AQC - Week 3

For the last week of AQC, the remaining 4 flights were all flown manually. The first 2 flights were a review of the previous weeks profiles (take-off, approaches, landings and single engine work), however this time without the automatics. For me, I found the 737-300 quite easy to fly manually as it just sits at the attitude you set and does what you want it to; its sheer size and weight clearly helps it from getting knocked about in the air, compared to the props we’ve been flying. I found, the most challenging part of manual flight is when operating with a single-engine – a lot, and I mean a lot of rudder and precise control is required.

The remaining 2 flights were LOFT exercises. Both mine and Jonny’s flights went really well and we managed to land all safely so was a pretty good result really. Fortunately there were no engine failures on the last flight but I did have a passenger suffer a cardiac arrest and had a drug smuggler on board, so a diversion was required.

After our last flight, we got an AQC report summary from our instructor, which me and Jonny were really happy with. Now the whole 3 weeks get reviewed by the training manager and we should get his report in the next week. After that we then get passed onto ARL, the company responsible for airline pilot placement, and we will all be hopefully entering the holdpool.

So that is the end of the 18 month CTC Wings course for the 8 of us on the AQC course: Jonny, Tom, Christian, Sean, Ben, Ross, Tessa and myself. Now there is just the wait for an airline job. Recent news has suggested a positive outlook for the months ahead, so with any luck it won’t be too long.

For now though, thanks to everyone who has read my blog over the last year. All being well, I will continue the blog when I commence training with an airline. In the meantime, if anyone has any temporary jobs going I’m open to all offers…..

Groundschool....where it all began

AQC - Week 2

Well it was worth it; the week of groundschool as well as the endless hours and evenings spent learning checks and SOPs got rewarded with our first week in the Boeing 737-300 simulator.

For the simulators, we are all paired up with another cadet who we do the whole AQC with. I’m paired with Jonny (a CP106 coursemate). Each session is 4 hours long where we do 2 hours of pilot flying (PF), before swapping, then doing 2 hours of pilot monitoring (PM).

During the first week we have been allowed full use of the autopilot and autothrust systems, and we have been practising a whole manner of profiles. In the first couple of sessions we practiced the basic jet flying procedures such as take-offs and landings (which always come in useful), go-arounds and basic jet handling – the 737-300 is supposedly one of the more difficult jets to fly. The next couple of sessions looked at ‘non-normals’ and emergencies. We practiced engine fires, engine failures, engine seizures, rejected take-offs and many other system failures making us work as a crew and methodically. Rapid depressurisations were certainly interesting, diving from 37000ft to 10000ft in just a few minutes, at maximum speed while wearing oxygen masks.

pretty lights

The final flight of the week was a LOFT assessment exercise where we flew a mock passenger flight from A to B (Manchester to Stansted). As far as luck goes, LOFT flights normally offer very little – poor weather, engine failures, system failures, and closed airports all often happen simultaneously in this one flight. The aim is to assess both our technical and non-technical skills. Both mine and Jonny’s flight went quite well; and I managed to land in Stansted for my flight rather than divert – thankfully the weather improved!

For the last week of AQC, we have all the automatics taken away and fly manually for the 4 sims. Myself and Jonny are on late shifts this week, one session finishes as 2am - we might as well get used to it considering our choice of career..............