King “Fisher”

This is a photo a few flight attendants from KingFisher Airlines, flying mainly out of London and the United Kingdom. King Fisher, at the beginning of the year, had a problem with a delay of payment to the increasingly agitated pilots working for them. I wanted to show this picture because I wanted to bring up a common question. “Who do I work for and where will I work when I start my career in Aviation?” I mean, what pilot does not think of these questions at least once in their journey of becoming a pilot? Again, I am not posting this picture because I want to discourage people from working for KingFisher, I just wanted to give some sort of an idea of what kind of company you could be working with some day. This could mean that you may be working as a flight attendant, international airline pilot in a four man crew, taxiing planes, air trafficker, control tower manager, aerial photography, crop duster (not like in high school hallways), or whatever you choose to be! My direct goal after college is to be a captain in a four man crew flying large airliner planes! I think that would be absolutely amazing. There was one more thing that I was getting from this picture. I was noticing the uniforms. I don’t know about you but I think there is some sort of an uplifting feeling of being all dressed up in uniform. Your posture and attitude change completely once you get that uniform on. I am pretty excited for the day that I get my “wings” and the loops on my shoulders of being a true certified pilot!

Sky Diving

This is a photo of a group of four hundred professional sky divers in Udon Thani, Thailand. They jumped out of five different Royal Thai Air Force C-130s from 23,000 feet. Okay, my FIRST question is, “who in their right mind would jump out of a perfectly good plane?” I mean I am a pilot (to be) and I don’t see why people would sky dive. Maybe that is just me. I mean I see the whole point of having that rush of actually feeling like you would be able to fly but then you have that problem of not really being able to control the direction of where you are going. At that point, you are in all trust of you parachute. I don’t think I could do that. I mean I probably will sky dive someday (the whole bucket list deal) but I would much rather stay inside of the aircraft and get that sense of my dream of being able to fly! I would rather have that “Bird’s Eye ‘point-of-view.'” Though, I do really like this photo I mean, this group of people are the true definition of professionals. This is absolutely astounding and would take a really long time in order to get everybody to know where they will be positioned and when they need to drop out of their plane in order to have everything be perfectly timed. It is truly a masterpiece and an art! I also thought it was really cool how they had everything color coordinated.  The first thing I thought of when I saw this photo was that they were representing something about the fourth of July. That’s just my first perspective of this photo.

 

“Run”way

This post by Dorothy Adele caught my eye. St. Barths’ runway is 2,133 feet long. It is one of the shortest runways in the world. This is the third most dangerous runway in the world. St. Barths’ is in the Carribbean Islands. Now, for any beginner pilot this would look absolutely horrific, am I wrong? I mean look how short that runways is! Okay, now let me tell you this. Dont, Be, Nervous! With anything, not only when you are flying, training, or having a career in Aviation, but you should never get nervous or scared. Take it with baby steps. Start off on a local airport and work your way up the “difficulty” ladder. Once you have mastered the one you are working on, then move up to a more difficult area of flight. There should never  be a moment in your flight where you either A, don’t know what you are doing, or B, you don’t know what to do in the situation you are in. If this is the case which I sure hope this will never be the case, but if it has become an issue then you either had a horrible instructor or you were given your license too soon without enough experience. You should always be confident in yourself and with your aircraft before EVERY flight you takeoff in!

What is Your Impression?

What is your impression of the Beechcraft King Air 250 (BKA 250) flying out of Chester, United Kingdom? Well, for one, the first thing I think of from this photo the BKA 250 is speed. This plane looks fast, let alone that it is a multi engine turbo-prop plane. The BKA 250 looks to be a commercial aircraft with retractable landing gear creating less intended drag. This aircraft also has wingtip devices. These wingtips are designed to reduce the drag by channeling the wingtip vortex, creating less drag and more speed, which also in turn makes for a larger payload to be carried on the aircraft. What elso do you notice about this larger aircraft? Did you notice the whale tail on the the emmpennage? If you didn’t already know, the emmpennage is the rear controlling region of the aircraft. This is by far, the most essential and most important area of your aircraft, since this area performs about two thirds of your control of the aircraft. Anyways, the whale fin of the BKA 250 is also another piece to direct air travel and create less drag. Hawker Beechcraft Corporation (HBC) had announced that they would be selling these new Beechcraft King Air 250s back in April. HBC is one of the leading companies of the world in business, special mission, light attack, and trainer aircraft. Though I do have a few questions about this aircraft. Is this specific aircraft only flown in Europe at this moment or is it sold and flown all around the world? I mean I am enjoying what I hear about this new BKA 250 due to the new improvements on aerodynamics, visual, and takeoff performance while increasing speed, range, and climb. The Hawker Beechcraft Corporation seems to be a very large and well known company. If you are looking at different aircraft to either purchase of fly, I would suggest that you look into the HBC.

They Said the Sky Was My Limit, Now It’s My Point of View

So they say the sky is my limit, but now it’s my point of view. This photo reminds me every time that I fly. Just look at this view. You feel like you can do anything, you are absolutely free! When they say bird’s eye view this is exactly what they mean. When somebody can look at this and receive the most amazing feeling of beauty, passion, and sensational freedom from the everyday, “Oh you have to move in this direction!” it is just absolutely amazing. Direction and isolation cease to exist up in the sky. There is not one person that I know that has never thought about living up in the sky some day. That is pretty much everybody’s dream. The moment you lay your eyes on a bird soaring through the sky, most people, like myself, begin to think about how they would love to have that same freedom that that bird has. To just wake up every morning to twist, turn, dive, and move in any such direction that we please without the environment around us is telling us we can’t do that.
Thought some of you may be asking, “Why would the photographer choose to take this photo?” I think the photographer wanted to have their viewers see their point of view too. There are some people that will never have the luxery to fly whether for recreation, business, or just to get from place to place. This photo shows those certain people what it really looks like when you are looking from the opposite direction of everybody else around you. Most pilots, such as myself, like to think that we have the greatest job in the world. Our office has the best view anybody can possibly imagine. “Living” in the sky is and always will be my most adored dream and soon reality.

Attack in Libya

Okay, well, I know this topic doesn’t really have anything to do about Aviation but, this does pertain to the “what’s going on around the world” topic. As you may have heard there was an attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya the other day due to a video that was posted, by a priest in Florida, on YouTube. This priest, last year, had made some nonsense about burning the Quran, which of course caused a stir. Anyways, this video was then translated from English and cause a huge fuss over in the Middle East which lead to extremists attack the US Consulate. Four Americans died, including Chris Stevens, our US ambassador for Libya. He was supposedly a very well know guy but I don’t see why this one guy was a huge deal. Who really is Chris Stevens? What accomplishments did he have? Also, what exactly is an ambassador? An ambassador is basically a representative of their home country, though they are in another country, trying to keep cultures and relations strong. Another question that occurred to me is how in the world could somebody be so devoted to their religion, faith, or social group go as far as to kill people, due to the fact that they didn’t like something those people had done? Talk about going to the extremes right! In my standards, I wouldn’t ever be able to kill somebody because I can’t even stab a straw into a Capri Sun! But then it occurred to me that nobody was saying who exactly did do the bombing of the Consulate. People are wondering who do we blame for this tragedy? And then you have people like me, where we are asking, “What exactly is the difference between an Embassy and a Consulate?” and, “Why was the ‘consulate’ the target … what was it’s purpose behind bombing there?”

Cool Video

I thought this was a really Cool Video! This video not only gives you a neat perspective of many different airlines, but also gives you a little information about a few of the airlines that do business around the world. One piece of information that this video gives you is that Delta Airlines is the largest airline company, to this day! Some day I would like to fly for commercially and possibly, internationally, but hopefully that isn’t just a pipe dream! Time and hard work will tell. Also, this video tells us that Asiana Airlines was thee best airline back in twenty ten. I am pretty sure that if you had the best airline in the world, you would feel pretty proud of yourself! Especially if it is put in a video to music like this video plays! To own my own airport or airline would be absolutely a dream come true! I definitely need/want to get quite a few years of piloting under my belt before that happens but some day I would love to own my own airline company! Though, the experience of piloting is my most important goal at this point. Just being in the air and living life, free as a bird, now isn’t that everybody’s dream? You would certainly think so. It is just the best feeling in the world taking off for the first time, looking over the horizon while sun sets on empty blue skies. Now THAT is nothing that can be beat!

Terminology

I would like to start off with giving you, as a reader, a few general aviation terms that are used around the world, coming from the BBC guidance listings.

AOC – Air Operators Certificate, this is issued by a state’s Regulatory Authority when they are satisfied that the operator has all systems, process and procedures in place to carry out normal Public Transport flight. If a company has an AOC, they will normally satisfy all BBC basic requirements in relation to Aerial Filming

Pilots Licenses – These in three categories, Private (PPL), Commercial (CPL) and Air Transport (ATPL). For Aerial filming purposes only CPL & ATPL license holders can be engaged.

Public Transport – Companies who operate under a Public Transport category in regulatory terms are the most stringently controlled and regulated, therefore offers the highest level of safety. Companies which have an AOC in the Public Transport category should be used for aerial filming purposes.

Let’s begin with the AOC (Air Operator Certificate). This certificate serves the same purpose all around the world. Every pilot must have this certificate in order to do any sort of aerial operations. For the beginner pilot, training for their Private Pilot License (PPL), you must:
– train for a minimum of 40 hours of flight time (10 of those solo)
– have some ground schooling, and
– fly for three hours with an FAA Flight Instructor, and
– finally, pass a written exam
After doing so, and passing, you will then recieve your PPL and also your AOC. Flying is not cheap, therefore, you WILL need to have a budget between two thousand and fifteen thousand dollars. This money will go toward the rental of the plane, the time put into flying, and the fuel. The cost of obtaining each certificate and licenses all depends on where you go and how long it takes you to learn all of the material and master the material. With the PPL, you will be able to fly for recreation and/or pilot for a small business. Typically though, with only a PPL, jobs, like Aerial Photography, are the most common. Anything higher you will then need to move up the ladder, as they say, to receive a higher ranking Pilot’s License and Flight Certificate. If I haven’t mentioned already, these licenses and certificates are no different than  your driver’s license. You will need to carry them at all times!