Luke P's Senior Project Blog
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Project Title: The Road to Pilot Proficiency BASIS Advisor: Luke Calhoun Internship Location: Flagstaff Airport Onsite Mentor: Fred Gibbs |
Project Abstract
For my whole life I have desired to become a pilot, and recently I’ve been working on achieving that goal. For my project most of my effort will be spent on attaining a private pilot’s certificate. My flight instructor is Fred Gibbs, a gold seal CFII who has received a NAFI master flight instructor award. Gold seal requires a good pass rate of students on checkrides, and CFII means he is qualified to instruct for both private pilot and instrument rating purposes. I will gain the legally required 20 hours of flight instruction, 10 hours of solo flying time, 3 hours of night flying, 3 hours of simulated instrument time, and 3 hours of cross country. The FAA requires 40 hours to be able to attain a license, however in the modern era of aviation with more complex aircraft and airspace, most pilots get their certification in 60 hours. Beyond attaining a license I will be working to find the qualities that make for a better pilot
Preparation – Week 10 – 4/27/2024
Everything really feels like its coming together. These past 2 weeks I've been doing a lot of pattern work trying to perfect my landings and I really feel like I've been nailing it. I'm almost always on centerline, they're almost always smooth, my flare has gotten a lot more precise and I'm not floating my... Read More
Building Experience – Week 9 – 4/27/2024
After my first cross country flight my instructor and I did a few more cross countries together to help me get a handle on everything before sending me on my own. During that time I also buillt the time for my night experience requirements. I thought doing pattern work and landings at night was quite... Read More
Cross Country – Week 8 – 4/8/2024
Whenever I use the term cross country to people outside of the aviation world they always have this surprised look on their faces. At first this really confused me because I didn't think it was anything crazy but then I realized that when I say cross country, people thing I literally mean across the country.... Read More
Solo Practice – Week 7 – 4/10/2024
After my first solo my instructor determined me to be ready for unsupervised solos. Essentially what that means is that I can rent the airplane and go up on my own without needing an instructor there to sign me off beforehand. Unsupervised solos were one of my favorite parts of training because I would go... Read More
On My Own – Week 6 – 3/27/2024
In my opinion, the biggest step of flight training as a private pilot is definitely going up for the first time solo. I think a lot of the public doesn't understand that during training as a pilot, we have to fly a decent amount on our own. I believe that soloing is very different from... Read More
Patterns – Week 4 – 3/13/24
One of the hardest parts about learning to fly an airplane is learning to constistently make smooth landings. As part of our training we practice landings by flying in something called the pattern. It's really simple, its just a rectangle that we use to takeoff and return to the runway with. When we take off... Read More
Landings – Week 5 – 3/20/24
As a passenger of a flight when you're landing you only really think of one metric to judge the quality of the landing which is smoothness. To the pilot, there's a lot of other factors that actually matter more. For a little background, my dad is an airline pilot so I hear a lot from... Read More
Preflights and Stalls – Week 3 – 3/6/2024
Flying isn't like driving a car. We don't jump in the airplane turn the key and go like you might in a car. In a car, if you start driving and you have a leaky tire, it becomes a pretty simple matter of pulling over. In the air, we cant pull over to change the... Read More
Takeoff – Week 2 – 2/28/24
Flagstaff isn't an easy place to learn to fly. As you might have noticed Flagstaff is almost never without wind, and wind tends to add an extra layer of difficulty to flying. Along with that, Flagstaff is high altitude, and planes don't perform as well at high altitudes. The weather here isn't very flying friendly,... Read More
Learning to Aviate – Week 1 – 2/21/2024
Project Title: Learning to Aviate My name is Luke P and I've always had a love for airplanes. My dad is an airline pilot so I grew up around the aviation world and my love of airplanes has lead me to pursue a career in aviation. I someday want to become an airline pilot. In... Read More