From the bottom up

Angel from Allentown, PA e-mailed me saying that he is interesed in obtaining his Private Pilot's License (PPL), but also wonders how exactly to start out.

Well, there's no one way to begin, so here's my story.

I was 12. It was my birthday. I think you can guess that it was a hell of a birthday for me. Since then, the agreement was that I can continue to fly as long as I bring home a great report card. The only thing that has changed since then is how often I fly. When I began, it was once, maybe twice, a month. Now it's at least once a week for two hours since I've moved up considerably.

When I started out, I was actually flying, not just doing paperwork in a classroom. Obviously the first thing I learned was the takeoff, but I think I stayed away from landings for a while. Landings are much easier said than done. When many students begin flying, they have the tendency to over-flare which leads to a harder touch down and possibly a bounce back into the air. Landings are all about timing and control, both of which can only be attained through sufficient practice.

Anyway, I think I started to do some manuevers before landings. Some of the manuevers scared the crap out of me simply because I didn't expect to do them. But I learned that it's very important to learn these manuevers like stalls, slow flight, steep turns, etc. immediately because you get the feel of the airplane more quickly. Before I get my Commercial License, I actually have to learn a few more like spins (fun, right?), lazy eights, and more.

For me, flying was a really long process since I started so young. It has only begun to pick up since I was 16. So, here are the minimum ages for each "level":

Solo (privilege, not a license or rating): 16
Private Pilot License and Instrument Rating: 17
Commercial License: 18
Multi-Engine: 18
Certified Flight Instructor (CFI): 18
Airline Transport Pilot: 23

The one of a few advantages to starting so young is that by the time you're 16 or 17, you already have the majority of the hours required for a license or rating, so there's no waiting. Because of that, I've gotten my solo privileges and my PPL license on or immediately following my birthday (I was able to fly alone before I could drive alone).

You actually don't need a lot of hours to get your solo. If you're 16 or you turn 16 during your flight training, many flight schools boast that you could have the privilege in a week.

After I obtained my solo privilege, I simply began to fly A LOT of cross-country flights until I turned 17 to build hours. Cross-country flights are not what you think. The term only refers to a flight 50 nautical miles or longer. That meant that Harrisburg, Williamsport, and Scranton/Wilkes Barre were popular destinations for me in PA. Other possibilities were the Jersey shore (Atlantic City) and some in New York state.

However, there were many restrictions to my solo privilege. For one, I couldn't go on a single flight without an endorsement from one of my instructors saying that he reviewed my flight info and has agreed that it is basically safe to fly the route twice (there and back). Secondly, the weather minimums were fairly high. If memory serves me correctly, I couldn't go if the cloud ceiling was lower than 3000ft and the visibility was less than 5 miles. Now I can fly in conditions under 1000ft/3 miles plus rain, fog, yada yada yada. Lastly, I couldn't carry ANY passengers, except for a CFI of course. If my friends or family wanted to fly along, a CFI would have to be present as well.

After one year and many hours later, I got my PPL license the day after my birthday. Now I could fly any single-engine plane that went on land (Cessnas, Pipers, etc.). I could carry passengers without a CFI. I could NOT carry passengers for pay, however. I no longer required an instructor to review my flight planning and sign me off. I still had weather minimums to obey, but they were lower than before. At that point, I could fly in anything down to 1000ft ceiling and 3 miles visibility. Although it was not recommended since those are still really low conditions, I could've done it (never did though).

Six months later, when I was about 17 and a half obviously, I obtained my Instrument Rating. This is what gave me the ability to fly in REALLY low weather conditions. Legally, I can go flying in 0 miles visibility with 0ft cloud ceiling (aka "zero-zero"). No catch either. Again, it's not recommended because it's simply too low. It's not a matter of whether I could fly the plane in 0-0, it's a matter of being able to land at another nearby airport (which is most likely experiencing the same conditions) if something were to happen. And you can't land ANYWHERE in the U.S. legally when the conditions are 0-0. Therefore, if I took off from any airport in 0-0 and I had a loss of oil pressure shortly thereafter, I'd have to fly to the next available airport which has weather conditions above certain minimums to conduct an instrument approach.

So that's where I am right now, and I spent 5 1/2 years flying to do it. Right now I'm just doing a lot of cross country flights to just gain a lot of hours for my Commercial License (need 250, I have 155). Once I've obtained that, I can finally "fly for hire". Afterwards, I just keep on working my way up.

Have another question? E-mail me at mike_stangy@msn.com