Since I’m not technically in “school” anymore, I’m migrating over to a new blog called “30 West” at http://30west.flyblog.com

If you’re curious what “30 west” is, it’s basically a geographic position more or less between Europe and the United States.

Also, coincidentally where Gander Oceanic and Shanwick Oceanic meet. Anyway, go to the new blog at http://30west.flyblog.com

Leg one!

Today was pretty darned exciting.

I flew a 767-300ER from ATL to JFK with a check airman.

First of all, we were in the “E” concourse, which I’m not really all that familiar with, PLUS it’s ATL, which I’m not really that familiar with and flying to JFK which neither my captain and especially myself really aren’t that familiar with!

There are A LOT of flight attendants onboard, I was really surprised, it’s like they were everywhere and the A-line noticed that I looked a little bewildered.

She asks, “You look a little nervous!”

“Yeah! It’s uhh, my first leg of IOE and…”

“Bah!” she said, “You’ll do fine, go turn the air on, it’s hot!”

First call to ground: “Delta 192, uhh HEAVY?!? 6E…taxi with golf!”

If you were monitoring ground control, you’d have laughed your ass off because the captain was laughing in the background when I said, “HEAVY?!?”

It was a full boat to JFK, but since we weren’t carrying 12 hours of fuel, the plane was an absolute rocket ship and the captain pre-warned me that it’s going to climb like a bat out of hell…

…which it did…

We were 250 knots and 10,000 feet before I got a good grasp on what was going on.

To get a feel for the aircraft, I flew it up to cruise altitude — generally, when you’re in training, your first inclination is to turn on the autopilot and wait for the abnormal situations and system failures, but I had to remember that I’m no longer in “SimWorld”.

The IOE captain’s a very gregarious and patient guy and I especially appreciated his “we’ll talk about the crap we have to talk about during the IOE during the transcon leg tomorrow, today, just enjoy the aircraft”.

The ER, albeit not a 747-400, is BIG. The cockpit it big, the extra space plentiful and there are fold out tables, clipboards, etc to make setting up the ‘nest’ a lot easier. Hell, I was surprised of how much extra space is being the “P-61 Panel” which is a quasi ‘flight engineer panel’ behind my seat.

The FMS was a little different than the simulator, what they call a “Plugin Play” which is a lot like the standard Pegasus, but doesn’t have the GPS and there are a lot of screens and selections I decided were “DFW” so I asked lots of questions before I executed anything.

“DFW”, by the way, is pilot talk for “Don’t ‘Mess’ With”

All is find and dandy on the descent. The 767 has a very logical, low-stress autopilot and the “gotta hit 15 buttons and mess with the throttles, even though the autothrottles are on” doesn’t exist. It’s great!

The captain thought I’d get the VOR DME 22L so I briefed the approach, threw it in the box (selected the approach in the FMS) and sat back all fat and happy on the descent.

And yes, I’m feeling confident, but I’m also scared crapless because I had built such a gentlemanly familiarity with the MD-88/90 that I didn’t quite have with the 767.

Then the next thing you know: “Delta 192 heavy, turn left 360, join t he 043 radial into Canarsie, cleared VOR 13L approach”

Aroo?!

Holy cow! Get it in the box! Rebrief the approach, set up mentally for a landing. Oh, gotta hit the VNAV! 13L… Hmm.

“Follow the rabbits…Follow the rabbits” I kept thinking.

Piece of cake.. Walk in the park… All that jazz.

Final flaps, final approach speed set, it’s just a cessna at that point.

…Forget about the mad dog ‘English’ you’ve got to do…

…Smooth control inputs…

“50…”

“40…”

“30…”

“20…”

…start easing the throttles…err THRUST LEVERS back, but not all the way…

“10…”

*bump*

Speedbrakes deploy, autobrakes kick on and we’re going to roll onto intersection ZA.

“Delta 192, turn right onto 22R taxi forward, hold short of Golf, contact Jet Blue ramp”

“Jet Blue ramp? What the heck? Did we get a gate change?

I switch over on COM2… well, it’s really COM-R because there are three VHF comm radios.

“Jet Blue ramp, Delta 192, we were told to contact you”

(and this is highly paraphrased): “We in the ramp at Jet Blue would like to welcome you to New York, nice job Doug Taylor and good luck with training!”

The captain asked, “You’re that guy from that website? Oh, this is going to be good:”

“Yeah Jet Blue, he ain’t done yet!”

I can’t remember the rest, but I’d like to thank the guys in the ramp tower for the warm welcome to JFK!

We continued taxiing into the gate and it certainly felt strange with how high I was sitting and trying to think about wingtip clearances taxiing into a narrow alleyway, but it all worked out!

This is going to be absolutely sweet.

I love the jet, love the operation and it feels great being on the serving end instead of the receiving end of wake turbulence!

More tomorrow!

I guess I forgot to make the last entry. So here goes.

The last day of LRN was a lot like the first, however we added some complex departures (Zurich) coupled with abnormals (heavyweight V1-go’s) and trans-Atlantic track changes.

What I’ll do when I finally do an international trip is walk you through the process of how we do things. It’s a lot (I mean A LOT) different than you’d expect!

Today is the start of my domestic IOE.

Tonight, we fly ATL-JFK

Tuesday: JFK-SFO

Wednesday: SFO-JFK

Thursday: JFK-MCO-ATL and then we’re done.

I’ll check in periodically to let you know how everything goes!

Long Range Navigation.

I’m already type rated (fully! not the cheesy first officer type either) in the 757/767 so today was my first day of LRN (long-range navigation) training and there’s A LOT of crap that goes on during Atlantic crossings.

I’m so lost, Im’ not even sure where to start but I’ve already got my IOE schedule.

Remember, I’m doing to do a domestic IOE and then two trans-Oceanic IOES. (AKA ‘TOE’)

My domestic IOE goes like this:

Day 1:
ATL-SFO

Day 2:
SFO-JFK

Day 3:
JFK-ATL
ATL-MCO
MCO-ATL

Then I have four Atlantic crossings that go like:

CVG-CDG
Layover for 48 hours
CDG-CVG

Then
JFK-MAD
Layover
MAD-JFK

I’m more exciting than you can possibly realize. Far more than that!

I had along entry typed about about my LOE (Line Oriented Evaluation) typed out, but my mac decided to take a dump on me and I didn’t save it, and it’s gone. I’m sure Lloyd and Kellwolf are getting a kick out of this because I’m such a Mac.Weenie.

Anyway, it more or less was a long, drawn-out speech about knowing your shit and not having to rely on your crewmember to hold your hand because he might be too busy to do so. Also, look at the ‘big picture’.

Long story short, I went first, got my type rating and then served as the full-qualified/typed pilot for the captain’s checkride.

Then some more random rantings about being positive about my employer’s future, et al.

Dangit, wish I hadn’t lose that posting. It was good.

Well, today was more of the same. Except I apparently work for a ’solvent’ carrier with a goofy new paint scheme.

I’m not a fan. It looks like we’re a Canadian airline… And the widget’s red! “Widget, back in the red again!” — I can hear the jokes on Leno already.

Anyway, tomorrow is the LOE at which upon successful completion I will receive a 757/767 pilot-in-command type rating.

More tomorrow!

I got my Central/South America “Mountaing Training” certification done.

We basically flew ‘hi speed’ thru the Cuban sector, learning about how to make position reports, talked about communications, how to program the FMS and such and went pretty far in depth with theater navigation in mountainous terrain.

For example, if you have a rapid depressurization, you just don’t start diving for 10,000 feet because you’re going to solve that pressurization problem quickly with controlled flight into terrain.

And that would be bad.

Anyway, on some routes in Central/South America, namely Bogota which we flew to today, there are route segments which have a corresponding alternate route to a diversionary airport with step down altitudes that will allow us to descend to a breathable altitude and remain clear of terrain.

Also, we trained a lot of RNAV/RNP approaches in Quito, Ecuador which you conduct curving approaches and missed approaches thru mountain valleys into a ‘bowl’ of sorts where the airport sits. We also did a lot of engine-out work in Quito as well, learning that the schoolhouse method of “request a straight out!!” during V1 cuts is the LAST thing you want to do in many circumstances. We did two-engine and single-engine arrivals and approaches into Quito, Ecuador and Bogota, Columbia.

Bogota is interesting because you’ve got to pre-tune two NDB’s and do a “figure 8″ climb. Hit a NDB, turn right, head to another one, turn left, back to the other one, slowly climbing to 13,000 before heading to the Bogota VORTAC.

The instructor kept the brief short because without actually seeing the procedures in the simulator, you’d feel like a dog watching “Jeopardy!” on television.

Anyway, I learned some important things. Not to step on any toes, but in Central and South America, you’re more or less on your own and ATC relies on the “fact” that you know exactly where you are, what the weather is and if you request a turn straight to the marker and a descent far, FAR below your sector altitude, they’ll reply with “Roger!” so ***situational awareness*** is life. You more or less lose it and you’re absolutely toast like the American Airlines 757 that crashed.

We did some of the curving arrivals/approaches into Quito, Ecuador in IMC/night. Then we flew it in day VMC and that solidified the point that you need to know not only where you are, where you’re going next and the navigation performance of the aircraft because when you’re flying a narrow valley on arrival, yanking and banking towards the final approach course, if screw up, you’re going to certainly make the evening news.

Ok, today was a lot like yesterday. “Real world” “Real time” emergencies where we takeoff from one airport, have a problem and end up diverting into another airport and taking care of the problem.

Probably the best highlight I had today was going on the missed approach in Portland, OR and then the weather miraculously cleared up, with the “help” of the captain, I slightly misjudged my base turn for 28R and flew the 767-300ER like an MD-88 to get back on profile.

I landed, we taxied into the gate and I thought, “Oh yeah, it’s a 767 ‘heavy’” I probably shouldn’t be yanking and banking the way I’d do an MD-88, but the instructor didn’t have anything to say.

Speaking of not much to say, I guess I’ll tell you a little about sim training…

It’s called the ‘brief’ the ’sim’ and the ‘de-brief’

First, our sim times are divided into “periods” A thru E. We rarely fly E’s, except I think for new hires and when they rent out the sim to other airlines. They go like this:

A Period: Brief 0500 Simulator 0630-1030
B Period: Brief 0920 Simulator 1050-1450
C Period: Brief 1340 Simulator 1510-1910
D Period: Brief 1800 Simulator 1930-2330
E Period: Brief 2220 Simulator 2350-0350

When I was a 727 Flight Engineer, I had a lot of “D” and “E” periods. E periods in ATL and D periods in Miami which was great because I’m a nightowl and I could fly in the night, enjoy a beer or three after the simulator with my sim partner in Coconut Grove, sleep in, brief early by the pool with the instructor, take a nap and hit the sims that evening.

This time training on the 757/767, I had a week of “C” periods, a week of “D” periods and now I have a week of “A” periods which are kicking my ass having to get up so early on the east coast.

Speaking of that, I’ve got to hit the sack very soon so I’ll wrap it up.

“The Brief”
Before every simulator, there’s a “brief”. It’s where we sit for about 90 minutes talking about what we’re going to see in the simulator and other emphasis items. Like tomorrow, we’re doing RNAV RNP approaches into Bogota, Columbia, departing from Atlanta. So we’ll spend lot of time talking about RNP, what to do when you can’t meet the minimum navigation performance, what to do DIFFERENT when you’ve got to go missed and various items about ‘hot ‘n high’ operations.

“The Sim”
Pretty self-explanatory. You get to go flying in SimWorld. The strange world where the quality of your landings mean nothing, but if you didn’t brief the living daylights out of a visual approach you’re going to hear about it during the…

“Debrief”
Basically, you talk about (or are talked TO) your performance, critiqued on procedures, things to work on and you receive a few ’slaps on the wrist’, a few ‘attaboys’ and whatnot. At that point, we’re usually both exhausted and the only thing on our minds after an “A” period is lunch, sleep and how the hell we’re going to keep any interest in studying for the next day of simulator training.

Speaking of sleep.

There’s a light at the end of the tunnel and we’re both pretty happy training is almost over.

Today was the first day of “Line Oriented Training” where we tie together normal procedures (preflights, cockpit prep, taxi procedures) that we learned in “Procedures Training” with non-normal procedures (abnormal aka “holy sh**, something’s BROKE!!!) trained during “Maneuvers Training” and make it as if it actually happened unexpected on line.

The first leg was my leg and the captain was the non-flying pilot. Pushback from gate 4 at JFK, taxi to KK for a intersection takeoff and then the fun started. Smoke in the cabin, cargo fire, rapid/emergency descent for the ILS 31L approach at JFK. Very busy, but the 757 is so flyable, it wasn’t an issue at all.

We did another takeoff and practiced jammed flight controls, hydraulic system failures and a few other things.

The next leg was a departure from SEA towards SLC, we had a rapid depressurization over a high MEA/MOCA area and did some mountain familiarization training in terms of descending rapidly to the ‘grid MORA’ and then direct to a known airway with better terrain clearance. We did a couple jammed stabilizer and partial flap landings and called it a day.

The hardest part of the day was getting up at 0345 for a 0500 brief and 0630 fly time in the simulator. Yowza.

I guess I never got around to writing the latest update on my progress, doh!

A few nights ago I completed my “maneuvers validation” which is another part of the AQP process.

The flight consisted of V1 cuts, flight control abnormals, low visibility approaches, autoland approaches, visuals (which are harder than it seems like) and a litany of other system malfunctions.

I guess I didn’t read the fine print and didn’t realize that I was going to have to ‘play captain’ for an aborted takeoff, a v1 cut (go? no go?) decision, an evacuation, getting left 3000 feet AGL abeam the airport and shooting a visual approach with no electronic or VASI/PAPI guidance. Also, I had to taxi around the airport as well to certify that I could follow taxi instructions, make 90 degree turns, and have a good understanding of the position of the airplane and to make sure I wouldn’t drag a landing gear truck through the grass.

All went well I’m glad to report.

In fact, the examiner was the head of 757/767 standards so you could say we didn’t get any breaks.

Thursday, I fly back to Atlanta and start the final phase of training at which at the end I receive a 757/767 Type Rating if all goes well.

Thanks for reading.