“This is the world you’re going to”

For $10 million, you too could have a simulator

For many of us who have recently been hired by a regional airline, step one in the training process is to attend a CTP (Certification Training Program). Pilots who don't yet have an Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) certificate have to go through this particular course in order to be able to take the ATP written test. Ironically, the course has little to do with the questions that are on the written test, but rather is a way to expose aspiring airline pilots to safety-related concepts that they will be dealing with in their careers.

This last week my airline sent me and 30+ of my new classmates to a 7-day CTP course where we went through 4 days of classroom followed by 2-3 days of simulator training. It was a bit long and tedious, sitting in class for 8 hours a day, but as it turned out we got really lucky with the ground instructor we were assigned.

A retired captain for a major airline, he had a wealth of experience and wisdom to share. The really neat thing was that it wasn’t just technical knowledge; he often would bring a moral lesson into the stories he told, and sometimes there was even something about God. When introducing himself, he had explained he had nearly decided to become a priest, but instead ended up in aviation.

We had him for 3 out of the 4 days and I thoroughly enjoyed hearing his fascinating stories, which had been collected over a long career of flying everything from military helicopters to wide-body international airliners. The stories ranged from the hair-raising to the hilarious. Many of them were cautionary tales, designed to give the student something serious to ponder or some important advice to put into use at some point in the future. Many of the stories highlighted how much he had loved his job and what an amazing career his younger listeners were entering into.

After finishing our classroom sessions, we each received 10 hours of simulator training to round out the course. This was going to be a tricky one for me. Months beforehand, I’d been wondering if I’d be able to make it through this course without having a Sabbath conflict, since the course was going to be 7 straight days with no official break. I’d called various people, sent emails, and done my best to get an accommodation worked out in advance, but to no avail; the best answer I could get was to show up to class and make the request when I arrived.

So that’s what I did. The one slight hope I had that it might be feasible was the fact that my course started on a Monday rotation, which meant that my classroom sessions would be done by the end of Thursday and I would be doing simulator sessions over the weekend. Since they run the sims 24/7, it would actually work if I did a daytime session on Friday, a nighttime session on Saturday after sunset, and whatever remained anytime on Sunday. If I’d been in an earlier class date, I would have been sent to a course starting on a Wednesday rotation, which would definitely have been a problem, since there would have been no way to get out of the final 8-hour classroom session that would have been on a Saturday. I took the Monday start date to be my cue from God to go ahead and give it a shot.

The first day of class I was doing my best to figure out who I needed to talk to to make my scheduling request. Unfortunately, the schedulers happened to be in a different building, and when I logged into my school profile, I saw to my dismay that my simulator sessions were already starting to be scheduled, and one was for Friday night. I quickly sent an email to scheduling, making my request to be able to do sims anytime Friday ending by 1730 (to give me an hour buffer before sunset) and after 1930 on Saturday.

A few minutes later I saw my schedule update - the night-time slot had morphed into an afternoon session, with the simulator activity ending at 1700. Still of concern was the debrief time: 1900-1930. However, someone had written in the notes: “Will be able to debrief at 1700”. I smiled.

A few minutes later I received an email from someone in scheduling: “Good afternoon Michael, unfortunately, we are unable to take requests for any particular SIM Times or Devices. You should receive your SIM schedule by end of day tomorrow.” Was my schedule going to change again? I kept a close eye on it, and despite the somewhat disconcerting email, by a couple hours later all my sim lessons had been scheduled: Friday daytime, and Sunday. Nothing on Sabbath! I breathed a sigh of relief and praised God for giving me a sympathetic scheduler.

The sim training was a blast. I had no idea they could create such a convincing illusion of motion inside those things. The first time I pushed the thrust levers forward for takeoff, I was surprised to actually feel myself being pushed back into my seat, as if the plane was really accelerating down the runway! I had the chance to fly the Airbus A320 full-motion simulator and after that experience, I'm starting to have aspirations to eventually get behind the controls of one of those birds for real.

Welcoming the Sabbath

I was still holding my breath a bit as Friday afternoon came around, as I'd heard that sometimes sim schedules could change at a moment's notice. But there were no surprises, and we finished the sim lesson on time, the instructor gave a quick debrief right at 1700 and I was free! I gave a heartfelt thanksgiving to God as I watched a beautiful sunset from my hotel window and welcomed the Sabbath.

After a full week of training, Sabbath was just the refreshing break I needed, and I enjoyed it with a new sense of appreciation. As it turns out, my Adventist airline pilot friend happens to live in the city where I was training, and so I got the fun chance to meet him in person for the first time and go to church with him and his wife. That’s one of the things that I think is so neat about being an Adventist - no matter where you go in the world, you’re going to find a church family and you have an immediate connection with like-minded people.

I completed my final sim sessions on Sunday, took my ATP written this morning, and now I’m on the plane with my classmates to the airline’s training facility to start the formal airline training for real. I don’t know what the next Sabbath conflict will be, though I’m sure it’s coming. But something that I’m also sure about is that if it’s God plan for me to get through training, He will open the door - or the window, or whatever it happens to be. I just have to be prepared for Him to do things a bit last-minute, because that’s the way He seems to operate. And I need to remember to enjoy the ride, as a good friend was reminding me this weekend.

One of the things the ground instructor was fond of saying as he would share inspiring and neat things about the airline pilot career was, “Guys, this is the world you’re going to - and it’s really, really cool.” After a week of hearing him repeat that, it’s actually starting to feel like it might really happen.