The Devil I Know

Its been a year since I've officially come "on line" and been flying for my current company. At my last logbook entry I've logged around 2250 hours total time with 1350 multi engine, 540 turbo jet and plenty of night and actual instrument time. Now I've come to a crossroads about what to do with my career.

With my current total time and experience, I'd consider myself over qualified for most regional airlines. They're are a lot of regionals hiring guys with a wet commercial ticket and 500 hours total time. On the other hand, I'm a few hundred hours short of meeting the fractionals hiring minimums. They want 2500 hour total time and an ATP of which I am missing both. My chief pilot has already pulled me into his office and told me that he was looking into upgrading me. They are looking to upgrade 2-3 of us First Officers in either June or July. The question is, do I really want the upgrade? Lets face it, I have a lot of gripes about how my company operates. I'm still bitter about the 5 and 2, 12 and 2 schedule they forced on us. Our planes seem to be falling apart at the rivets. I don't fly as much as I'd like and I spend way too much time away from home. BUT, I absolutely need 1000 hours turbojet PIC to reach my ultimate career goal of UPS or Fed Ex. Do I want to dance with the Devil that brought me, take the upgrade and sign away another 18 months of my life? Or do I search out other gainful (turbojet pic) employment when my contract runs out at the end of the year?

Switching to the left seat would mean a huge pay increase. If things stayed busy and I flew a lot, I could easily double my current salary. But even more important than the pay would be the golden turbojet PIC time I could accumulate. To me, that's worth more than the pay increase. Every 6 minutes in the cockpit is another .1 in the logbook towards my career goals. The whole reason I took this job over ExpressJet was for one simple reason, quick upgrade! Like some people say, be careful what you wish for, you might just get it.

Checkride

So I'm sitting in our base in the South and the pager goes off. It says I have my sim ride the next day and to be at headquarters in the morning. I knew this was coming, but I was hoping to get a trip out of here instead of doing the checkride, but the flying Gods have spoken. Its not that I don't want to do the sim, but I'd rather be out on the road flying and making money instead. I was doing a little calculating and all I need is another 2500 miles and my mileage pay gets another bump up. With the rest of this week shot, I'll have to get the miles next week.



I had a really good time flying the sim last year. It was the first time I had ever been in a full motion sim. In fact the very first time I ever stepped foot in the box, the guys flying did a fantastic job of showing me how realistic the motion was. My sim partner and I showed up at the sim at our ungodly assigned time of 1am for our 4 hour slot in the box. Turns out the sim had been having some issues earlier so the guys going before us were only half way through their session when we arrived. The instructor asked if either of us wanted to sit in and watch the next session. I volunteered because I had never seen a company crew at work and I wanted to see how they flew. The guys I was going to watch were a couple of Lear guys going through a transition into the Falcon, so I figured I could pick up some pointers on how things are done. Well, I certainly got a lesson. Let me give you a little background info before I dive into their sim session. The Lear and the Falcon are two different animals on the ground. The Lear can be taxied by either the FO or the Captain. It is a more traditional aircraft where you steer with your feet. The Falcon is a big pig (as compared to the Lear) and uses a steering tiller while on the ground. The typical fashion a take off is completed in the Falcon is with the Captain using the tiller until 80kts and then you transition to using the rudder for directional control. So in my very first simulator experience, I got to see a crash.

It turns out that the Lear guys were unaware of the tiller procedure and somehow had managed to make all of their previous takeoffs with out incident, but this was not going to last for long. As I sat in the jumpseat observing, I saw the instructor input an engine failure at 100kts. So when the guys hit 100kts on the takeoff roll, the right engine was going to fail. This would cause the crew to abort the takeoff. As the crew prepared for the takeoff, they briefed the departure and then called "tower" (the instructor) and were cleared for takeoff. As they added power, I got to experience the motion for the first time. It was awesome, just like the real thing. I had to hang on to my seat to keep from falling backward. As the plane accelerated it felt just like the real thing. All my inner sensations were moving around and I felt like we were really moving. Then things got real interesting. At 100kts the right engine failed. The only problem was the crew wasn't expecting this and the plane started to veer to the right. So the sim started to rock me to the left. Then the flying pilot tried to correct to the left but over corrected and the plane veered to the left. Then the non-flying pilot sitting in the captain seat tried to correct with the tiller and he over corrected to the right. So I got tossed to the left again. By this time things in the cockpit were out of control and the plane ran off the runway and they got the dreaded red screen of death. I was still sitting in the back seat grinning from ear to ear because I thought it was the coolest thing I had ever seen. It was a great way to be introduced to a full motion sim.

So back to why I like the sim. The sim gives you the chance to do things that hopefully you will never have to do in real life. You get to practice V1 cuts, single engine operations, stalls, steep turns, hydraulic system failures, electrical failures, missed approaches, holds and a host of other things. During my initial training we had multiple sessions that allowed us to practice. This time around I get one shot at it and that's it. I kinda wish I had more time to play around, but its all work and no play for this session. Some guys get all bent out of shape and nervous about recurrent checkrides, but I just see it as a way for me to showcase my talents and show the chief pilots I'm ready to upgrade.

A really good month

So far May has been a great month for flying and making some much needed $$. Thanks to the cool schedule change, I got to spend the first week of the month at home with the fam and then got to do 5 and 2's for the rest of the month. What I mean by 5 and 2's is I work from Monday-Friday and I'm usually home by late Friday night. I don't mind 5 and 2's, but it was the dreaded 12 and 2's from the old sked that I hated. But with the new sked, I can bid a line for what days I want off. Seeing as how I'm high up of the seniority list for FO's, I usually get my first choice of lines. By choice this week, I'm working a 12 and 2. I could have had last weekend off, but instead I decided to work my days off in exchange for double my daily salary. With the expenses of Squirts surgery quickly approaching, we can use the extra money. In addition to the extra money for days off worked, I'm finally making some real good money in mileage. I'm not going to get into specifics about how much I'm making, but if I were to make this kind of money year round, it would be on par with Captain pay at most regional airlines. Its too bad this kind of money doesn't come around regularly (but it soon might). Anyways its back to sleep for me. I'm sure I'll have another trip waiting for me when my required rest is up and I again go green.

Taking a stand

When it comes to planes there is flyable broke (MEL) and there is grounded broke (broke, broke). MEL broke is tolerable depending on what is not working. Grounded broke is bad. On my latest flight this week I ran into problems with a grounded broke issue and had to take a stand against flying the plane.

On our Lears, as with all jet aircraft, we have a Yaw Damper. When the Y.D is on, it automatically controls the rudder to prevent Dutch Rolling. Without getting into a discussion about aerodynamics, a Dutch Roll is where the plane wants to rock back and forth without any inputs from the pilots. At high speeds planes have a tendency to do this if you make a turn. The Y.D basically keeps the passengers from getting motion sickness. On this particular flight the Y.D had a mind of its own. Several times the rudder made un-commanded movements and yawed the plane slightly to the right causing the plane to start rocking. Anytime you have a control surface move without you manually doing it or you telling autopilot to make the input, you have a problem. We were on our way from the Mexican border enroute to a fuel stop in LA for our eventual destination of our base in the North when the anomaly occurred. Normally if something out of the ordinary occurs in flight, if it only happens once we can chalk it up to aircraft gremlins, but if it happens twice or more, you have a problem. During climb out the rudder made its first un-commanded movement. Granted it was not a hard movement, but it was very noticeable. The captain and I both chalked that up to a gremlin. Several minuets later it did it again. This is where I had to take a stand.

After the second occurrence, I considered the Y.D to be a problem. The captain did not see it my way. He wanted to continue the trip to our fuel stop and then on up to our base in the North. I told him that any un-commanded control movement like this is a big deal and we should ground the plane. He saw it as an inconvenience and we should just ignore it and we’ll write it up when we get to our base in the North. Then it happened again. That galvanized my position that the flight should be discontinued and we should divert to the nearest suitable airport which happened to be our base in the south. The captain wanted to continue to our fuel stop and we’d talk about the situation then. That’s when I told him that there was no way I was going to continue the trip with the rudder making un-commanded movements. He can continue to our fuel stop and ground the plane or we can go to our base and ground the plane, but either way, I refuse to fly the plane any further in its present condition. Needless to say he was not very pleased with me, but safety of flight comes first before finishing the trip so he could get home. So we diverted to our base in the south. It happened to be closer to our present position and in perfect range for a normal descent from our cruising alt of FL410. In some miracle of modern technology I managed to pick up the ILS about 90 miles out and flew it all the way in to the airport for an uneventful landing.
I really hate having to cancel trips and down aircraft especially when we have freight on board, but when it’s an issue of being grounded broke, it really isn’t a hard call to make.

Record setting day

Yesterday was one loooong day. It was a record setting day for me with 11.4 hours in the air, 17 hours of duty and 3963 miles flown. For you that follow their 135 regulations, yes I did go over both flight and duty hours for the day, but due to the ability to massage the system, its all legal in the eyes of the feds. Personally I'd like to see more stringent regulations considering flight and duty times, but that's besides the point. The day started at 1am central time when I got a rude awakening call from Captain Scarecrow. He wanted to meet in the lobby exactly when our FAA mandated 10 hours of rest were up so we could head to the airport. Normally I would have been pissed to have been called about work during my rest period, but I wasn't sleeping so it wasn't a big deal. I knew about the trip ahead of time so I was expecting the call. We piled our junk in the van and headed to the airport. Our trip was scheduled to take us from SHV-ABQ-BTR-FLL-MDST-FLL. MDST is Santiago, Dominican Republic. I was pretty excited about this trip when I heard about it due to the fact that it is a great mileage trip and I'd never been to the D.R. before.
The first leg over to ABQ was pretty uneventful due to my new borrowed toy from my dad. I'm using his Garmin 496 with Nexrad radar to pick my way around storms. Its such a powerful tool, I wish I had one for myself. I'll do a post on the 496 at a later time. We got to ABQ around 4:30am and loaded up our cargo for the trip to the D.R. We had to make a slight change to our planned fuel stop on the way to FLL because our charts and approach plates were going to expire, so we headed to our base in the south. We switched out the old charts for the new ones and picked up a life raft. It was at this point that I mentioned to the captain that we should take some cash along for the trip out of the country. I've read plenty of articles in Professional Pilot to know that its always a good idea to take a few thousand dollars in cash anytime you travel outside the country. On the flight to our base, I mentioned several times that we should pick up some cash, but did he listen to me? I'll get to that later.
The trip to FLL was the longest leg I've ever done in a Lear. We did a 2.9 hour leg and flew 1114nm. When we landed, we had exactly 1000lbs in the tanks which was the bare minimum. We topped off our tanks and cleared customs outbound. The next leg to the D.R. was a beautiful flight. I wish I had brought my camera with me this week because I could have taken some great pics. We were up at FL410 and had a great view of the Caribbean and the islands. I didn't get to see a whole lot of the D.R due to the clouds on the flight in, but it looked pretty green. When we got to the airport it was a typical visit, all I saw was the airport, but this is where it gets interesting. As captain Scarecrow was inside doing paperwork, I was out at the plane in charge of refueling. The fuel truck comes over and the driver doesn't speak a word of English and my Spanglish isn't very good either. But what I got from the conversation was the word "Cash". He would not take any of the credit cards we had in the plane and refused to fuel the plane. I hate to say I told you so, but that was a big "I frigging told you so!!" to the captain. It took several hours for the company to finally fax over an appropriate credit card that the fuel truck guy would accept. So after spending a few hours out on the hot ramp all I wanted to do was go back to the states. Our last leg was to be under part 91 regulations, so this is where we can massage the system into letting us fly over our 10 hour of flight time and over our 17 hours of duty. The trip to FLL couldn't have gone quick enough for me. I was dead tired, sweaty, smelly and all I wanted to do was get out of the plane. We finally landed for the last time, cleared customs and headed to the hotel for some much needed rest. All in all, it was a great day.

Back to work

Thanks to our new schedule I was able to spend last week at home. It was much needed because Jack is on the mend and couldn't go into daycare for the week. He is healing up nicely and seems to be doing just fine. I think he really enjoyed having Daddy home for the week. I know I sure enjoyed it, but by Friday, I needed a squirt break. After 7 months of being home only 6 days a month, having 10 straight days at home was giving me the "aviation itch". As Erin will attest, its time for me to go back to work. So after bumming a ride with the parents to my wonderfully run down base in the North, I'm sitting here not so patiently waiting for the pager to go off so I can go poking holes in the sky in a Lear.