Lets have a think tank on improving flight instruction.

[Hedley]

TOTG wrote:

I most certainly produced better pilots at the end of my full time instructing career. Would I have produced better pilots if I had 1000 hours before I started instructing. You bet.

People who are now looking to start receiving
flight instruction, carefully re-read the above.

Would you hire an inexperienced plumber, or
electrician, or lawyer or doctor?

Insist on an experienced instructor at your
FTU. You are the customer, and FTU's think
that you should pay the same for an inexperienced
instructor as for an experienced instructor. Ok,
for the same price, choose the experienced
instructor. Buy into their rhetoric.

[Big Pistons Forever]

I do not think there is anything wrong with a 250 hr CPL/QFI newbie instructing for the PPL. If they are properly supervised then there is no reason they will not turn out competant PPL's. The real issue in my opinion is training for the CPL. This is a professional license and therefore the teaching should be done by professionals, hence my contention that training for the CPL should be done by folks that have a minimum of 500hrs PIC flying the line in a commercial (non FTU) operation. What a lot of aspiring CPL's do not seem to realise is the operator is not providing an airplane for the flying pleasure of the pilot. He is supplying an airplane to a customer who wants safe and efficent travel. That should be the aim of CPL training, and frankly IMO can only be truly understood by someone who has done some real time as a line pilot.

[quicksilver]

rant

[MichaelP]

I agree that a person with line flying experience is a bonus in flight training, but I don't think I have done a bad job of preparing students for the real world of aviation... Many of my students have thanked me for the training I gave, after they got into that real world and found that the fundamentals of staying alive at the basic training level do apply to the 'real' world as well.

Teach it right first time...

Yesterday the 737-400 broke off the 36 ILS to circle to land on 18.
There was an 18 knot wind from the SW... There are mountains in that direction and there was some turbulence.
The aircraft was low and close turning base and then to a short final. It never did get properly stabilised... The buildings were very close as the aircraft rolled left and right, perhaps due to turbulence, probably because the pilot overshot the centreline.
We were low, too low, the approach was very very dangerous, and I'd love to have been up front to sort it out.
Instead I was in the back with the passengers, many with astonished looks on their faces.

I don't fly Boeing 737's but hand flown to a visual landing it is an aeroplane like any other aeroplane and basic rules have to be followed.

It's a bonus being a line pilot and then teaching students, but the fundamentals are important to everyone.

I have to phone the airline concerned, I have to make my instructor's report, maybe I'll save a few lives...
That approach was too dangerous, there's a pilot who needs basic training.

Postscript:

I wrote to the airline as follows:

I was on ***Air ****** yesterday afternoon.
I am a pilot with in excess of 6,000 hours and I teach people to fly.
Yesterday the aircraft approached Chiang Mai via the 36 ILS and then circled for runway 18.
I cannot sleep at night unless I furnish your flight department with my impressions of the visual approach flown.
The passengers were astonished, it scared them, and what do they know?.
For me, as a pilot, it scared me too, I considered the approach to have been very dangerous.
The aircraft was low on the base leg which was also in my opinion too close to the runway.
The aircraft was too low when turning finals. I do not expect to see buildings that close when the aircraft is in a bank.
The aircraft was not stabilised on the approach at all.
The pilot had not allowed himself enough room nor enough time to stabilise the aircraft and assess the effects of turbulence and the crosswind.
There was no further room for error, no room at all for an engine failure. The throttles were continuously going up and down.
The landing itself was OK.
Looking at the windsock there was a wind from the south west at around 18 knots.
There was some mechanical turbulence from the high ground in that direction.

I like *** Air, but worry sometimes at the taxy speeds, the 'hurry factor'... I know the block times are to be kept to a minimum... The hurry factor may be a reason for this pilot to get the aeroplane on the ground as quick as possible without taking the time to set the final approach up properly.
I worry that the crews do not get enough training.
Doing a visual approach should not be a difficult thing, and this particular approach concerned me enough to write this note to you.
I would prefer *** Air to not have an accident. In my opinion ****** came very close to having an accident 8th April 2008.

Please deliver the above to the chief pilot in confidence.

[trey kule]

I agree that a person with line flying experience is a bonus in flight training, but I don't think I have done a bad job of preparing students for the real world of aviation... Many of my students have thanked me for the training I gave, after they got into that real world and found that the fundamentals of staying alive at the basic training level do apply to the 'real' world as well.

I agree with you Micheal. It seems that there are many who say how nice it would be to have 1000's of hours of line experience...without any real evidence to support it. If one looks at the objectives of PPL training in particular, I see no reason why it can not be done properly by an the present day instructor.

The problem, and I keep coming back to this, is the instructors are simply, in many cases, not doing their job properly, either through ignorance or inexperience, or, as I keep harping on it, because they are not being properly supervised and monitored (tried to make this seem like less on an "English" dressing down)

Those instructers that do a good job, few as they may be, do a good jpb. The problem is there are many instructors out there who think that they are doing a good job because their students pass.....and forget that they took hours and hours more than necessary (and money to the student) to accomplish the deed.

My plan is to instruct when I retire in a couple of years. Will be interesting to see if all my "real world" experience will make better pilots.

[Hedley]

I see that many think that it is ok for an inexperienced
instructor to teach private students.

In my experience as CFI at three different schools over
the decades, an experienced instructor should be able
to get someone solo around 10 hours of dual. Perhaps
a bit less sometimes, depending upon circumstances.

But then I see inexperienced instructors, going around
and around the pattern with frustrated students at 30
hours, and they still haven't gone solo yet.

Is that ok, too? Is the customer getting good value
for his money, by flying with an inexperienced instructor,
who is learning to teach on the student's dime?

[trey kule]

Well Hedley., I will choose to debate the issue.

If it takes about 10 hours to solo a student, with which I totally agree, where the hell was the CFI when students were motoring around with an instructor at 30 hours? Why wasnt the CFI monitoring things and having a chat with the instructor at 15 hours? Reviewing with instructor how to teach properly. I read things on here by instructors that if I were their CFI I wold be going ballistic on them.

It is great to say that it is instructors inexperience but without the CFI doing their job properly, this kind of situation will happen. If the instructor just does not get it, then time for them to look at other career options...or as our industry works, move to another flight school.

[Hedley]

where the hell was the CFI

Probably out on a charter trip, building multi time. Or somewhere,
anywhere else. If you scratch many FTU's today, I think you'll
find many of them have absentee or weak CFI's.

I read things on here by instructors that if I were their CFI
I wuold be going ballistic on them

See above. Yes, you have to wonder about the effectiveness
of many of today's FTUs given that their students have to
come to an anonymous internet website to get answers.

If the instructor just does not get it, then time for them to look at other career options

That's too drastic a response. Most of the time, the
inexperienced instructor has only one way to teach
something, and if that one way doesn't work, he
teaches it the same way again, and if the student
still doesn't get it, well ...

With an inexperienced instructor, generally what
happens is that the student teaches himself to
fly, and hopefully the inexperienced instructor
stops the student from killing himself during
the process. If the student isn't able to teach
himself how to fly, well, there you are at 30
hours, going around and around in the circuit.

I shall be excreted upon from a great height
for uttering this truth in public, but a great deal
of learning about flight occurs without an instructor.

As an example, almost all of the great pilots
are self-taught. For example, who taught
George Beurling, Canada's greatest fighter
pilot of the last 90 years, to shoot? Clearly
not the air force.

The most difficult maneuvers I have ever
performed in an aircraft (eg surface level
outside loop in line abreast formation) no
one taught me anything about it. I asked
around everywhere I could think of, no one
WOULD teach me anything about it, so I
had to teach myself how to do it.

Welcome to aviation.

[Big Pistons Forever]

In a perfect world everyone would get the benefit of an extremely experienced instructor from the ab initio, however I think the industry needs to provide oportunities for new pilots. My first job as a commercial pilot was as a Class 4 QFI. None of my students took 30 hours to solo and I think I turned out safe competant PPL's. However I worked for a well established school with an excellent CFI and generally high standards. The problem of CFI's not doing their job is a completely different issue and IMO should not be solved by demanding all instructors have high levels of experience and therefore by extension can function with a poor/absent CFI. Going back to my earlier post I feel strongly that we must acknowledge the difference between the PPL and CPL and insist on higher standards for instructors of professional qualifications.

[Hedley]

In a perfect world everyone would get the benefit of an
excellent CFI and generally high standards.

However, there aren't many excellent class 2's
let alone class 1's available. They're all either
retired boomers or young guys, trying as hard
as they can to get out of flight instruction.

Why on earth would an excellent class 2 or 1
instructor want to stay in flight instruction,
given the alternatives available to him?

[MichaelP]

The most difficult maneuvers I have ever performed in an aircraft (eg surface level outside loop in line abreast formation) no one taught me anything about it.

You 'deathinately' have a death wish there Hedley!
I've known some of the best pilots ever who died doing stupid things... The only thing about the above manoeuvre that the crowd will appreciate would be the closeness of flaming red jam on the runway.
Personally I don't want to be there to see it!

I also did aerobatic air displays, but the aerobatics I did were flowing and accurate to display the aeroplane properly. I did not do competition style aerobatics at airshows.
Some of the things I have seen were bloody dangerous, some of the people I saw in those days are dead now.
I am lucky to be an old pilot while having been somewhat bold in my past.

As to flight training...
The approach of that 737 was very bad, something I'd expect from a presolo student given a PFL from the downwind, not something I'd expect from a properly trained and qualified air transport pilot... But perhaps that airline pilot had never learned the fundamentals.
I see a change for the worse here in Thailand.
The Asian thing of no loss of face, nobody fails, no discipline... Whereas the chief pilot at SGA, who himself is Thai, said at our C208B groundschool that there was no place for the 'Thai way' in the cockpit, I see a strong resurgence in that way.
It's a shame, but especially up here in the north, the foreign pilots and instructors have given us all a bad name.

Then there was the experience I had in China. Beijing Pan Am with instructors from many nationalities... The quality was variable, the best were the europeans, the worst were american. The australians were genrally a good bunch as were the kiwis.
The American way is not the best way, definately not.
It is easy to learn in the USA, a country set up well for what we do, even the weather in many places is excellent.
The facilities in the USA allow for the lowest common denominator to fly somewhat safely...
Try to do what they can do in the USA in many parts of the world and there's disaster in the wings.
Standards have to be higher, a lot higher, in Asia where there are not the facilities afforded the americans.
Where good piloting ability will save the day.

So here's the thing...
I do not think it is a bad thing if a class IV takes 30 hours to send a student solo... The class IV has to learn.
But that 30 hours of learning should not be done with one student!
It is for the CFI to ensure that the school is run properly, and the students are properly catered to.
Regular progress checks should be made to sort the students and the instructors problems out.
No student should reach 30 hours before solo if that student is otherwise capable.
The student should be transfered to another more competent instructor or taken on by the CFI until this important stage has passed.

In the end we have to ensure that the students get quality training.
The students we have now are the instructors of the future.
Instructors are trained to meet the TC flight test requirement, and they then revert back to the way they themselves were trained.
If they were first trained well, then they will teach well.

Discipline is fundamental to the future of flight training.
Well disciplined students who have a somewhat professional outlook to their recreational PPL flight training will be better instructors in the future.

I myself came under some criticism during my flight training... I could have been ejected from Exeter Flying Club if I put a foot wrong!
Fancy sending a student away!
But that sort of attitude on the part of the instructional team meant that fewer fools were trained at that time.
The discipline I learned then has kept me alive until now...
I still make mistakes; to err is human.

[Cat Driver]

I get a lot of PM's and this one pretty well outlines the flight instructors plight in Canada.

The author of this has agreed to allow me to post it with his/her name deleted.

What will improve instructing? First how about just start with a salary that is legal in Canada. If I were a bottle collector on the street I would have made more money than I did instructing. Maybe if I made enough money to live, instead of rapidly increasing my mountain of debt, I would have stayed an instructor for longer. Right around the point I became a quality instructor I was applying anywhere to get out, you know so I could pay for my groceries and all. Over the last 20 years the cost of everything in the flight training industry has shot through the roof, the only cost a training unit can control is how hard they stiff the employees that bring in the bacon. Second, and I'm not sure if this is congruent with every school or club, start treating your instructors with respect. I worked a lot of jobs before getting into aviation and instructing, never ever in my life was I treated worse than I was when I was instructing. I don't mean by the customers, they treated me fine, I mean by the owners and managers. If I worked my fingers to the bone or dragged my heals I was treated with the same level of NO respect. Which is really unbelievable, because these people don't get paid a penny unless instructors are busting there ass. So you would think it would be in their best interest to treat us well. They get away with this for the same reason that people can get away paying someone 14K a year to fly a navajo, because no matter how many people say no there will always be someone else that will say yes.

You want to improve instructing, how about you start talking UNION . I loved finishing a 12 hour day, maybe I flew for 4 (which means I was paid for 4 of 12 hours. Somedays would be longer some shorter) and walking out to my piece of crap car wondering if it had enough gas to get me home, and counting the number of days left to pay day trying to figure out how many hours I would HAVE to fly that month to be able and pay rent. Wondering what I was going to eat, answering my phone only when I recognize the number (collectors are a call'n).... Ahh the life of an instructor. All that while I watch as my employer hops in there brand new vehicle and drive off without even a wave.

Not a pretty picture is it?