Preflight

An experience pilots never forget

Each year, when the AOPA Flight Training team is putting together this annual Learn to Fly issue, I'm tempted to reach for my first logbook, blow the dust off its cover, and re-read some of its earliest entries. It's always interesting to see what's changed--and what hasn't.

"8/17/89, Cessna 152 68266, 5W5-Local. Familiarization, 4 Fundamentals, Taxi Procedures." R.L. Tidrick signed off the lesson: 0.6 hours of ground instruction, 0.6 hours of flying time, and one landing.

Although it's been nearly 20 years, I still remember that morning well. August in North Carolina is hot and hazy, and instructional flights were most comfortably undertaken first thing in the morning. I worked up a sweat going through the preflight with Ralph--of course, in weather like that you could work up a sweat standing in the shade. Sometimes I wonder about the 0.6-hour duration of the flight, but then I recall the sensory overload I felt that morning--even though I'd flown frequently in small airplanes before my first lesson. I learned that there was a pretty big difference between riding along and actually flying.

At the time, Triple-W Airpark in Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina, was a busy little general aviation airport. The fixed-base operator had two Cessna 152s and a 172 for training, there was a busy maintenance shop, and a variety of aircraft came and went. Yet there seldom was more than one airplane in the pattern, so you could keep your patterns in tight to the runway--my logbook shows as many as 10 or 11 touchdowns during one hour of landing practice, a rate I've never been able to match elsewhere. Sadly, a flood devastated much of the airport during the 1990s, and from conversations with other pilots who flew there, the airport never totally recovered.

What do you remember about your first flying lesson? E-mail me your recollections and perhaps we'll publish them in a future issue of the magazine.

Beginning pilots today have many more options when they learn to fly. For decades, the private pilot was the only entry-level pilot certificate; now, new pilots can choose. The recreational pilot certificate offers fewer privileges, but it also requires less training to earn. Some flight schools--notably Sporty's Academy, the Batavia, Ohio, flight school affiliated with Sporty's Pilot Shop--promote this certificate aggressively. At Sporty's Academy, students become recreational pilots first, even if they're aspiring airline pilots enrolled in the aviation program at the adjacent University of Cincinnati-Clermont County. This gives them a more easily achievable goal, and the new pilots can then take family members and friends flying as they progress to the private and commercial certificates.

As the newer sport pilot certificate becomes more widely available, it may add a new entry to aviation that could be achieved even more quickly--with the added benefit that an FAA airman medical certificate is not required. (As you might expect, it confers fewer privileges on the pilot than a private or recreational certificate, and you'll need to obtain a medical if you move on to one of those certificates.) Arlynn McMahon, chief instructor at Aero-Tech in Lexington, Kentucky, writes about her experience offering sport pilot training (see "Instructor Report: Embracing Sport Pilots," p. 71).

While Aero-Tech has not yet graduated a started-from-scratch sport pilot, ultralight pilots who transitioned to sport pilot have come back for additional training toward a private pilot certificate, McMahon said. To learn more about the sport pilot certificate, see AOPA Online.

Oh, and let's not overlook glass-cockpit technology. Some students are choosing to learn in state-of-the-art aircraft, and it's not just those who have set their sights on the cockpit of a modern jet airplane (although many flight academies and aviation colleges are moving toward all-glass fleets).

At press time we were pleased to learn that Michael G. Gaffney, president and chief flight instructor at Skyline Aeronautics, which he owns and operates along with his wife at Spirit of St. Louis Airport in suburban St. Louis, Missouri, was named the 2007 national Certificated Flight Instructor of the Year.

Gaffney is the author of "Glass Class," our six-part series on transitioning into a glass-cockpit airplane; part two is in this issue (see "Glass Class: Bump, Scroll, and Twist," p. 32, and the accompanying multimedia online. Look for more on all four national general aviation award winners in next month's issue.