Training the Best

Yet another life lesson in be careful what you ask for. All I wanted was a break, a couple days off to relax and recover.

I've been working my ass off for the last two weeks. After finished the first four contact (visual flying, not flying based on instruments) flights, I went straight into the Basic Instrument phase of flight. Seven simulator events, two a day with two practice sims thrown in there, then three flights with no time in between make for a tired flight student.

On top of all that I went straight back into contacts with no break. After two weeks of memorizing procedures and tailoring my flight technique for instrument flight, I was dropped right back into the visual flight world. There are course rules to remember, maneuvers I haven't done in weeks, radio calls I haven't made in just as long, and the landing pattern. All of these skills degrade over time, it's not like riding a bike; you have to be doing them on a regular basis to keep sharp.

The Navy does have procedures in place to allow student pilots to get back in the groove. If you haven't been in the front seat in more than 14 days (weekends count) you get a mandatory warm-up flight. You are required to repeat your last flight and the grades don't count. Then the next flight you fly is an optional warm-up, meaning that if you fly it and knock it out of the park, the grades count. If you do badly, they do not. If you've only been out of the cockpit seven days you get the optional warm-up.

So I flew FAM 4 this morning as a mandatory warm-up and the flight went well. My instructor, Lt. Machinski, and I had initially intended to take off and do some touch and goes in the pattern at home. Normally we would do this at our practice field to the south, Waldron Field, but we could not climb high enough to make it there via course rules. Course rules are pre determined altitudes and routes that we stick to in order to avoid mid-air collisions. The air space around Naval Air Station Corpus Christi is one of the busiest in the country, so course rules are pretty damn important.

So the home field bounces (touch and goes at your home airfield) seemed like a good idea until I tried to climb to pattern altitude at 800 feet. We couldn't even make it up that high; I had to dive down to 700 feet to stay out of the clouds. I did one touch and go and tower informed me that it had been my last one; my next must be a full stop. When the cloud layer is too low they close the overhead pattern; only ground controlled IFR departures and arrivals. So I came back around and landed.

After some discussion, my instructor got an IFR clearance and we took off IFR for the high areas. We got some high maneuvers done, which went pretty well. I felt good back in the front cockpit, with the blue sky above me and the controls in my hand. I screwed up a few maneuvers on the first go around but cleaned them up on the second try. We came back home, landed the plane, debriefed uneventfully. Everything was great until I turned my cell phone back on.

There was a voice mail from the flight surgeon. During my annual flight physical last week, the flight surgeon ordered some tests to clear the kidney stone waiver out of my record. Way back in 2001, I had one kidney stone and the Navy has made the biggest deal out of it ever since. My advice to anyone entering military service? Don't tell them shit they aren't going to find out about anyway. If I hadn't told them about the kidney stone in the first place, I would have been commissioned a lot earlier and would be a lot further along in flight school right now.

So one of these tests was an x-ray. I didn't even think about it at the time, I was just expecting to have this damn waiver out of my record. Well apparently there is something in my right kidney which looks like a kidney stone on the x-ray. I am being scheduled for some further tests to determine exactly what it is and what course of action we will take next. From what I understand right now the worst case scenario is that I will be out of the cockpit for a few weeks. Best case scenario is that the anomaly on the x-ray will turn out to be nothing and I'll be back in the saddle again within a week.

While this is not tragic, this really pisses me off. I am part of a class, with study partners and friends that I made who are moving along at the same pace I am and doing the same flights. Now I may wind up a month behind them before I am med up again. The class I start with doesn't really matter that much as far is the Navy is concerned, but it sucks for me. Oh well, yet another test on my way to wings.

// posted by Josh @ 4/18/2006 04:38:00 PM 2 comments

Yeah, sounds like a good time, right? Not at all. Well the penetration was kinda fun but I'll get to that.

Double pumped is an expression we have for when the squadron schedules you for two graded events in one day; usually two flights or two simulator events. It sucks. There is a lot of studying that goes into each event and when you only find out the day before at 6pm that you are going to do two simulator events the next day you have to kick the studying into high gear, losing necessary sleep for the two events. Not only did I get double pumped, I got double pumped on BI3 and 4, two of the busiest and hardest BI sims. On top of that, this was Friday and the rest of the squadron had a half day because of a tie cutting ceremony for the students who had recently soloed. This leads me into the big blue weenie.

I kinda made this one up from a Marine Corps expression, the big green weenie. Any time the Corps screws a marine by making him work on the weekend, screwing up his pay, sending him to the worst parts of the country and world, it is referred to as betting the big green weenie; being screwed by the Corps. Well I'm not under the command of the Marine Corps; I'm under Navy command so it's the big blue weenie.

I finished my first block of flights on Tuesday and moved on to the Basic Instrument phase of flight school. The BI phase consists of seven simulator events and three flights flown in the back seat with the hood over your cockpit. In this phase, we start to learn how to fly an aircraft solely on the instruments, with no outside reference. This is how you would fly if you had to fly through the weather and clouds obscured your vision. It's a big part of being a military pilot, because we can't stop flying missions just because of a few clouds. It is incredibly hard to do at first.

Instead of being able to look outside at this huge horizon and tell which way your aircraft is pointed, you now have to look at a collection of ten gauges that all tell you something different about your plane in a different way. And they don't all read the way you would expect. The attitude gyro shows you the position of the ground, so if you are banking left it actually dips to the right. On top of that gauge is your angle of bank index which shows you how many degrees of bank you have but in the opposite direction you have it in. If you are banking left, the index deflects to the right. But right below that is the RMI which shows you your magnetic heading. This works in the direction you would think it would. If you want to go to a heading of 090 and it's to the right on the gauge you bank right. AAHHH! Why can't they just make a little plane gauge?

To do your seven simulator events, you go to building 89, the simulator building: the swallower of souls. There are seven cold, lifeless T-34 simulator cockpits waiting there with about thirty old men who combine forces and conspire to destroy student naval aviators' confidence and take their dreams of flying tactical jets. The old men for the most part are nice guys, but they don't let even the smallest slip up go unpunished. Even a small slip up is noted on the grade sheets. Well for the most part they are nice guys. Some are assholes, but I digress.

BI (basic instrument) sims are an exercise in frustration. In your dark pitching and rolling little capsule you must balance on what seems like the head of a needle. No control movement goes unpunished. You trim the rudder, the elevator, and the ailerons until you think you have it stable but if you look away for a second you find out that it wasn't as stable as you thought. You look back and you are diving, climbing, or rolling out of control.

Your instructor, who is grading your every move, is watching a computer screen which actually gives him more information than your gauges. His are bigger and in some cases digital so when you think you have your torque set at 550 ftlbs, he can see that you actually have 563ftlbs set. For every maneuver there are graded parameters, you have to stay within a certain limitation of airspeed, altitude, and heading to get a passing grade. A pass at this stage is a 3, an even tighter set or parameters gets you a 4, and even tighter gets you a 5. As the sims progress, a 3 is no longer a pass and you must get 4s.

This balancing act requires what we call a good "scan", meaning that your eyes never fixate on one gauge, they bounce from one to the next, taking in information, combining all of what you have seen to form a mental picture of what the plane is doing. If your airspeed is high and your altitude low, raise the nose. If your altitude is high and your airspeed high, cut power and raise the nose. If your heading is drifting left, trim the rudder right and you are probably going to have to reduce power and trim up elevator. There are over a dozen possible fluctuations with related fixes and they must come naturally, without pause, because the longer you wait, the worse things get.

All of this constant attention, analysis, and action makes for a very tiring hour and twenty minutes. With the canopy closed it gets pretty hot in there too, making things even worse. Each time I get out of the sim I am covered in sweat and I am mentally exhausted. So it really sucks when you have to go another one only two hours later. You feel like you're ready for the second one but about a half hour into it you start making stupid little mistakes and the frustration sets in. Before long, you're looking for the ejection handle to get the fuck out of that thing.

Penetration is a pretty cool maneuver in which you drop a whole lot of altitude in a short time. In IMC conditions, there are clouds which obscure your view of the ground and other planes, so you need to do this in a predictable manner when ground control clears you. The best way to do this is with a rapidly descending turn. Chop the throttle to idle and drop the nose. Let your airspeed accelerate to 180 knots and hold it. This maneuver will give you a 4,000 foot per minute descent rate and a pretty steep nose down angle. In a short amount of time you descend from 13,000 feet to 3,000. The simulator has motion, so it approximates what it will feel like in the plane, but I can't wait to do it for real.

So I survived my first week of BI sims without too much damage. My grades weren't what I was hoping for, but I know my maneuvers and I've got a bit of time to study this weekend for my two sims on Monday. Unfortunately, that means I'm going to be studying on my birthday. Oh well, it won't be the worst birthday ever, that title belongs to the birthday that I spent on Parris Island. Man, I can't wait to get back to the plane.

// posted by Josh @ 4/08/2006 11:15:00 AM 0 comments

Yes, it's true, military pilots really do have call signs just like in Top Gun. However, unlike Top Gun, they are not cool names like Ice Man and Maverick and we don't write them on the front of our helmets or introduce ourselves to girls using this name.

In reality, call signs are usually earned for some embarrassing event or trait, or even just making fun of the pilot's name. They can actually change with each squadron you go to if your new squadron mates think yours is too cool they'll give you a new, more embarrassing one. Oh, and the last thing you ever want to do is try to get a call sign; you'll wind up with the most awful name ever. Some examples of call signs I have heard and know the story behind:

Maj. Steven "Flounder" Foley - he slipped off the pull up bars during a squadron PFT and fell flat on his back.

LCDR Theodore "Bunza" Steelman - just sound that one out. Take the "man" off the end of his name if you need help.

"Heater" - an F-15 pilot who left the canopy defog on too long and melted a canopy.


So I told you all that in order to explain my first call sign, given to me by my on-wing, Lt. Gilkison: Oscar. As in Oscar the grouch. My TBS buddies would believe it's because of my sometimes grumpy demeanor in the field, but that's just too easy.

During my pre-flight brief for my FAM 3 flight on Monday I had to draw out the landing pattern on the dry erase board. I don't know where the Navy buys their dry erase markers but this one stunk like hell. Lt. Gilkison didn't say anything until another instructor opened the door to the small room to tell him something. After a brief word the instructor said something to the effect of "Alright man, I'm gonna go cuz I've got a flight and it really stinks in here." Without missing a beat, Lt. Gilkison points to me and they both share a laugh at my expense. I thought it was pretty funny.

After the flight, on a hot day in a plane with an air conditioner that refused to work I asked Lt. Gilkison why we left the canopy open after getting out. He explained that it was so the ground crew could post flight the aircraft and after a slight pause "and because you stink." It was at this time that he decided to name me Oscar.

At least they didn't find out about my hash name.

// posted by Josh @ 4/04/2006 11:44:00 PM 3 comments

Twenty touch and go landings today. My freaking brain is fried.

The flight started badly because of a brand new checklist that Training Wing Four threw at us on Friday which changes a lot of our pre-start and pre-taxi checks. I didn't study them as much as I should have and got my routine all fucked up form the start. I've learned that I do better with a routine, that way I know everything is done and set. I forgot to check the oxygen system today. Not a good thing.

The weather sucked too, so I had no horizon to reference, which made things a lot more difficult than they had to be, but a lot of my mistakes were simply instrument scan. I'm not scanning the instruments quickly enough and reacting appropriately. But that's what this flight is for, to make a lot of mistakes and correct them. We almost hit a bird too, how's that for a fun day?

The difficulty with the landing pattern is that there is so much going on in the two minutes you have in between each touch. Every second you have is used up with an action, a checklist, a radio call, or a check of the instruments. Take even a second off and you are missing something that will screw up your pattern. But with practice those mistakes start to go away and the steps start to become second nature.

Even with all that going on, I still enjoyed the flight. I don't know what it is, but being at the controls makes it all better. Back to studying, I've got a 0650 brief tomorrow morning. Probably not going to fly it; the weather looks crappy. You never know though, today's weather was supposed to be nice and almost no one got up in the air.

// posted by Josh @ 4/03/2006 06:51:00 PM 0 comments