They are invaluable when it comes to interpreting METARs and TAFs. (http://www.navcanada.ca/NavCanada.asp?Content=contentdefinitionfiles%5Cpublications%5Clak%5Cdefault.xml)
Great post, I completely agree.Try to describe a beautiful sunset with sweet calm air, or the fear after heavy chop bangs your head on the canopy. Like looking at the world in shades of gray, the training that gets you the certificate lacks the full brilliant color of real world flight. Thanks for sharing.
Blake – yes, the local-knowledge weather manuals are great. I had a disappointing experience on the phone with a Nav Canada briefer a few days ago, when I was trying to talk about the risk of fog on the north shore of Lake Superior, and the briefer clearly hadn’t read those manuals (or didn’t want to talk about them). Usually, the briefers at London FIC are the best out there for weather knowledge, so I’ll treat that guy just as the exception that proves the rule.