Who here has ever flown a small plane? Anyone actually got a pilot license? I haven't, but from what I understand it's not that uncommon to do an introductory flying lesson in some parts of the country.
Two nights ago I had some really strange dreams including one involving my dad and I flying a 2-seater (neither of us are pilots lol). As unrealistic as the dream was (the guys I told on IRC about it thought it was pretty crazy) it suddenly got me thinking about piloting small aircraft. I started looking into it.
Apparently in the USA getting a private pilot license, which will allow you to pilot small single-engine planes, takes about 40-70 hours of flying time plus some ground instruction. It's not cheap. My research online revealed that the total cost will be somewhere in between 7-13 thousand dollars.
Amazingly this never occurred to me before, but there is an executive airport and about 10 flying schools within a few miles/km of my apartment. According to their websites, the total cost of getting a license would probably be a little more than the national average (guessing between like 8k-15k).
I really can't see myself actually getting one right now, but the idea of it is really cool. For people who go ahead and do it, the next step would be an instruments certification, dual engine plane, etc, which increases what you are qualified to fly and do.
I'm hoping there are at least a few people on TL who can share their experiences about riding in or piloting small (2-6 seater) airplanes. The smallest one I've ever been in was probably ~75 people.
How cool would it be to fly instead of drive to places during times of peak travel. Here's a hypothetical situation I put together in my head just now that would have been awesome:
Me, a few weeks before MLG Providence: Hey guys, I'm heading up to MLG on Friday. TL Guy: Oh hey micro; any chance I can catch a ride with you up to Providence? Me: You can, sure, but I'm taking the Cessna.
XD
Please share any experience you have or questions. Although this is really expensive, I dare say it isn't unreachable for those who truly want to be able to pilot small planes (I could afford it, in theory (cash on hand plus tax return in a few months plus summer paycheck advance = good buying power), but I don't think it would be a good time to do this). Thinking long-term here!
One thing to keep in mind based on my current research: after getting licensed, owning your own plane usually doesn't pay off. Even though planes aren't that expensive if you get an older/basic model, the storage of the plane, maintenance, insurance, and gas all add up pretty quickly each month XD
edit: if I actually did it one summer (such as possibly this upcoming one) and blogged daily about the process, would that be something you would be interested in? I can justify this further if it somehow becomes educational for other people XD
I had some of those introductionary lessons before and I do plan on getting my license for small plains sooner or later. I can totally relate with that thought, planes are awesome. <333 ... Had most of my lessons in a Cessna, too. One lesson in a C 172.
When you first get into that thing you are like "WAIT WHAT THIS OH GAWD" because you see all the big nuts/screws and realize there will be not even half a centimeter of metal between you and the rest of the world. Looks scary as hell when you see it from close up at first.
The sound when the thing is started is even worse, imagine a 20 year old car with a formula 1 engine. =D ... Then you take on the headphones and if you're lucky you get an ***** instructor like I did, too. All he did was adjusting the fuel stuff, telling me what does what, told me how to start in theory, asked what does what, crossed his hands behind his head and said "Go ahead, get it in the air."
Basicly every single flight instructor (and pilot) that I know are huge, lovely jackasses when it comes to stuff like this. It's awesome.
What you do have to keep in mind about costs is that (speaking for germany here but most flight stuff is the same internationally) you have to show a certain amount of flytime per quarter or your license won't get extended and you need some extra lessons with an official instructor (70 euros / hour+) before you're allowed to fly solo again. If you're buddies with someone you can usually get away with it for free/cheap, but the cost of extending the license + some more flight lessons can add up quickly.
Owning your own plane makes no sense at all. I don't know if there is stuff like this, but in germany we have "flight clubs" (Flugvereine) where you have lots of advantages over "real" flight schools and traditional chartering.
First of all, you can get away with almost half the price (5-8k Euro compared to 10-15, depending on where you do it) and also you can rent planes for some maintenance fee+fuel cost, then leave it at the target location. This most of the time ends up being way cheaper and faster than travelling by car.
Here's a pricelist example: http://www.fliegerverein.eu/charterpreise.htm ... The 2nd row from the right shows the price for club members (250 Euro one time fee or 32 Euros / month for an advanced membership (no idea what this changes)) per hour and.. wait for it.. including insurance and taxes. ... Depending on the airport you'd like to land at you're charged between 10-25 Euros and there is usually no fee for parking.
Also those prices apply ONLY to times where the plain is actually running, that means you can e.g. charter a plane to fly from Munich to Rome, stay there for two weeks, fly back and only pay for the 2x 3h it took you for way there and back.
These clubs are rather scarce (the one I linked above is e.g. the only one in southern germany that I know of), however they usually offer distance learning and are really worth their money. (Basicly they're run by non-profit aurplane nerds.)
If you have any more questions about this stuff, feel free to shoot them. Since I don't have my license either (for me it's mostly about the time required to keep it active since it needs you to be around the same place for more than 3 months), I probably can't answer the specific stuff but I'm glad to help where I can.
tl;dr: Flying is awesome. <3
Edit: About being scared about it. Once you realize how much you have to invest to get and maintain that license you realize how few retarded people are up in the skies and get scared of driving a car. Trust me on that. =D
Edit 2: When I was around 12-15 I loved playing the old MS flight simulators and the instructor I flew with pointed out that this type of stuff really helps for getting the right feeling. All the instruments are the same and most basic concepts apply there, too. After having some lessons I can say that it's really pretty similar ('xcept all the awesome sound of course. =P) ... just pointing that out in case you ever liked that type of thing.
I figured this was worthy of finally making an account.
As a present for my confirmation many years ago, my parents got me an introductory lesson at the local airport. I took lessons in a Cessna 152 for about three years and I did my first solo flight on my 16th birthday. The lessons generally ran $100-120 for about an hour, hour and a half. I can’t immediately find the requirements of a Private Pilot’s License on the FAA site (U.S. Requirements) but it was roughly 100 flying hours, some of them had to be night flying and solo flying and cross country flights (flights greater than 50 miles if I remember correctly). You also have to complete an exam on the computer and take a flight with an FAA representative to demonstrate your competency as a pilot. I believe there are also annual requirements to maintain your license. I didn’t get my license but I did enough to solo (maybe 75 hours and passed a medical exam) and it wasn’t all that special since I was really only allowed to fly in the flight pattern of the airport (take off, fly in a circle around the airport, then land). I believe the general license that people get after their private pilots license is the IFR license or something along those lines. It stands for like Instrument Flying Requirements or something and basically means you're competent enough to fly in low visibility conditions using just the instruments in the plane.
A little bit about actually flying, it’s pretty freaking sweet. When you’re first taking off in a small plane, you’re traveling so fast that the only logical step that would come next is for the plane to just lift off the ground. It’s completely unlike flying in a commercial plane. Some random tidbits I remember about the traffic patter are when taking off from the runway, the flight path perpendicular to the runway when taking off is “crosswind”, the flight path parallel to the runway when landing is “downwind”, the flight path perpendicular to the runway when landing is “base”, and then the flight path in line with the runway after “base” is final; and then you land. One of the first things I learned with my very first instructor was how to recover from a stall. So we flew out to the practice area and flew up to maybe 5,000 feet and then we'd pull the throttle out quite a bit and put the flaps down (to simulate landing) and then pull back to bleed off the airspeed. A small alarm would then go off indicating a stall is imminent and then we'd wait for it to happen, then we'd immediately level the plane, put the flaps up and push the throttle in. It was pretty. Some boring things were like flying in circles around landmarks to demonstrate ability to maintain altitude and distance from an object; but another cool demonstration was recovery from disorientation. I would take my feet off the pedals and hands off the yoke and put on glasses that prevented me from seeing anything. The instructor would then perform a number of turns, gain or lose altitude, and mess with the controls. I would then have to take off the glasses and immediately assess what needed to be done to orient the plane and prevent a crash, whether that was giving it more or less throttle, putting the flaps up, or pulling up or down on the yoke, or dealing with the trim. I guess you could say it's like "macroing" because you need to do all these things at once to correct the plane.
My greatest advice would be to get the training hours and license as fast as possible if it's something you want to do. Like I mentioned before, I took flying lessons for three years and I had a total of four instructors. This was somewhat discouraging because you're basically going on an awesome adventure through life with your instructor where you’re learning how to FLY A FREAKING PLANE! The problem is with each new instructor, I had to keep going over the basics so the instructor knew where I was at in the process of obtaining my license. I eventually stopped because I felt I wasn’t advanced any further in my progress to getting my license and I was just burning my parents money and my last instructor was a douchebag. I attribute instructor turnover to the job not really being anyone's dream job. Sure you're helping and teaching people but they probably view it more as a stepping stone to the major airlines or private chartering.
I would love to be trained to be a pilot of any sort, but unfortunately that price to do so is really steep for me ._> I'll stick to my flying games ^>^
Maybe sometime in the future if I live in europe, as the advantages r.Evo laid out are really good, specifically the Munch to Rome one :o
I wrote about some of my flying experiences in this blog.
I'd actually recommend that you look into gliding as well. It's like flying a plane, only without the engine. I actually find gliding to be a lot more fun than flying since there is arguably more focus on the flying itself than on the side tasks that come with it.
Edit: Oh yeah, in line with what everyone else is saying, go get yourself a familiarization flight. There's no reason not to, and it'll give you a general idea of what flying in a small aircraft will be like.
Hey, I'm currently training to become a professional pilot in Finland. I don't know much about getting a licence or flying in the US, but the flight schools in your area probably offer some kind of introductory ride where you can get on a plane with an experienced instructor to get a feeling of what's it like to fly a small Cessna or Piper. They'll let you see the sights of your town from the air which could be a fun thing to do even if you don't plan to get a licence and possibly let you control the plane too for a while.
About the idea of flying instead of driving to places.. Flying without an instrument rating on a plane without the proper equipment is extremely dependent on the weather. Unless you are lucky and live somewhere with guaranteed sunshine every day of the year you won't be able to rely on flying to get anywhere. As a hobby though, flying can be the most awesome thing ever.
To r.Evo: While it's true that you only have to pay for the air time, I really really doubt a flying club would allow you to reserve one of their planes for two weeks without additional costs or restrictions. Also flying from Munich to Rome would include flying through the Alps, which with a small plane is not a small thing to achieve unless you're an experienced mountain flyer. And it's not 3 hours but more like 4+hours even if you were able to take a straight route.
I don't know of any European flying schools but I know Embry-Riddle (United States though) is an actual aeronautical university where you can get a degree in anything from aerospace engineering to the actual pilot aspects. Small airports tend to offer air rides where you pay per pound; it could be a good experience to just get up in the air, even though it'd be more of a sight seeing event rather than a lesson but it would give you an open to talk to the pilot a little. Any medium sized airport probably offers lessons. I would suggest networking to find someone who has their license since they could probably offer some good suggestions for a local flight school.
I got my helicopter private pilot license two years ago. Took me about 50 flight hours and lots of loot.
Flying is the easy part, it is memorizing all the book work that you will spend a lot of time on. But it is a joy to learn because EVERYTHING you learn within the classroom is directly applied to what you do in the air. It is an extremely rewarding and unforgettable experience.
The best part is when the instructor trusts that you have the skills and knowledge necessary to let you go out on your own...setting us free. I would make flight plans to small little airports in the middle of nowhere or go to a busy airport and go round and round with the air traffic. One time the air traffic controller got a little annoyed and asked me how much longer I was going to stay, but I was told by my instructor to make 10 approaches, so I made 10 approaches.
I was also luckily enough to go to a school near Boeing Airfield, and at night when everything was quiet, I got to land among the big big jets.
Whether you do fixed wing or rotor-craft, I wish you luck and happy flying!
Here is vid my instructor took of me the week before my final state test:
I've always thought that flying single-engined aircrafts would be amazing. You often hear people say that it is one of the greatest, most liberating feelings in the world, and I don't doubt them. Unfortunately, this is something I'll never be able to do, but I envy the people who do.
EPT
![[image loading]](http://www.austincc.edu/rblack/courses/COSC2425/_images/Cessna150.jpg)
