To get a glimpse of what a commuter pilot new-hire born in the 1940s can expect, this author trained with a class of pilots being inducted into Great Lakes Aviation Ltd., a United Express airline.
Great Lakes flies an extensive fleet of Beech 1900D turboprops, serving ports of call such as North Platte, Nebraska; Traverse City, Michigan; and Telluride, Colorado, from hubs in Denver and Chicago.
The journey to a regional airline job begins with the interview.
I am in Spencer, Iowa. The cheery receptionist welcomes me, hands me two stapled documents, and directs me to a table under the din of fluorescent lights. Another applicant about 30 years my junior is already seated there. He smiles thinly, then buries his head back into the same two quizzes that I am about to take.
The first is a personality inventory test. You know-the kind of test that makes you wonder if you are some kind of deviant. The second is an airman knowledge test of sorts covering the gamut from the federal aviation regulations (FARs) to pilot judgment. Let's see. The flashing red light from the tower means....The five hazardous attitudes are....After a cordial interview with the director of training who probes my aviation experiences, drops a few technical questions, and engages in a good dose of male bonding, I am invited to join a new-hire class.
For the individual launching a pilot career, no matter what the age or experience level, preparation for the cockpit at a regional airline generally consists of several stages: basic indoctrination; aircraft systems and procedures; airplane simulator; and airplane training. My program at Great Lakes spans nearly two months.
It is the first week. I say good-bye to my bride of 24 years and trek to my new home for "indoc:" the Cheyenne, Wyoming, Holiday Inn.
The following morning in the hotel lobby, I see about 25 college students milling about. I leave for the designated meeting place: a former community college facility at the Cheyenne Airport which serves as the company's digs for corporate business and ground school.
As I nestle into a place in the classroom, I am stunned to see the same collegians from the Holiday Inn filling chairs around me. These are fresh-faced, Generation X future United Express pilots. I feel ancient.
I scan the collection of fairly recent graduates from the University of North Dakota, Winona State, Kansas State, and other aviation schools and universities who have acquired anywhere from 300 to 800 hours primarily as CFIs. I see no more than five who could be over 30. They include a mid-fortyish money manager, a former United Airlines flight attendant and ex-school teacher, a first officer from another regional airline, a general aviation pilot who just has the bug to fly for the airlines, and a Boeing 747 ground instructor at United. The remaining members of the mostly male class look more like fraternity pledges than airline captains in the making.
There is a saying in the airlines that training for a pilot position is much like drinking from a fire hose. For the next week, the man at the fire hydrant is Jason, a Great Lakes line pilot and instructor. He begins the drenching by distributing two thick manuals-the Flight Operations Manual (FOM) and the Flight Standards Manual (FSM). These are accompanied by what appears to be seven pounds of handout materials.
From 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, Jason aims the nozzle of that fire hose directly toward the gray matter of his students. Here are just a few samples of what the brain is expected to absorb: corporate structure; NTSB accident reporting regulations; hazardous materials rules; aircraft security; bomb threat procedures; fueling policies; deicing practices; evacuation; prisoner escort; minors on flights; ground handling; flight operations; FAR 121; FAA-approved operations specifications.
I begin to believe the regulations that govern airline operations were devised by asylum inmates. Attempting to decipher rest rules, oxygen requirements, and air carrier alternate requirements is right up there with trying to translate the tax code.
The only way to sort it all out and retain it is to study, study, study. For the entire week, I am in a time warp. New York could have slipped into the Hudson Bay and I would not have known. Every minute from 6 p.m. until bedtime near midnight is dedicated to processing the information and preparing for the next morning's quiz.
At the start of each class day, Jason passes out a quiz on the previous day's subject matter. Ultimately, each student faces the much-feared Basic Indoctrination Final Examination-a two-hour multi-page test. If you fail, you might be sent packing.
The Sunday before the big test, the hotel atrium is littered with cliques of students pounding each other with a barrage of questions in preparation for the final exam. The day of reckoning arrives. We all pass.
That night, my significantly junior classmates and I toast our good fortune in a local drinking establishment. Age is no factor. We are all in this together. But the brief oasis of celebration comes to an abrupt halt the next day as we begin Beech 1900D systems training.
For another week, a second instructor, Eric, force-feeds us minutia on propeller governors, fuel systems, landing gear, pressurization, electrical buses, power sources, EFIS equipment, oxygen supplies, performance data, and more federal aviation regulations. Diagram after diagram is projected on the screen, each looking more like a blood vessel chart of the human body than a mechanical system. Each schematic is a maze of lines, valves, motors, and pumps. Just as with "indoc," each night is spent attempting to absorb and process the avalanche of data presented in that day's class.
Concurrently, the student must memorize no fewer than 160 Beech 1900 limitations and speeds and become intimate with 47 checklists.
Somehow, this absent-minded aviator who cannot remember where he set down his reading glasses is able to recall enough to pass yet another brutal exam.
Great Lakes' training involves both simulator and airplane experience. Because of the crush of new pilots, captain upgrades, and proficiency checkrides, it is almost a month before I see the Beech 1900 simulator at Denver's Centennial Airport. In the meantime, I daily review scads of index cards, trying to keep the information swimming in my head from escaping through my ears.
After checking into yet another motel on a Monday for a five-day stretch, my training partner, Rich, and I meet our simulator instructor, Dave.
Each day, the five-hour simulator briefing begins at 1 p.m. Dave pours procedures into our brains, explains flows, drills us on emergency action items, reviews limitations, and quizzes us on performance. When we are just about drained, we enter the simulator for a four-hour session ending at 10 p.m.
The machine is ultra-sensitive. That first night, I feel as though I am tap-dancing on top of a basketball. I am perspiring simply keeping the "airplane" within 400 feet of my assigned altitude.
As the sessions progress, more and more flight garbage is hurled at us: V-1 cuts; pressurization failures; engine fires; single-engine missed approaches; instrument glitches; landing gear problems; propeller overspeeds; low engine oil pressure; on and on. All of this mayhem takes place, of course, while shooting NDB approaches or otherwise trying to keep the airplane upright in instrument conditions. There is no autopilot.
I feel so far behind the simulator that I consider surrendering my pilot certificate to the FAA. I am astonished when Dave recommends me for the next step-airplane training.
My 15 hours of airplane dual are spread thin over a month and four instructors. Because of the backlog of pilots awaiting the one training airplane based in Spencer, I spend endless hours in the motel. In one stretch, I wait nine days before flying a two-hour mission at 1 a.m. with thunderstorms bearing down in three of four quadrants. In that flight, we fly to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to dance with all of the approaches.
Once in the airplane, I find it is a veritable tank compared to the simulator: stable, powerful, and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.
The airplane sessions are intense. Each flight, conducted mostly after midnight or in gale force crosswinds, sees every conceivable simulated anomaly and failure. Flying the airplane is not much more difficult than piloting a Seneca on steroids, but being able to execute Great Lakes' procedures when things start falling apart is a steep challenge.
Finally, the director of training says, "We can offer you a flight officer position." Mission accomplished.
Though I have yet to don the uniform, I can say that I made it to the cockpit of an airliner. If I can do it, you can do it. However, if you pursue this goal as a late-lifer, be mindful of the energy and anxiety spent in earning the instrument rating. Multiply that by 50 and you will have some idea of the kind of mental and physical investment it will take to make it with a regional airline.
After all of this, you will start flying the line at a paltry $15.50 per flight hour. You will sweat as you carry a load of ice to the middle marker; you will be subjected to the verbal abuse of unappreciative passengers, and you will try to keep a loving relationship together even though you are living out of motels 20 days of the month. All this and more can be had for a base guarantee of $1,200 or $1,400 per month to start, plus overtime.
If you're still motivated, then apply. Search out airline Web sites. Talk with airline pilots. Read the trade magazines. The time is right.
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