The First Trip
Today was my first trip as an FO for my company. I must say that it went really smooth and I had a blast. We were on time and everything went like clockwork. Thankfully I flew with a awesome Capt. who was a great help by showing me some more tricks of the trade and being patient when I wanted to run through checklists. He showed me a few things that I can do to speed up my flows and get the cockpit prepared faster. Overall I was pretty quick, but he had some better ways of doing things that were quicker. His tips are valuable in making me a better pilot.
The day started off around 8:45am with a page from dispatch saying I had a trip. I was pumped. I was packed and out the door to check out in record time. I met the Capt at his hotel and we headed off to the airport. After some bickering with the rental car people about gas in the rental car, I grabbed our flight plan and headed to the plane to get ATIS, our clearance and set up the aircraft. By the time the Capt. came out everything was set up and we were ready to fire up the engines. He was pleased that I had all our "numbers" and the plane was set up for the flight. I did ask him to help me with the GPS because its not something I've had much time playing with, but he showed me how to set it up and we were ready to go. It was his leg so he flew and I handled the radios and checklists. It was a smooth and quick flight to DPA where we picked up our freight.
The second leg was my leg. I was pretty excited to finally be flying. But I had to calm myself down and run through the flight in my head before I got back in the plane. I made sure I went over the departure procedure so I was prepared for what ATC (air traffic control) was going to throw at me. After we loaded up our freight, I got our clearance and we started em up. Taxi out was normal, but all I could think about was how cool this was going to be. My heart was racing. I was excited to be flying a jet and didn't want to mess up and look like an idiot on my first trip. Thankfully everything went awesome. I pushed the throttles up, set take off power, made all my callouts and had a perfect first take off. We climbed out and were on our way to Indiana.
Enroute to our destination the Capt looked over and asked if I wanted to use the autopilot. I looked over at him with the perma smile (permanent smile on my face all day) and told him I was too selfish to let the autopilot steal my fun. He laughed and said he was the same way on his first trip. He showed me another trick to put in my arsenal. This one was for descent planning. I tried it his way and it worked out perfectly. It was servere clear out so we flew a visual approach into our destination airport. Flying patterns in jets is going to take some getting used to. We fly higher, faster and farther from the field than what I'm normally used to. My pattern was a little closer to the field than it should have been, but it was still good. The Capt. was helpful with tips on power settings and what I could expect for pitch settings and airspeeds. I flew the final right on glide path and Ref +10 which was right on the numbers. I reduced to idle over the numbers and made what I thought was a pretty decent landing. The Capt. agreed with my assessment and was extremely happy with how the flight went. Overall and awesome day, I cant wait to do it again.
The day started off around 8:45am with a page from dispatch saying I had a trip. I was pumped. I was packed and out the door to check out in record time. I met the Capt at his hotel and we headed off to the airport. After some bickering with the rental car people about gas in the rental car, I grabbed our flight plan and headed to the plane to get ATIS, our clearance and set up the aircraft. By the time the Capt. came out everything was set up and we were ready to fire up the engines. He was pleased that I had all our "numbers" and the plane was set up for the flight. I did ask him to help me with the GPS because its not something I've had much time playing with, but he showed me how to set it up and we were ready to go. It was his leg so he flew and I handled the radios and checklists. It was a smooth and quick flight to DPA where we picked up our freight.
The second leg was my leg. I was pretty excited to finally be flying. But I had to calm myself down and run through the flight in my head before I got back in the plane. I made sure I went over the departure procedure so I was prepared for what ATC (air traffic control) was going to throw at me. After we loaded up our freight, I got our clearance and we started em up. Taxi out was normal, but all I could think about was how cool this was going to be. My heart was racing. I was excited to be flying a jet and didn't want to mess up and look like an idiot on my first trip. Thankfully everything went awesome. I pushed the throttles up, set take off power, made all my callouts and had a perfect first take off. We climbed out and were on our way to Indiana.
Enroute to our destination the Capt looked over and asked if I wanted to use the autopilot. I looked over at him with the perma smile (permanent smile on my face all day) and told him I was too selfish to let the autopilot steal my fun. He laughed and said he was the same way on his first trip. He showed me another trick to put in my arsenal. This one was for descent planning. I tried it his way and it worked out perfectly. It was servere clear out so we flew a visual approach into our destination airport. Flying patterns in jets is going to take some getting used to. We fly higher, faster and farther from the field than what I'm normally used to. My pattern was a little closer to the field than it should have been, but it was still good. The Capt. was helpful with tips on power settings and what I could expect for pitch settings and airspeeds. I flew the final right on glide path and Ref +10 which was right on the numbers. I reduced to idle over the numbers and made what I thought was a pretty decent landing. The Capt. agreed with my assessment and was extremely happy with how the flight went. Overall and awesome day, I cant wait to do it again.
posted by Windsor at 10:51 PM
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