iPods on my Flight Deck

March 13, 2010

Mother has just sent me a ping on Flightdesk.  Seems another flight officer candidate - aka “nugget” - is coming on board next Thursday.  My inflow of nuggets has been steadily increasing and more and more part of my job involves converting them from candidates into Flight Officers.   In my world a candidate doesn’t become a flight officer until they demonstrate that they can fly and navigate this ship without impinging on the system nor spilling any passenger’s drinks.  My job is to help make that transition happen.  And not that I mind either.  I’m enjoying  teaching and orienting these newbies to the wonders of jet navigation.  A lot of them are not bad pilots.  But many of them are coming to the line right out of flight school.  These kids have been flying slow piston aircraft - with some time in faster turboprop aircraft - but most haven’t had much time in jets yet.   

And there’s the rub.  At jet speed everything happens much faster, and it’s real easy to blow a mental fuse if you don’t stay ahead of your aircraft.  The key is to always always always think at least one or two steps ahead of your aircraft and your flight plan and always be prepping to what’s going to happen next.  Always be thinking about what your next move is going to be.  And there’s a whole lot of staring at the dashboard in order to make sure this happens properly and exactly.  That’s the “sheer boredom” part of flying that Ernest K. Gann discusses at length in his wonderful book Fate is the Hunter.  We see a lot of it.  Especially when on cruise at altitude.   

One nugget I could tell was getting bored on a long 130DME leg between VOR stations.  At one point he turns to me and asks… “so what do we do when we’re just on cruise?”  

“We stare at the dashboard and watch the little numbers change.  We pay attention to what’s going on with the aircraft and our position.”  

A slight pause.  “Ah” comes the reply with a definite note of disappointment.   “So I can’t listen to my IPod then, right?” 

Really?  You have to ask?    Fortunately I didn’t say the quiet part out loud this time. 

But mostly these new guys are really dedicated and just want to learn and be the best pilots they can.  So we fly.  A lot.  Spokane, Denver, Casper, Aspen, Salt Lake, Seattle, Vancouver, Spokane, Boston, Portland, Bradley, JFK, Nantucket, Bangor, Syracuse, Albany - out and back, out and back, back and forth.  Lather rinse repeat.   When you’re done with that, go back and fly some more.

I don’t think Candidate IPod is going to make it.