Groundschool-tastic!

Now this may sound a little bit strange to non-flying types, but learning how to fly doesn't just involve learning how to fly. The fun bits in the air, with sky under the bum, come at a price. This price is known as groundschool, and involves spending hours in the classroom learning about theory.

Which is what we've been up to this past week - Groundschool preparation for the 6 PPL Exams that we're taking over our first 6 weeks down here in Hamilton. Last week was the Radio Telephony multi-guess exam for which I got 96%. Luckily, my time in the RAF has prepared me for this 'academia' and it hasn't been as much of a culture shock for me as it has for some of my colleagues with little or no flying experience. This week just past was the meteorology week, and we sat the exam this morning.

Now luckily having done a degree in Geography, with some modules in Climatology/Meteorology, as well as previous flying, it has been more of a revision for me than a 'learn from scratch' job. Which meant that the 1hr10min exam this morning was completed in 15 minutes. Not sure if it'll be 100% but hopefully somewhere in the 90s.

Next week is Air Law, this one might be a little trickier, due to some differences between the UK and New Zealand. Better hit those books...

First Lesson

One week after starting at the Crew Training Centre in Hamilton, today was the big day. I would finally get the chance to get my hands on the Diamond DA-20 Katana that is to become my new office over the next 7 months. The first week had consisted of a number of groundschool lectures and general familiarisation with the Hamilton Airport and CTC operating procedures. The weather wasn't very kind either causing a number of flights to be cancelled. It's strange coming from a place where you would go flying in pretty poor weather a lot of the time to one where you need at least 16kms visibility. But this is a VFR (Visual Flight Rules) course at the moment, so it kind of makes sense to be able to see where you're going....

So, at 0914 NZST on the 19th September 2006, the flying training began with Katana SFB lauching into the skies for the first lesson in the syllabus - Effects of Controls. The weather was pretty reasonable with just a few showers dotted around and good visibility, perfect weather for learning the foundation skills essential to accurate powered flying. Learning to taxi was initially pretty amusing, trying to get used to the differential braking system used for steering. By the end of the lesson though, my instructor was grimacing less than at the start, so there must have been some sort of improvement in the driving...

Luckily much of the airborne lesson is similar to the instructing I've been doing at Kenley in gliders, and this gave the opportunity to relax a bit more and just enjoy being in the air again after what has been a bit of a break. If the weather holds out, tomorrow is lesson 2; Straight and Level 1. Oh, and more taxiing practice....

Arrival Down Under!

No matter which way you look at it, 24 hours is a long time to be continuously travelling. Singapore Flight 321 left London Heathrow at 22:15 on Wednesday 6th September and arrived in Auckland at 10:30, 2 days later. Obviously, 11 hours of that time is taken up by the time difference. Notwithstanding that fact it is still a long time to be sitting on your elbows, on an aircraft.

Luckily, Singapore Airlines is one of the best in the world, so the journey was actually pretty comfortable. Good food, good movies, and the first time that I've ever slept continously for 7 hrs on a flight. The LHR to SIN sector took 12.30 hrs and the onward flight 3hrs later bound for AKL took a further 9.

We arrived to a crisp Spring morning at Auckland, and after having our bags X-Rayed on the way out of the airport for contraband biological items, we were in the minibus for the 100km journey south to Hamilton. Apparently you're not even allowed to bring bottled water into New Zealand. Seems a bit strange to me, as I could have drunk that water on the plane containing whatever bugs it did, and then a few hours later sent it down the 'dunnie' into New Zealand's sewer system to wreak havoc on some poor unsuspecting Kiwi fruit, or whatever....

We arrived in Hamilton to a bit of a surprise, the brand spanking new accommodation for us near the airport was not quite ready yet and we would have to spend a week in some student accommodation in Hamilton town itself. A bed was a bed after the journey time, and the weekend was spent getting over the jetlag.... Or at least starting to. Waking up at 4am without an alarm clock is a somewhat bemusing experience...