My helicopter FI course – Part I by Helen Krasner
It’s many years since I qualified as a helicopter instructor and nearly as long since I thought about my Flight Instructor (FI) course in any detail. But I was sorting through some stuff recently and I happened to come across the detailed diary which I kept during those weeks. The diary reminded me of just how hard I found that course. Indeed, it was probably the most difficult few weeks of my whole flying career. I wrote about it...
Degraded Visual Environment training
Rotary flight training school Helicopter Services is launching a new training programme aimed at equipping pilots with new knowledge and techniques for dealing with flight in a degraded visual environment. Flight in a Degraded Visual Environment (DVE) is unfamiliar, can be extremely challenging and ultimately lead to an accident, explains Helicopter Services MD and chief pilot Leon Smith. “By understanding planning, avoidance and...
Unexpected problems for students
After you’ve been instructing for a while, it can become fairly routine for most of the time. You give pretty much the same briefings for each flight exercise, although you may adapt them a little to suit the individual student. And, especially in the early stages of flying training, teaching the actual exercises is fairly similar with every student. For each manoeuvre, you go over what to do, you demonstrate, then you let the student...
Instructor Notes – Helen Krasner
How to handle flight test nerves Aviation must have more practical tests than just about any other career there is. From PPL, through CPL, FI rating, IR; then there are type ratings, revalidations and renewals, check flights… The list is endless, and it doesn’t stop even when you qualify and get a job as a professional pilot. So, if you suffer from exam nerves, flying training can be very difficult. Written ground exams can also cause...
Empire Test Pilot School Take Delivery of New Aircraft
The Empire Test Pilots’ School, ETPS, at MoD Boscombe Down has begun taking delivery of its new fleet. The first Airbus H125 helicopter decorated in the new ETPS livery has arrived at Boscombe Down, to join the school’s modernised air fleet. The H125 joins the new Grob 120TP fixed-wing aircraft, which has been flying from Boscombe Down since November 2017. The school’s new Pilatus PC-21 has now also joined the new ETPS fleet. A...
