Unsung hero's, the real flight instructors.

[rayban]

Just curious to know what actual working pilots out there think of flight instructors as new hires into 703 or 704 ops.

It seems to me that the real "instructors" out there are guys and gals doing line indocs on newbies and flying the line with them until they know what they are really doing. I think quality top of the line flight instructors are very few and far between. Most of the time flight training is performed by the people with the least experience in the industry whereas most other industries allow only experienced people to train new people.

I once overheard someone say, in relation to flight instructors, does he have 1000 hrs or the same hour 1000 times?

Food for thought.

[Tubthumper]

I'm not hungry.



... and I thought it was going to be an interesting topic.

[7kcabfun]

Well Ray tell you what, I will go get 10,000 hours in a jet and some real experience then you can pay me $150 per hour and don't forget the FTU's cut of 25 per hour. Then if you like we can also do all of your training in a glass cockpit SR22 G3 @ 330 per hour. What I have seen is that most of these newbies you seem to be so against teaching have superior stick and rudder skills when compared to the AC captain that has 30,000 hours. Not that the AC never had these skills, but the are lessened by years of pressing buttons. With these newbies they are also learning so they are less likely to allow a student to get to far into trouble where the Experienced guy may let them get farther than they should, cause he has "seen it all before."

So to make sense of it all lets pay the instructors 200K per year and AC can have all the 200 hour wonders for the big iron@less than peanuts. May keep them from Chapter 11. Sure the flying public will be thrilled. Oh wait a minute... then we would be in India. I am sure if the system is so terrible you could go there, actually please do. Leave cause if I were you instructor you would be fired already.

[7kcabfun]

Sorry, but really burns me when some moron gets on the forums to complain about instructors. Believe it or not it is a hard gig. Go to work everyday and give the controls to someone who doesn't know how to fly and calmly talk them through a climbing turning stall full power with 20 flaps set. If you want to know how an instructor is going to do for his 703/704 line indoc look at his instructing record. If he did 1000 hours and got at least 12 or 13 people to a license and all passed on the first attempt, then he must be good at instructing and probably will do well at indoc time. If he did 1000 hours instructing and only recommended 3 people for a flight test he is a screw up and will probably screw up his ride. If the instructor did 1000 hours and 20 recommends and 15 failed obviously they don't care about the quality of work they do and will do poorly. Its a shame guys like you exist and can't think about instructors in any other light, or see the big picture. Maybe you should find a Class 4 and have them teach you about situational awareness.

[mattas350]

Well said 7k, well said!

[Invertago]

Hey Guys lay off rayban, he is probably a superior 703/704 pilot who taught himself to fly. Bet he sent himself solo after only 5 hours!


Hey rayban is a 704 guy flying a bag the same route from Winnipeg to Thunder bay getting the same couple hours over and over again?

rayban, you're a ignorant dick.

[VikVaughan]

[Hedley]

Wow, you must have to be some kind of hero to
be able to fly straight and level from one airport
to another

[Just another canuck]

There's nothing wrong with instructing IMHO, but it's the lack of real industry experience that makes them less suitable for a 703/704 op... there was a similar topic awhile ago and someone made a really good post for instructors and their introduction to the real world of aviation/flying/whatever you want to call it. They do need to learn to keep their mouths shut... at least for the first while. No high time captain wants to hear you tell him about theory of flight and what he/she is doing wrong. And at the risk of opening up a real can of worms, instructors are more likely to be on the ball when it comes to the rules. There are a lot of ops that may not necessarily want you to break rules, but bending them certainly is not out of the question. Instructors are less likely to do this.

That said, when someone came in with a resume at my old company who was an instructor, it was immediately filed under "G" once that person left. He had too many bad experiences with them in the past I guess. I personally think he was going too far, but as you can see, this kind of thing does happen.

[Just another canuck]

Found it... kevinsky's post from awhile ago.

I'll pipe up as the 1% out there that loves teaching.

I'd be a career instructor if I could make a living at it. I really truly love teaching. So much so that I still teach part-time even though after fifteen years of flying I have a great paying job and my own plane which I can fly anytime I want.

Maybe 40-50% of my time over all these years is instruction the rest was split between flying up north, on the prairies out on the Pacific Coast and BC interior.

I would hire an instructor. They do have positives. No matter how you look at it a 500-1000hr instructor is going to be sharper than a 200hr gradute. They've spent every flight practicing emergency procedures, making mutiple landings and basically hammering in all the basics over and over again. Instructors tend to be a fair bit quicker on the up take when learning to fly new machines do to the strong base skills and the bag of learning techniques they have perfected. To those who think they aren't flying the plane much the exact opposite is true. Instructors are flying the plane twice as much. Instructors are mentally flying the plane in their heads as it should be flown and also flying it from the students perspective in order to anticipate any wild any crazy maneuvers they might make. Of all the flying I’ve done, teaching required the most concentration and skill, after all it’s much easier to recover from your own mistakes than from someone elses.

That said I've bumped into a number of instructors that have made me just shake my head and feel embarrassed to admit I belong to the group.

If you become an instructor and then go up north to get a job here’s the formula for success: First shut up, second watch, third listen, and then after about six months you can open your mouth but make sure it's not to the chief pilot, practice on a rampie first if he gives you a funny look then go back to above mentioned procedure for another month or two.

I'm not saying that Instructors need to unlearn and forget everything. They learn lost of good techniques and skills. They just need to realize that these skills and techniques are only 20% of what there is to know about flying and opening their mouths with the attitude that they know everything only makes them look foolish.

[rayban]

compared to the AC captain that has 30,000 hours. Not that the AC never had these skills, but the are lessened by years of pressing buttons.

Tell that to Cap'n Sullenburger

[Cat Driver]

Rayban you are poking into a hornets nest with this subject.

The only real instructors are those who have passed TC's flight instructors exams and oral/ flight tests and hold the coveted world renown Canadian flight instructor rating.

[Canoehead]

Folks, it really isn't about who did what where and for how long. It's about the attitude the person brings to work with them (IMHO).

[rayban]

Rayban you are poking into a hornets nest with this subject.

The only real instructors are those who have passed TC's flight instructors exams and oral/ flight tests and hold the coveted world renown Canadian flight instructor rating.

Your right Cat, I will leave this one alone and apologize to the flight instructor community for any ruffled feather's, actual or implied, my posting may have caused.

As a peace offering I'm willing to completely change the subject with this.

I think the Montreal Canadians hockey team is the best NHL team that ever existed. Past, present and future.

End of discussion.

[Just another canuck]

I think the Montreal Canadians hockey team is the best NHL team that ever existed. Past, present and future

Now you're just being stupid .... and I'm a Habs fan.

[Hawkeye4077]

HABS FTW!!!!!!!

[broompusher]

Reading this enitre thread really made me shake my head at everyone on here.....then Conoehead said what I think is the best attitude to have.

Folks, it really isn't about who did what where and for how long. It's about the attitude the person brings to work with them (IMHO).

[just curious]

Just curious to know what actual working pilots out there think of flight instructors as new hires into 703 or 704 ops.
It seems to me that the real "instructors" out there are guys and gals doing line indocs on newbies and flying the line with them until they know what they are really doing.

I taught ab initio candidates 30 years ago. I do training & line indoc at the 704 level now. I worked my ass off to qualify air cadets so that they would A) Pass, and B) Not destroy an aircraft I needed to make a living on.
I had to find my own work, my own schedule, do everything but the maintenance. In doing so, I kept a place that would have shut down going for 5 years. My students wound up at AC, WJ, corporate flying, and the military.

Now I work my ass off to ensure the new pilots we have understand and comply with our SOPs, and drive that machine in such a way that they won't bend it.

Yes, there are candidates who arrive and have a pretty strong conviction that they know everything they need to know about our operation, aircraft, and environment. Some of them are ex-instructors. Some, sadly are just deluded.

I am equally sure the same applies to 703/704 guys going to AC and WJ. There are people everywhere who assume the skills acquired in their last job are directly transferable to their new job. It isn't always so.

JC

[Bede]

I used to think instructors were useless, even when I was an instructor. Now I'm trying to get my instructor rating back for the fun of it. Man, I forgot a lot (VFR rules, instructing stuff, human factors stuff, etc). It sure is humbling.

[Cat Driver]

I forgot a lot (VFR rules, instructing stuff, human factors stuff, etc). It sure is humbling.

Interesting comments.

Some years ago I went to TC for advice on starting a flight school.

We got around to my desire to renew my flight instructors rating and he asked me how long ago I let the rating lapse. I told him about twenty years ago, he calmly told me it was going to be more difficult for me to renew than if I were starting from zero.

I asked him why and he said I would have formed to many of my own ideas on how to teach and would have to be retrained.....turns out he was right as I never did get enough retraining to renew my rating and that conversation took place twenty three years ago.

However I do not feel humbled because I was unable to wrap my mind around all the " stuff " TC demands one learn and regurgitate to one of their inspectors.

The way I look at it I am better off without the rating renewed as I can still teach a lot of different kinds of flying and I do it using the " stuff " I learned back in the days when we taught people to fly in airplanes that were harder to fly and we did it in thirty hours for a PPL. Not to mention the teaching skills I have developed over the past forty or so years as a check pilot working in the industry.

Of course there will be those who will think that I am weak in the " human factors " and " The laws of learning " subjects but that is O.K. with me because I can charge a hell of a lot more for my instructing time than most flight instructors dream of making.

[ScudRunner]

To Quote the Late Colonel Sanders:

"I'm too Drunk to taste this Chicken"

[7kcabfun]

"Tell that to Cap'n Sullenburger"

As you'll figure out later, they will put 10 or more crews in the sim under the same conditions and none will go as well as that. The man was a ringer for that. They did this with the Gimli glider and all of the sim checks ended with all on board lost.

Besides a pissing match Ray, It is more about prejudice, because I am an instructor. I have seen guys w/200 hours work the ramp for a year and couldn't even score a 30% on the IATRA, so no initial PPC ride for them. My instructing allowed me to study for it for a day and a half and get an 85%. Not great but better than a 30%.

People said the Tuskegee airmen wouldn't be good pilot's because they were black. History shows they were pretty damn good. So maybe you should lay down your prejudice because of they way I got to my jet job and learn to look at the traits of the individual. From what I have seen here of you I'm gonna bet it is always the fault of someone other than you and that, it took you extra hours to get license, because you react to the next step rather than reason through it.

Slow Minds and Big Ego's keep the aluminum recycling prices low.

My 2 cents.

[Just another canuck]

I have seen guys w/200 hours work the ramp for a year and couldn't even score a 30% on the IATRA, so no initial PPC ride for them. My instructing allowed me to study for it for a day and a half and get an 85%. Not great but better than a 30%.

I didn't look at an aviation book, pamphlet, CARs, etc. for about 4 years then went and challenged the IATRA after only a couple hours of studying some notes. I passed. I can't even imagine how it's possible to 30% on this exam... multiple choice is easy. If you don't know the answer, reason which answer it is not. The IATRA is nothing to brag about... a monkey could pass this exam.

[Cat Driver]

Yeh, pilots lose track of the importance of knowing the answer to all those tricky questions in TC's written exams.

[Handsome B. Wonderful]

My experience with instructors has been this...They've spent the last 500-100hrs being required to "know" the answers to all the "important" questions, as Cat says, that we all asked back in the day. That's their job. Then some go and get their first "IFR" job and come across as inexpereinced know it all weiners because they've spent their entire "career" knowing it all, but dont really know much outside of what they've seen and done. Nobody's at fault really, it's bred by the position they held, and bred into the rating and I think. 703-704 operations are especially notorious for requiring you to "think outside the box". Something that is not really built into the lesson plans of the TC instructor rating or the job itself. Some of you will argue that all students are different; And this may be true, however they're doing the same exercises in the same practice areas, and doing the same "cross contries" to the same airports.

Scoring 85% on the IATRA isn't really going to make you a good 703-704 pilot. It may help, especially on rides, but being able to learn from the guys next to you and from their experiences, giving them constructive help, and most of all helping keep them out of trouble,will make you a good 703-704 pilot. The guy who brags about how well he scored on any of his exams, none of which are really of consequence in day to day ops, (besides the obvious, ie: alternate mins, etc...) is not likely not the guy who makes a "good 703-704" pilot.

Somone hit it on the head when they said it was all about attitude...

Just have some humility.