My Flying Career

Met with my instructor yesterday to discuss the nitty gritty before our first lesson, tentatively set for April 1st.  We went over a little bit more detailed syllabus, signed some paperwork, filled out a logbook audit, which is basically every crazy combination of flight hours you can think of.  Dual Night, Solo Night, Total Night, Dual Night X-country, Solo Night X-country, Total Night X-country, and so on and so forth.  It took quite a while to fill out.  I can’t imagine having to fill one of those things out if you had like 1000+ hours.  Took me long enough with ~140 hours.

After working through all that, I went down to the FBO store and bought a Seminole POH (Pilots Operating Handbook) & laminated checklists and the Cessna 172P POH & laminated checklists.  Yay! More books to read!  I’m actually very excited to have the Seminole POH.  After going through the King Video’s it will be nice to know, when they say “this is only for hydraulically actuated props”, to be able to know, “Hey, the Seminole has Hydraulically actuated props!”.  :-)

So between now and next week, I will be memorizing checklist items, reading the Seminole POH and building some more time in the club plane.  How very exciting!

Well in my first post I said I would talk a little about the process I used to pick the school that I would be completing my training at.  This process was filled with much research, advice from pilot’s I respect, and prayer.  Originally I was going to go through the “Fast Track” program at ATP (Airline Transport Professionals, Inc.).  My wife and I decided not to take that route because we were newlyweds and not seeing each other for 3 months was out of the question.  And even though they provide housing, it is only for the student, so my wife would not be able to come.

My next choice was Delta Connections Academy.  They were just finishing up their brand new campus in Houston, TX at the time.  My wife and I were planning on flying down their to check it out and find a place to live.  Ya know, just scope out the area.  We had heard both good things and bad things about Houston and of course the bad things are what stuck in our minds.  ”It’s hot and humid, the crime rates are really bad”.  Needless to say, it would cost more than twice as much to move to houston and go through their program with moving expenses, living expenses (I would not be able to work much while attending school), and school expenses.  With the seemingly endless downturn of the economy, their just aren’t the school loans their used to be.  So even if I wanted to go to Delta Connections Academy, I wouldn’t be able to.  I look at the glass half full.  That decision was easy.  I can’t go, so I won’t go.

Then my instrument instructor mentioned that I should just stay here, get my ratings through Hillsboro Aviation and work for Ameriflight when I build enough time.  It would be cheaper, I’ll make some good connections here on the west coast (which is worth a lot in this business),  I can do school at my schedule and work part time and best of all, I wouldn’t have to move.  Seems like the perfect plan right?  Flawless in fact hehe.

Well we are about to find out…I anxiously await my first day at Hillsboro (April 1st, 2009).  Meanwhile I have been saturating myself with flying.  Reading blogs (check out my blog roll), re-watching my King Schools Instrument DVDs, flying on Flight Simulator practicing approaches, anything and everything I can do to keep myself pumped up and ready to roll.

In conclusion to this post, I am happy where I am at and where I am going.  And on a slight side note, my work decided to keep me for Tuesday’s and Thursday’s!  Which is fantastic and a huge load off my mind.  So I will be going to school Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and working the other two days.

See ya next post!

Well…I signed the loan and told my work that I would be going to flight school on April 1st.  No turning back now! I’m so excited I haven’t been able to sleep well (or that could be the massive amounts of coffee I drink at work).  This is something I have dreamed of ever since I was a kid and now it is becoming a reality.

Now it is true that the aviation economy is not at it’s high point.  But I think of it this way; Treat the aviation economy like the stock market.  Buy low and sell high.  Well, it’s hard to think of it getting any worse that it is now; so I figure it can only get better. Right?

A little about myself.  I am 22 years old and am married to the most wonderful woman ever (she would have to be to put up with my aviation craze).  Over the past few years I have earned my Private Pilot’s Certificate and my Instrument Rating add on from flight instructors at my local airport.  I believe this to be the most inexpensive and efficient way to start out.  More on that later…

The flight school I have chosen is Hillsboro Aviation out of Hillsboro, Oregon.  Many factors have come in to play when choosing this school and after literally a year of researching, my choice is clear.  Since this is more of an introductory post, I will not go too much into detail, but don’t worry, I will lay out my reasoning and research in future posts(so stay tuned ).

One last thing…the point of this blog is give other pilot-career-aspiring folks out there a chance to hopefully educate themselves from my mistakes and maybe even right choices every now and then.  I, in no way, consider myself a good writer, so you will have to bear with it.  But I will do my best.