January 30th:
A bright-faced, young, Sri Lankan girl walked up to me and introduced herself. She was my first student and, as my boss informed me, a very motivated and smart one. As a brand spanking new instructor, I had quite the road ahead of me. Having just recently passed my instructor check rides, I was now given a girl with zero aviation experience. With merely 230 hours under my belt, it was, in essence, the mostly blind leading the blind.
That day almost seems like years ago. I had literally just moved to town and was living out of a small mom and pop hotel near the beach. I found the Florida winter to be relaxing and often would return from work and open the windows to my room so that I could smell the cool sea breeze as the sun set. Tough life, I know. I appear to be reminiscing...or digressing. Either way, I'll get back on track. After going over a lesson about basics of flying on the ground, we planned her first flight for the following day.
February 25th
Many of you may have seen the photo of the slight (especially compared to me) girl with the airplane after her first solo. The road to that milestone wasn't a smooth one. The both of us were, in ways, learning together. She was eager to learn but lacked some of the motor skills that comes naturally to some pilots. As a very small girl, she often got overpowered by the aircraft and would let a little turbulence get her almost out of control.
I experienced a pretty shocking revelation when I tried to relate flying to driving a car after an incredibly bad landing. As a 20 year old, she informed me that she had never been behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle. While having driven a car isn't a mandatory requirement when flying, especially since the two things are so different, the experience gained solely by spending hours keeping the large metal vehicle between two lines is one that can help someone know if they are too far left or right of the runway. I remember when I was learning to drive that I was often afraid of mailboxes and oncoming cars no matter how far or close they actually were. In my inexperience, they all seemed inches from hitting me.
A few days before, I sent her up for her first progress check. I was walking out to another flight when I heard her come back to the pattern from her progress check. I stood on the ramp and watched her, time after time, abort the landing and go around. For whatever reason, she continually kept approaching the runway excessively high. When she got to the ground, she was told that she failed the progress check and was nearly inconsolable. Her life was over. This was her dream and she had failed. "Is this going to go on my record?" she asked in between sobs. I assured her that this was purely an internal progress check and that it doesn't really count. I told her that everyone fails at some point but it is only wasted effort if you don't learn from your failure.
She eventually went on to pass and on February 25th, she flew an airplane by herself for the first time. Releasing a student to fly solo with your name and certificate number in their records is an extremely painful experience. What did I forget to tell her? Is she really ready? As I walked out of the airplane and heard her start the engine, my heart skipped a beat. The engine revved up and I panicked. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned around. For sure she had forgotten to contact ground control and was just going to taxi to the runway. After a brief second of panic, I turned back away from the plane and just told myself to trust her. She's done this 20 times before and every single time she's done the right thing. I watched and listened to the radio as she did her three landings. As she taxied back to the ramp after her final one ground control came over the radio. "Epic 535, taxi to the ramp via bravo and charlie. Is that your first solo?" She responded affirmatively with her meek British accent. "Well, congratulations. You did a great job." Even though that compliment was directed at her, I knew that indirectly it says a lot about me. She eventually went on to fly solo to Jacksonville and Melbourne with little to no issues. Then on...
April 13th:
...she passed her Private Pilot Check ride. The designated examiner, a very experienced pilot designated by the FAA and assigned to the region, had nothing but good things to say about her performance. Her flight planning was thorough (exemplified by color coding and a flawless flight plan) and her knowledge was sound. "She'll make a good pilot," he said. She was, however a little bent-out-of-shape when I wasn't there for the end of the check ride. My two friends, Dick and Shane, had come in to spend some time with me before literally heading out to the other ends of the earth and I had gone back to spend time with them.
June 7th:
Shortly after her private pilot check ride, we jumped right into instrument training. Many students think that after earning a private, it will get easier when in fact the opposite is true. We consider the private pilot's certificate to be a "License to Kill Yourself." Yes, you've proven that you can land and navigate. You've even proven that you can handle some very basic emergencies. Unfortunately, without the experience of the instructor in the right seat, you have little to tell you that you are heading into a bad situation. As a private pilot, you are barely able to hold your heading and altitude. Starting instrument flying, those tolerances because a lot more stringent and sometimes that transition is painful...for the both the student and instructor. An good "instrument scan" is imperative to safe instrument flying. When I would catch her fixating on a particular instrument or omitting it all together, I would just say one word: "Heading," "Altitude," "Glide slope." Those words would be repeated over and over throughout the course of her instrument training. After spending several months together, it was also the first time I made her cry.
It wasn't intentional but after repeating several lessons, she continued to make the same mistake over and over again. After receiving a clearance from me in the simulator, she went on to ignore two of the restrictions as she had done multiple times in the past. "No," I said in a particularly stern voice that I'm sure my sister is familiar with (but never having yelled or even set her up for the failure). After pausing the simulation I asked her, "What was your clearance? Right it's the same as it's been for the past 3 days. So, why do you keep ignoring it?" She stared straight ahead and just said "ok." "No, it's not ok. I want to know WHY you keep doing the wrong thing." All I was looking for was "I didn't hear it, or I forgot, or I thought you said something else." All of those things can be fixed through various methods like writing things down or bugging or asking the controller to repeat. "Ok," though, tells me nothing. I explained that I can't help her if she can't tell me why she thought the clearance was different. As I turned away to start the simulation again, I saw a tear drop from her cheek onto her shirt. Great, now I'm a dick.
Then, after a month and a half, she went up for her instrument check ride and passed with flying colors. The hardest part was still ahead for her. We were now going to make two very significant changes. We were going to transition to a completely new airplane and it had gauges and dials instead of a digital display. Additionally, it was a much harder aircraft to control especially considering the two engines. I worried for her because her he past struggles in the much easier-to-control Cessna.
August 18th:
The saga continued throughout July and August. Her study skills were proving to really help her in her ability to fly the new airplane. She easily committed the checklists to memory and soaked up the completely new systems of the aircraft. She did struggle a little with controlling the airplane but had far less of an issue than I thought.
One day toward the end of the course, we diverted to a random airport as part of her training. She hadn't done one since her private course but that had only been a few months before. After the flight was over, she got really mad at me. "You didn't teach me to do a diversion like I told you to!" We went into a small briefing room where we had a very serious conversation. I told her that we had just went over this material merely a few months before. In fact, you did all the calculations and navigation just fine. She protested that I didn't teach her how to do it in THAT airplane. I calmly replied that diversions in a twin are no different than diversions in a single engine other than knowing that you have to start descending much earlier. Things happen faster at 170 knots than they do at 100 knots. "You knew we were going to do a diversion and I know you took notes on it when we did it during private flying. It's the exact same thing. Why didn't you review your notes?" I asked. "Well, the notes don't help me at all. They are useless." I could sense the frustration and irrationality because I often do the same thing when I want someone else to blame. Ask any of my friends. "You're doing fine. Literally all you had to do was descend earlier and that would have been fine. You are getting upset about nothing."
Then yesterday, August 18th, she went up for her Commercial Pilot Multi-Engine check ride. She was incredibly nervous and for the first time, I wasn't. As I helped her fill out her paperwork, I made an interesting observation. Total Time: 201 hours. She was only 30 hours short of where I was when I first started teaching her. I now sit at 700 hours. As I look back to that time, I realize how much I've learned. In the past 7 months, I've easily doubled what I know about aviation. Each thing that I learn, I try to pass on to my students in hopes that they will retain it even though I know some of it will go in one ear and out the other.
I was sitting on the couch when I saw her and the examiner pull back into the ramp. As he walked in the building, he gave me two thumbs up. "Chris, she did a great job. Honestly, that's probably the best commercial check ride I've ever done. Good job." While I know I was only part of that equation and most likely a smaller part than I'd like to believe, I know that I taught her almost everything she knows about flying an airplane. I sat in the right seat as I watched her struggle to land. I watched her struggle to fly an instrument approach. I watched her cry when she failed and swear when she was frustrated. I helped her through all of it. Then, only 6 months and 19 days after her first flight (far faster than we said it would take), she flew an instrument approach with one engine not functioning and did it better than I could ever hoped for. "The best commercial check ride I've ever done." Wow. Now that's good feedback.
As she literally dragged me by my sleeve out to the airplane to take a picture, I couldn't help but notice something wrong. In all her glory, on a perfect day, she double parked the airplane. There it was, sitting squarely between two parking spots. I made fun of her for a little but decided that since she was no longer my student I'd give her a hand instead of laughing as she tried to move it herself. At least it was a MOSTLY perfect day...
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