My time in the Northern Territory comes to an end having accumulating 2005 flying hours
First up, working in the US obviously requires a work visa. I applied for and went to Sydney to attend my E-3 work visa interview at the US consulate. I was in and out within 30 minutes and after a quick trip to see the family and some friends I was back in Darwin the next day. My visa arrived two days later. Next up, submit my resignation, always awkward especially since I did love my job. Did my last two weeks and work put on a BBQ for me and received a gift from them. Chartair, will always hold a special place in my heart... OK, so packed up my stuff, saying goodbye to my friends and next thing I know I was in Sydney sitting on my American Airlines flight looking out onto the ramp prior to push-back.
I am not going to lie, it was definitely a hard decision to make leaving the country that provided me with so much opportunity to seek a new opportunity in the US. I arrived in LA and when I boarded my connecting flight to Salt Lake City, Utah I was upgraded in Business Class and who do I sit next to? A United Airlines Boeing 787 First Officer. Well we hit it off for the 2 hour flight and he was showing me all sorts of cool stuff on his iPad about the route he had just flown from London to Los Angeles over the Polar region. I was taken away. I told him my story and he was just so excited to hear about how excited I was and he recalled to me that where I was in my career was the favorite part of his. Little did I know it but ironically I actually saw this FO again when I was returning from Australia a year later to go back to work. I checked in with the crew up front as I was jumpseating and he recognized me straight away and we chatted for another 10 minutes. What a great guy!
Anyway where was I? OK, so into Salt Lake City I organised the Social Security card, bank account, phone number and whatever else I had to do. It seemed never ending as an expat all the run around you have to go through...
OK, so SkyWest. I showed up to my first day of CTP which is a transition program to allow GA guys like myself to get a feel for the difference between jets and and lower powered airplanes that I was used to flying. It was all about energy management, navigation (children of the magenta line comes to mind), scheduled 121 ops, CRM and of course three sims in the Embraer 175 jet. My sim partner a fellow Australian, Brady had flown in the Northern Territory and also in the High Country in Papua New Guinea, he was a very experienced Check and Trainer and I couldn't have had a better sim partner and friend. During our initial sim brief everything went in one ear and out the other literally... I specifically remember the discussion about Flight Path Vectors (FPV) but that is all I remember. Anyway we did our three sims which consisted of all phases of flight, slow speed events and dual engine loss turn-backs. It was all about getting used to the idea of operating with 2 crew, energy management and the amount of excess thrust available and how you manage that inertia. It was really fun and in the end we got to fly under the Golden Gate Bridge and under the Gondola at Christ The Redeemer. It was a great event and appreciate all the effort that was put into our training from the Sim Instructor Robert for his fantastic instruction and briefings. Completion of the CTP program was the first step into the transition of the FAA ATP Licence.
Brady sitting in the familiar left seat and me having just finished the CTP program
OK so the fun was done, now time for the serious stuff. CRJ Indoctrination and Ground school. First Indoc, this was a 4 day crash course on company Operations. It went through everything from Ops Specs, Flight and Duty, Instrument Procedures and Jeppesen reviews, Weather procedures, FAA 121 regs and International ops since we flew in to Canada and Mexico. It was an overload of information that had us present for 10 hours a day and then about 4 hours of self study at night. This was a lot of new information especially since I came from Australia with different rules, so adapting to the US system was a big deal. This culminated in a written 100 question exam with a pass mark of 80% which was tough, I scored 90% and was really happy about it. My sim partner scored 94%.
Next Systems, oh lord. This was two weeks of a non stop firehose of material and after the first week I was convinced I was going to fail. Prior to starting the Systems course, we were each required to complete 54 Computer Based Training (CBT's) modules detailing each of the main systems. I had never really completed CBT's before and it was an interesting concept of training material delivery which I really don't like but hey that's the industry we are operating in... This involved clicking through slides and answering questions, it took me 4, 16 hour study days to complete these CBT's and then the Systems ground school started... Systems itself was taught in sequence from Pre-flight all the way through to Post flight. It was an easy to follow method but wow information overload. It probably took me until day 10 for it to really start sinking in and for me to understand the content in some detail. Going through all the various manuals, classroom lecture style teaching, a Synthetic device to practice flows, an FMS computer lab to learn the FMS and then Performance classes... It was so much material in such a short time frame. Inside that two week period we were required to pass a flow validation to ensure we were competent on all our flows in the right seat, in addition to an FMS validation and Performance validation. These were all chicken feed compared to the big one... The Systems validation. Again a written test, 100 questions, pass mark of 80%. How did I go? I scored 92% and was literally over the moon. Needless to say my sim partner beat me again with 94% haha. That night culminated in copious amounts of liquor in a Mormon City, it was interesting but a great night. Next the FTD (Procedural Trainer) and then sims...
Certificate for completing the CRJ Ground School
SkyWest Class of November 15, 2017
My Sim partner, Brady in front of a CRJ 700
We had three FTD sims followed by a validation to see if we were competent enough to go to the Sims. The FTD's were glass panels of all switches, displays, Physical FMS units, Thrust levers and a Yoke and Rudder pedals. This is where we learnt to operate as a crew and be 100% competent on all our flows, checklist usage, CRM and handling minor malfunctions. It was a great training tool and our instructor was fantastic. We went to our validation and both scored a perfect result to progress to the sim sessions. Off to Atlanta we went...
We were scheduled eight sim sessions with a Maneuvers Validation on Sim five and a Type Ride on sim eight. Much like Systems, this required a lot of study so I went in knowing what I needed to do instead of being taught. We went over all in flight sequences, company profiles, Cat II training, emergency procedures, slow flight and the dreaded Cross wind landings. The CRJ's downfall especially the CRJ 200 is that the wing can make contact with the ground if the correct technique isn't followed. Anyway how did I do? It was a lot information to absorb learning the profiles, callouts and then actually performing them. It took me sim 3 to get comfortable with the airplane. It was obviously a lot faster than anything I had ever flown and the first 3 sims I felt behind the airplane. By sim 3 I was comfortable with the profiles, callouts, procedures and now finally the handling of the jet. By the time my validation came around I was ready! We completed 20 maneuvers, we were allowed two do-overs. On the second attempt of a poorly demonstrated maneuver it was deemed unsat and you went into Special Tracking program and had to redo the Validation with more training allocated. Obviously that wasn't something I was willing to comprehend. I came out not having to repeat any maneuvers and got a perfect score.
Our Sim Instructor demonstrating the 30 knot crosswind landing in the CRJ 200
Next up, Line Orientated Flight Training meaning how we fly the line in day to day operations. Our first flight was Denver to Salt Lake City, taxi, fly a complex SID, en route portion, STAR in to SLC, ILS approach, taxi to the gate type stuff. I thought this would be the easy stuff but there was a lot going on. It initially felt as if there was never a second to just take a breath haha. We had two of these sims and then our Type Ride. I had my TR with an Line Check Airman who had a bad reputation among the company pilots. His nickname was Terminator. You can imagine how much I was looking forward to my pivotal moment so far in my short time with SkyWest. It didn't start well, my paperwork was not quite right as I was doing a licence conversion. This actually worked in my favor though, because it gave us less time on the ground to discuss all the theory stuff haha. Anyway I get in the seat, meet my seat support who is a Captain based in SLC. We are ready for push. We taxi, depart, arrive, taxi in. It was all fairly non eventful with only minor failures and holding instructions. It was a walk in the park. I got my ATP! I made a lot of friends and had a great time in the SkyWest Airlines Training program. I am truly grateful to have participated in a high quality training system and credit to those that designed it! Next up line training and flying the line. Stay tuned!!
