The Airplane Fanatic Thread

[The People’s Elbow 707]

I didn’t know one of the resident Surly pilots worked at Lufthansa. 
 

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/lufthansa-pilot-draws-giant-penis-21629295
 

[StassneyHorn 6575]

Started my PPL courses at VT-AAA in New Braunfels this week. They have a Pilot Pathway program that I’m jumping headfirst into at 30 y/o. Was deciding between them and Coast Flight in San Marcos but Coast Flight is completely booked up with people in the American Airlines Cadet Academy. The first week has been nothing but ground school and have already chugged through 5 of the 11 chapters in the Jeppesen book. Pretty damn excited about starting the journey, just read through this thread and there’s way too many crash reports so that’s keeping me pretty sober about the opportunity. Going to try and post in here at the end of every week as a fun way to track my progress and beg for tips and ask questions.

Edited March 6, 2020 by StassneyHorn

[MaclovioBrown 100]

44 minutes ago, StassneyHorn said:

Started my PPL courses at VT-AAA in New Braunfels this week. They have a Pilot Pathway program that I’m jumping headfirst into at 30 y/o. Was deciding between them and Coast Flight in San Marcos but Coast Flight is completely booked up with people in the American Airlines Cadet Academy. The first week has been nothing but ground school and have already chugged through 5 of the 11 chapters in the Jeppesen book. Pretty damn excited about starting the journey, just read through this thread and there’s way too many crash reports so that’s keeping me pretty sober about the opportunity. Going to try and post in here at the end of every week as a fun way to track my progress and beg for tips and ask questions.

I can get you an E6B cheap

[Your Mom 4805]

Very cool man.  Good luck and keep us all posted.  Don't worry about being 30.  I was 32 when I got my first regional job and your path certainly be quicker than mine.  

[OU Sucks 8797]

On 3/2/2020 at 9:00 AM, Armybrat said:

The Convair family crash record is really long all over the world - google that extensive list.

Yup, I've only taken photos of 5 different Convairs, and 2 of those later were involved in fatal crashes (both about a year after I photographed them).

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

1 hour ago, StassneyHorn said:

Started my PPL courses at VT-AAA in New Braunfels this week. They have a Pilot Pathway program that I’m jumping headfirst into at 30 y/o. Was deciding between them and Coast Flight in San Marcos but Coast Flight is completely booked up with people in the American Airlines Cadet Academy. The first week has been nothing but ground school and have already chugged through 5 of the 11 chapters in the Jeppesen book. Pretty damn excited about starting the journey, just read through this thread and there’s way too many crash reports so that’s keeping me pretty sober about the opportunity. Going to try and post in here at the end of every week as a fun way to track my progress and beg for tips and ask questions.

Feel free to reach out if you'd like about the training process and what you're looking forward to as you get to the airlines. I'm just about 3 years ahead of where you are, but I started (for all intents and purposes) at 28.

Also happy to be a resource as a (still current) CFI/I.

[StassneyHorn 6575]

I screw up too much trying to post pictures, so here’s a link. Got to check out the American Airlines campus in Irving a couple months back.

 

https://imgur.com/a/KluhDaB

Edited March 7, 2020 by StassneyHorn

[ss13 1832]

^ Use https://imgbb.com/, it's easy & works here. 

 

 

[Gil Bang 25922]

KLM retiring 747s. Immediately

[GlenFromTheMailRoom 1603]

@G650  Took my first trip on an actual G650 this past week.  Felt much larger than the falcon 50 & King Air.  More head room and bigger wash facilities. The family and I were on an older model (2010ish), but still a very nice plane. 

[Handcruser 2805]

the 650 is about twice as big as the 50 and 4 times the size of a king air.

It’s a big plane.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[Your Mom 4805]

No surprise but it's getting crazy out there.  I flew through Tulsa yesterday and AA must have had close to 100 airplanes parked on the taxiways and the closed runway.  787s, 777s, the MAXs, all just lined up and mothballed.  

In the last few days Chicago Midway and Vegas towers have both been closed due to controllers with COVID-19.  We were taking off uncontrolled from MDW just like old times at little airports.  Today I just read NY center is shut down due to staffing.  All NYC major airports including Teterboro and Islip are groundstopped and airplanes not in NY Center yet are being turned back and diverted.   

I think it's only a matter of time before all this is shutdown except essential flights with medical supplies, essential personnel moves, etc...  

[StassneyHorn 6575]

So I’ve now gone through 4 flight lessons and about 8 ground schools. The last lesson was over Power on/off stalls, slow flight, and steep turns. Managed to get everything lined up and handle the take off on the last two lessons, but had to hand over control on the landings. The 45 degree steep turns messed with my stomach at first when the instructor showed how to do them, but once I got my hands on the controls it went away quickly, just an awesome feeling. Handled the power on stall pretty well according to my CFI just took what felt like an eternity to actually stall when I had rotated so far back. When it did, I pretty forcefully pushed in and recovered quickly. Power off stall felt like it was never going to happen, but it let out a small whimper and then recovered. Preflight inspections coming pretty easy to memory, but my preflight checklist is still taking longer than I like, and and I’m making what feels like pretty embarrassing moves when taxing and have to hand over the controls. There are times I have the pedal all the way down to the floor to try and make a turn onto the runway and I get no change in direction, then I adjust the throttle and I’m way off course cause the pedal is all the way down.

The school is doing its best to have less than 10 people at the hangar or trailer at a time with COVID going on. Just trying to get through as much as I could until any message of closure gets announced. 

[Handcruser 2805]

Back in the 70’s my dad was doing stalls with one of his students. This student just happened to be a Dallas cowboy football player who was slightly larger and stronger than my dad lol. Anyway, dude apparently pulled the yoke back all the way and froze. My dad is punching his arms as hard as he can to break the grip. Finally got him to release but he said that was about as scared as he ever was as a pilot/instructor.

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[Your Mom 4805]

16 hours ago, StassneyHorn said:

So I’ve now gone through 4 flight lessons and about 8 ground schools. The last lesson was over Power on/off stalls, slow flight, and steep turns. Managed to get everything lined up and handle the take off on the last two lessons, but had to hand over control on the landings. The 45 degree steep turns messed with my stomach at first when the instructor showed how to do them, but once I got my hands on the controls it went away quickly, just an awesome feeling. Handled the power on stall pretty well according to my CFI just took what felt like an eternity to actually stall when I had rotated so far back. When it did, I pretty forcefully pushed in and recovered quickly. Power off stall felt like it was never going to happen, but it let out a small whimper and then recovered. Preflight inspections coming pretty easy to memory, but my preflight checklist is still taking longer than I like, and and I’m making what feels like pretty embarrassing moves when taxing and have to hand over the controls. There are times I have the pedal all the way down to the floor to try and make a turn onto the runway and I get no change in direction, then I adjust the throttle and I’m way off course cause the pedal is all the way down.

The school is doing its best to have less than 10 people at the hangar or trailer at a time with COVID going on. Just trying to get through as much as I could until any message of closure gets announced. 

Don’t be embarrassed over the mistakes. The honing of this craft is a lifelong project. There will always be something you’re trying to be better at.  Sounds like you’re making good progress. 

[markstanco 12573]

Don’t be embarrassed over the mistakes. The honing of this craft is a lifelong project. There will always be something you’re trying to be better at.  Sounds like you’re making good progress. 

The main one you work on constantly is keeping your takeoff and landing numbers exactly the same.

[Assman 1830]

On 3/21/2020 at 1:31 PM, Your Mom said:

No surprise but it's getting crazy out there.  I flew through Tulsa yesterday and AA must have had close to 100 airplanes parked on the taxiways and the closed runway.  787s, 777s, the MAXs, all just lined up and mothballed.  

In the last few days Chicago Midway and Vegas towers have both been closed due to controllers with COVID-19.  We were taking off uncontrolled from MDW just like old times at little airports.  Today I just read NY center is shut down due to staffing.  All NYC major airports including Teterboro and Islip are groundstopped and airplanes not in NY Center yet are being turned back and diverted.   

I think it's only a matter of time before all this is shutdown except essential flights with medical supplies, essential personnel moves, etc...  

Yet I just ended an 8-leg 3-day without a single cancellation or reroute.  We ran into tons of crews that were on DH #3/4/5 but there we were, slaving away for every single bit of the 28.5 TFP we earned.  My trip this coming week is still a go with no changes.

[DaysOff 7947]

My last 4 day was ripped in half because it had a Guatemala city layover. My next trip has a Quito layover so half of it is cancelled. The rest of it will be removed because they're consolidating legs. My IAH-SFO is showing cancelled. There's now way to deadhead earlier to catch up and be 117 complaint.

We have such a draw down for April that I'm back on reserve. Over 100 50 hour stay at home lines were awarded for IAH 737 CAs and we'll still have almost 200 reserves. Hope they don't fuck with me. Should be off through April 11 with upcoming vacation.

[DaysOff 7947]

And it's cancelled. I'll now operate one AUS IAH leg over the footprint of an original 4 day. Not bad for 20hours of pay. Let's see how long that keeps us out of bankruptcy.

[Your Mom 4805]

I came to work 3 days ago thinking everything was going to be ripped apart. It’s a beating of a 15 leg 4-day. And I hate doing 4 days as it is. I picked this one up to make up for some stuff I gave away earlier in the month. So far out of the 15 legs only one has canceled and turned into a dead head on an earlier flight.  Today is day 4 and everything but that one leg has gone as scheduled. Mostly up and down California with anywhere from 3-25 pax per flight. 

[Assman 1830]

2 hours ago, Your Mom said:

I came to work 3 days ago thinking everything was going to be ripped apart. It’s a beating of a 15 leg 4-day. And I hate doing 4 days as it is. I picked this one up to make up for some stuff I gave away earlier in the month. So far out of the 15 legs only one has canceled and turned into a dead head on an earlier flight.  Today is day 4 and everything but that one leg has gone as scheduled. Mostly up and down California with anywhere from 3-25 pax per flight. 

My loads from this weekend:

FLL-STL: 103

LAX-BWI: 81

Everything else:   25-40ish

Honestly way better than I expected.  We're losing money but it seems not as fast as other airlines.

[Your Mom 4805]

Yeah I was surprised to take 95 HOU-TUL the other day. But since then I’ve seen mostly around 20. 

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

I had 39 people total across 3 legs last Wednesday. So there's that.

We had a flight go out with only a dog in the hold today (had they known before they pulled the jetbridge, they wouldn't have put it down there).

[DaysOff 7947]

Our world is falling apart but today is a good day. No more O2 above FL250 single pilot.

Narrator: never wore it anyway

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

3 minutes ago, DaysOff said:

Our world is falling apart but today is a good day. No more O2 above FL250 single pilot.

Narrator: never wore it anyway

Wait, what?

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

39 minutes ago, DaysOff said:

Our world is falling apart but today is a good day. No more O2 above FL250 single pilot.

Narrator: never wore it anyway

Just got the notice from our union, as well. We still have to abide by our FOM until they can get it changed, but that is good news. Now I won't feel as much like a criminal for not wearing it.

[Your Mom 4805]

So now I don’t even have to pull it out and set it on my lap as if i might put it on... Nice. 

longhornmaniac, how you doing?  A buddy of mine’s wife is a FA where I think you work. She said the company was putting out some ominous stuff if they didn’t get some funding. Any latest news on that?  

I guess Compass is done and Trans States is soon to follow.   
 

 

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

7 hours ago, Your Mom said:

So now I don’t even have to pull it out and set it on my lap as if i might put it on... Nice. 

longhornmaniac, how you doing?  A buddy of mine’s wife is a FA where I think you work. She said the company was putting out some ominous stuff if they didn’t get some funding. Any latest news on that?  

I guess Compass is done and Trans States is soon to follow.   
 

 

Hey. I appreciate the check-in. We all need to be supportive of one another in times like these.

Yeah, the flight attendants had a call last night. I listened to a bit of the recording. It was pretty dire, but it seems to be the consensus that the Company has a penchant for scaring the flight attendants into submission. The story being told didn't really jell with what our established financial numbers show. I don't doubt that it's bad, but I think we're in a slightly better position than was described. The company was urgently calling on us all to reach out to the government leaders asking to include either grants or unsecured loans to help the regionals. Most of the regionals don't have enough assets to obtain loans that require assets as collateral.

The good news is, the most recent package being discussed (tonight) seems to include $25 billion in grants for 121 passenger carriers. That would be roughly equivalent to 4.5 months of payroll for all the airlines, which might just get us through the worst of it.

I actually have a line next month. We'll see how much of it I wind up flying. 

How are things going with you?

[MaclovioBrown 100]

On 3/21/2020 at 4:12 PM, StassneyHorn said:

So I’ve now gone through 4 flight lessons and about 8 ground schools. The last lesson was over Power on/off stalls, slow flight, and steep turns. Managed to get everything lined up and handle the take off on the last two lessons, but had to hand over control on the landings. The 45 degree steep turns messed with my stomach at first when the instructor showed how to do them, but once I got my hands on the controls it went away quickly, just an awesome feeling. Handled the power on stall pretty well according to my CFI just took what felt like an eternity to actually stall when I had rotated so far back. When it did, I pretty forcefully pushed in and recovered quickly. Power off stall felt like it was never going to happen, but it let out a small whimper and then recovered. Preflight inspections coming pretty easy to memory, but my preflight checklist is still taking longer than I like, and and I’m making what feels like pretty embarrassing moves when taxing and have to hand over the controls. There are times I have the pedal all the way down to the floor to try and make a turn onto the runway and I get no change in direction, then I adjust the throttle and I’m way off course cause the pedal is all the way down.

The school is doing its best to have less than 10 people at the hangar or trailer at a time with COVID going on. Just trying to get through as much as I could until any message of closure gets announced. 

Pump the rudder pedal to give those slow turns some help. Soon you'll get the hang of throttle and differential braking

Edited March 24, 2020 by MaclovioBrown

[Thetexashammer 1062]

7 hours ago, MaclovioBrown said:

Pump the rudder pedal to give those slow turns some help. Soon you'll get the hang of throttle and differential braking

New pilots don't use enough rudder. 

[Your Mom 4805]

15 hours ago, Longhornmaniac8 said:

How are things going with you?

All good so far.  Waiting to see how long we can keep this up.  Partial pay leaves of absence are being offered. Gonna be interesting to see how senior they go. I’m planning for the worst but hoping for the best possible outcome to all of this. 

[StassneyHorn 6575]

Flight school will not be allowing any lessons the next two weeks.  Was able to go through S turns and turns around a point today, with emergency descents and emergency approaches and landings on Monday. S turns came along well when I had a road to focus on. Turning around a point became easy once I realized what he meant by picking a spot and having the wing strut in front of it and maintaining distance/ altitude. First time flying with “variable” winds at only 3 knots, definitely underestimated it at first as my takeoff was a little rusty and took a bit to straighten out. I thought it’d have a negligible effect but was wrong in that regard.

kind of glad for the break so I can go start memorizing/learning the checklists like emergency and pre-landing and drill into my head the maneuvers we’ve gone through. I’ve been able to go through the lessons/maneuvers at the present time but have caught myself spaced out on simple things like getting into slow flight once we move onto new maneuvers.

[StassneyHorn 6575]

2 hours ago, Thetexashammer said:

New pilots don't use enough rudder. 

I was talking to my CFI about this today after the lesson. I‘ve been hovering my foot over the right pedal while in the air and applying what I call “mini-pumps” during flight when I see the ball stray rightwards. I’ll see the ball floating out of the indicated lines on the turn coordinator and that’s when I pump. Apparently it should be gentle, constant pressure unless making turns or correcting with ailerons.

[Your Mom 4805]

Chair fly the maneuvers until they're automatic.  At your desk, on the couch, in the car... The less brainpower you need to devote to trying to remember a procedure the more you have left to focus on the technique of it.  It's boring as all get out, but it's free training and it'll save you time, stress, and money in the airplane.  

[markstanco 12573]

Medicals on hold

[DaysOff 7947]

Such a stupid ruling calling it no enforcement action. Thanks Dad. Why not just extend everyone's medical 3 calendar months. Planes won't fall out of the sky if I don't read your fucking eye chart I have memorized anyway.

[Chewbacca 7767]

[mention=285]G650[/mention]  Took my first trip on an actual G650 this past week.  Felt much larger than the falcon 50 & King Air.  More head room and bigger wash facilities. The family and I were on an older model (2010ish), but still a very nice plane. 

Nothing humble about this one.

[markstanco 12573]

Such a stupid ruling calling it no enforcement action. Thanks Dad. Why not just extend everyone's medical 3 calendar months. Planes won't fall out of the sky if I don't read your fucking eye chart I have memorized anyway.

Haha! No shit. My 3c medical guy HATES and I mean HATES the 3C bullshit. Says it is government crap to limit pilots. He turns his head towards the chart when you read it.

I'm 48 and 20/30 but have to cheat on my right eye.

He has a shirt on the wall of his office where he cut the back off in 1971 (cfi). One of yall in north texas or SE okie may know him.

[StassneyHorn 6575]

Had my stage review lesson before getting ready to solo and absolutely bombed last week. Things that came easy first time through like stalls were just a disaster. Pushing the sticks way too far in on recovery rather than leveling out and causing “oh shit” descents, no power on the power off stall recoveries. Completely blanking on emergency landing ABCs. Even lost something like 500’ on a steep turn. Still forgetting details on communications.Not sure if my expectations are just high or if I fucked up pretty bad through 8 flight lessons. Should’ve came in more focused.

Going in tomorrow evening and hoping to put this past me. Would love to solo by end of next week, need to put this behind me now, just have to be confident in what I know.

Hope you guys working have something steady, or at least some cargo leads.

[Longhornmaniac8 255]

2 hours ago, StassneyHorn said:

Had my stage review lesson before getting ready to solo and absolutely bombed last week. Things that came easy first time through like stalls were just a disaster. Pushing the sticks way too far in on recovery rather than leveling out and causing “oh shit” descents, no power on the power off stall recoveries. Completely blanking on emergency landing ABCs. Even lost something like 500’ on a steep turn. Still forgetting details on communications.Not sure if my expectations are just high or if I fucked up pretty bad through 8 flight lessons. Should’ve came in more focused.

Going in tomorrow evening and hoping to put this past me. Would love to solo by end of next week, need to put this behind me now, just have to be confident in what I know.

Hope you guys working have something steady, or at least some cargo leads.

Don't stress about it. We all have bad days, even us professional pilots. I had a bad day in the sim a couple of months ago. Life goes on.

Everything you did wrong there is both normal and easily correctable. Truly. The maneuvers are as much muscle memory than any sport is. Repetition is the key, so keep after it.

The steep turns are, in my opinion, the hardest thing to master. Remember that as your bank angle increases, your lift, which in straight flight is all in the vertical direction, begins to change to both vertical and horizontal. Necessarily, this means your overall vertical lift vector decreases, which requires more back pressure to keep level flight. Trim helps immensely. I taught my students to trim the hell out of it. This helps offset some of the required back pressure (or all, if you get enough in there).

And as an instructor, I'd always rather see a student jerk the nose too far forward on a stall because it shows me they understand the way to correct it is to reduce the angle of attack. Just a little more practice will get that "oh shit" panic blood pressure spike out when the nose buffets and breaks, and you'll realize you can apply a smooth corrective nose-down input and break the stall without being in a nose dive.

[Shoxthemonkey 1977]

https://www.aerotime.aero/clement.charpentreau/24788-fighter-jet-crash-averted-by-defect-in-civil-ejection-incident

On March 20, 2019, a civilian passenger was accidentally ejected from a twin-seat Rafale B fighter jet as the aircraft was taking off from Saint-Dizier 113 airbase, eastern France. The final report of the French investigation bureau for State aviation safety (BEA-E) on the incident outlines a chain reaction of both human and technical failures, one of which unexpectedly prevented the fighter jet from crashing.

It'll be fun, they said. What could go wrong, they said.

[Chad Fuck 17661]

https://www.aerotime.aero/clement.charpentreau/24788-fighter-jet-crash-averted-by-defect-in-civil-ejection-incident
On March 20, 2019, a civilian passenger was accidentally ejected from a twin-seat Rafale B fighter jet as the aircraft was taking off from Saint-Dizier 113 airbase, eastern France. The final report of the French investigation bureau for State aviation safety (BEA-E) on the incident outlines a chain reaction of both human and technical failures, one of which unexpectedly prevented the fighter jet from crashing.
It'll be fun, they said. What could go wrong, they said.

That is quite the series of totally avoidable unfortunate events.

[Assman 1830]

If only the Rafale had the same ISS the T-6 and T-38 with the Martin Baker seats have.  It has 3 settings:

SOLO:  If your handle is pulled, your seat and only your seat goes.  Doesn't matter if you're sitting in the front or back.

BOTH:  If any handle is pulled, both seats go

CMD FWD:  If the forward handle is pulled, both seats go.  If the rear handle is pulled, only the rear seat goes.  This is the setting you use for non-pilots sitting in the back for this exact reason.

[Your Mom 4805]

23 hours ago, Chad Fuck said:

That is quite the series of totally avoidable unfortunate events.

The first of which was letting a couple of Frenchmen play with war toys. 

[Armybrat 40826]

So what is the state of general aviation during all this discombobulation?

Just the 1%ers are traveling as usual?

[RPM 26318]

 

[Ths71 472]

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Bobby_Batronic 1994]

12 hours ago, Armybrat said:

So what is the state of general aviation during all this discombobulation?

Just the 1%ers are traveling as usual?

Not hardly. 

Netjets has offered 1000 voluntary leaves of absence, roughly 1/3 of their pilot group, and Flexjet has cut their flying guarantee (just the pay guaranteed) by about 1/3. 

The super wealthy are largely sitting things out. 

[Armybrat 40826]

I hear the King of Spain is quarantined on his private jet, so....

...this means the reign in Spain will stay mainly on the plane.

 

 

 

 

 

 

{ok, I’ll show myself out}

Edited April 15, 2020 by Armybrat

[RPM 26318]