Day #11

For those of you who didn't hear, I didn't have school on Monday and Tuesday due to the crazy ice storm. I watched the weather reports on Sunday and they said it would probably be bad but I really didn't know what to expect so I didn't pay much attention. To my surprise on Monday I had 1/2 inch of solid ice covering the entire car and everything else. The sidewalks, parking lots, absolutely everything was covered and there wasn't anything that anyone could do about it. It took me around 20 mins to finally get the ice melted enough to scrap it off and see out the windows so I could park in the covered parking (I know that I should have done this to begin with but I wasn't thinking). On Tuesday everyone else got around another inch of ice which made things even worse.

On Wednesday I thought that the FAA would cancel classes again but they ended up having them because the course is already so condensed. Luckily my instructors are going to be able to catch us up without having to come in on Saturdays or pushing back graduation a couple of days.

As for the material that was covered on Wednesday, it included finishing up basic navigation (latitude/longitude, great circle routes, effects of wind on flight, and effects of altitude and temperature on speed) and also finishing radio/satellite navigation. The radio/satellite navigation lesson was pretty interesting because we started to discuss about the ground based transmitters that are located throughout the country and serve as the backbone to the national airspace system. Basically these different types of transmitters are on the ground and send up various types of signals and voice recordings. The planes then use these transmitters as waypoints to help them navigate through the sky. Some of the types of transmitters were confusing since a lot of it is the same just a little bit different. For example a basic transmitter is called a VOR and the military uses something very similar but it is called a TACAN, then to make it a little more confusing the FAA decided to combine the two with a few extras into a VORTAC. Here is a basic picture of a VORTAC, for some reason when I post pictures it doesn't fit them into the space right, if you click on the picture it will take you to the website that I found it on. Overall I thought it was okay, I just know that I'll have to study this a bit.

Day #10

TEST DAY!!!! As soon as we came into the classroom we had to take the test so we wouldn't fall behind on the lessons for the next block. I guess the third block is when we start to get into the entry level nasty stuff like figuring out speeds and distances, as well as basic navigations. Luckily all of us scored above 90% so no one had to retake the test! We were the first class to all pass Block 2 test. I guess all of the other classes have only been able to have just one or two people fail. All of the instructors were really cool about it and made a big deal of our accomplishment. They're going to think of some sort of reward for our hard work, probably pizza or something similar.

I can't really describe the basic navigation lesson, but go to this website and you can see some of the maps that we looked at. Copy and paste the link in another window/tab and just scroll around like you would on google maps. You can zoom in and get a pretty detailed view of what I was looking at in person, or zoom out and get a general view of the area. The map basically lays out different routes, airspaces, obstructions, etc...

http://skyvector.com/

Day #9

Since we didn't get very far on the aircraft recognition lesson last night we had a lot to catch up on today. Just about the whole class thought that this lesson sucked, but I really liked it since I got to look at a bunch of cool airplanes and learn little facts about them. I guess that was when I finally realized that I am an airplane nerd. Oh well, it's going to pay the bills.

We went over planes like a Cessna Cutlass 172, Beechcraft Baron 58, Super King Air 200 (my personal favorite in the propeller class), Boeing 777, etc... In all I think there was close to 40 different airplanes that we had to completely memorize. Not only did we have to know what the airplane was from the picture, we also had to know the aircraft identifier, weight class, manufacturer, and how many series/models were released. For the Boeing 777 example I had to say: Boeing 777, heavy weight class, B772/773, and then discuss the difference between the 200 series and the 300 series. Marty told all of us that we would have 30 years of memorization so we need to get used to it early on. After going over the material for a long time, I felt pretty good since I already knew all of the military airplanes except some of the helicopters.

We finished the day off with an extensive review of the material that we had covered throughout the week to get us ready for the second block test tomorrow.

Day #8

Today we finished up principles of flight with talking about helicopters. This was a pretty humbling experience because I thought that I knew quite a bit about helicopters because of working out at the base but I was dead wrong. I had no idea about the different controls and how helicopters operating under such different circumstances. The lesson wasn't all completely knew stuff which made me feel a little better.

The next lesson was about wake turbulence.
As you can see from the picture wake turbulence is the air that rolls off the end of the wingtips and speeds up to disrupt the air all over the path of flight. The tube-like portions of wake turbulence that are directly off the wingtips are called vortices or wake vortex. We also discussed topics such as which type of configuration results in the greatest amount of wake turbulence and ways to adjust flight paths to avoid catastrophic accidents.

We finished up the day with aircraft recognition. This lesson will be pretty interesting since it is about learning what plane is what. We basically look at a bunch of pictures and see what specific characteristics stick out to help us identify each plane.

Day #7

First of all let me apologize for taking so long to update the blog. I have been very lazy when it comes to getting on the computer for anything that relates to work. I promise that I will start to do a better job at updating.

So I had yesterday off because of MLK Day and a bunch of the guys in my class went and saw Grand Torino. I thought the movie was very good, but very vulgar. I would probably recommend that if you want to see it, just wait till it is a rental.

At work, we finished up learning all about Federal Air Regulations and which rule applies when and where. All in all it was a good lesson to learn about but that doesn't make it any less boring. After we finished the general overview of each FAR we dove right into FAR part 91 in great depth. Part 91 contains generally operating and flight rules for all aircraft operating in US air space. Some of the rules that we discuss were VFR and IFR flight visibility minimums, terrain clearance limits in both mountainous and nonmountainous areas, and what should be done about radio failures during IFR flights.

FAR 91 took us all the way to lunch which was a little longer than what the schedule wanted but Marty wanted to make sure that we fully grasped the material. To finish out the second half of the day we stated Principles of Flight. I am so glad that I was exposed to most of this material in the military because the people that had never learned about why the wing has it's camber or about how air density and density altitude affect airplane performance were completely lost. Some of the stuff was pretty basic like what is flap or a rudder, but they have to make sure that everyone at least has basic knowledge.

Boring yet interesting at times.

Day #6

Alright so today was the big day, our first block test! My class was pretty stressed because if you don't pass with at least a 90% you have to retake it. The instructors make us shoot for a higher score on all of the block tests so when the final test in basics comes up we can ace it and not worry about getting a 70%. I'll be honest I thought about bringing an extra pair of underwear with me to school(but I didn't). I did not want to be the only guy to not pass. We finished the test and we got back the results in about an hour. The class average was 86, which meant that two people didn't get 90%. I felt bad for the two of them, but I think that they didn't pass because they didn't study very well.

So the day, or night shall I say, went along with us starting on airspaces. We learned all about Airspace A, B, C, D, E, and G. And all the things we can and can't do in it, and what a plane needs to be doing in those airspaces. This lesson was loaded with info and I know that I'm going to have to study this a lot so I don't mix anything up.

Afterwards we started on the FAR's (Federal Air Regulations). This was a very long portion and very tedious! I really don't know what to say about this except, it is almost like a review of all the information we had before, and a bit more. That's about all for today, was a great day because of the awesome block test.

Day #5

Today my class finished up the Radar section we started on the night before. We learned about Primary and Secondary Radar, their components, and their advantages and disadvantages. It was pretty cool to learn how the radar works, I only knew the very very minimal way it worked, bouncing radio signals, but I learned there are a lot more ways it can be used. Then we took the quiz and started on the next section.

After that we started on the FAA manuals and Orders. We learned about the Orders 7110.10, 7110.65, 7210.3, 7340.1, 7350.7, changes to these documents with changes, notices, and supplements, and also the AIM (Aeronautical Information Manual. This part was said to be a very boring and tedious part of training, but our instructor made it quiet painless and to tell you the truth, I didn't think I could memorize what every Order and Manual was in under 1 hour, but he definitely got us to memorize it, or at least me.
At the end of the Orders and Manuals we learned about the words May, Shall, Should, and Will. Their definitions and their uses. These are important words that are used in the documents. For example the word Shall means that something is mandatory, the word Should is something that is recommended, May is optional, and finally will just means that it isn't really required. After that we took another quiz.

After that we started on the Letters of Agreement and Standard Operation Procedures. This part was quiet easy as long as you know the definition of what each one and who they apply to. This was a quick 2 hour lesson and then a quick 10 question quiz.

After that we started our review for the Block test we have for day 6. We first started by being split our into 4 teams, each who table of 4 were a team. Then we played Jeopardy, this game really help make us think and was really fun. My team won the jeopardy game with $26,396. Not that it really mattered, but I really hate loosing so I'm glad I didn't have to hear any crap talk. But as the instructors said, it is only a game and the main thing is to have fun and learn.

After the game we reviewed the entire block 1 stuff, and that took a whole 45 mins. We just skimmed through it with the instructor asking us questions and it was a pretty fast review. I was surprised at how much I learned and remembered in a week's time here at OKC.