Becoming a Flight Instructor
by Graham, 3rd April 2021
Flight Simulator Fairoaks Airport.
Opening as a private airstrip in 1931, Fairoaks Airport (EGTF) has gone on to have a rich 90-year history - creating numerous commercial pilots, engineers, ground crew, and other such aviation-related careers. Those of us from Airline Experience, as the latest addition to this rich history, want to share and record our time and progress here at the airport. This blog is written by one of our Directors, Graham, describing his time instructing at the airfield.
How did I end up Instructing at Fairoaks Airport?
As a freshly qualified Flying Instructor in June 2014, now I was outside of the comforting world of flight training, it all fell to me to find my direction. I donned my smartest attire and got into my car to visit every airfield I could find in the Southeast UK. On arrival at the Flight Centre, Someone directed me to the primary office where I met Paul, who is mainly responsible for starting my career being paid to fly.
Our main point of discussion was the Safety Pilot role on the King Airs, leading to a phone call a week or so later asking if I would assist on a day trip to Le Mans for the race. An early alarm call and a great day out followed; the Captain at the time, Chris Rand, remains a great friend of mine six years later.
Unbeknownst to me, after this flight, my CV was picked up by a chap called James, a best friend I hadn’t met yet working in the Synergy office who thought I looked like I was worth a try. He brought me to the company owner’s attention, who I ‘happened’ to bump into a week or so later on my next trip in the King Air. A discussion was had, and suddenly I had a job as a Flying Instructor!
What’s it like being a Flying Instructor?
Flying instructing was never part of my career plan as such. After a year or two of unsuccessful attempts to break into the airlines, it was a path I chose to go down to make myself more employable. I found a course (my Flight Instructor course was conducted at Stapleford Flight Centre, by the absolute Flying Ace Keith Pogmore) that developed my skills as a Pilot, gave me more confidence in aeroplanes, and fitted a mindset of strictness in myself that prepared me to go into a job where skills and currency became my responsibility, gone are the days where an instructor is checking me out every 40 or so days, now I was that instructor.
The day to day job is hard work. There are no two ways about it. You are flying 6-7 times a day with minimal breaks in between. The absolute godsend is the student’s mid-way through their course that you can send to check the aircraft so you can wolf down some lunch. You get used to it, and after an initial month or so of exhaustion, it becomes one of the most rewarding things I have been lucky enough to do. Anyone reading this that calls themselves an aviator is familiar with the utter bliss and gift that is flying, the ability to not only enjoy that for me but to be able to give that to someone else by taking them from no experience to seeing them holding their licence is a joy I was privileged to behold.
The next advantage to instructing is that it does teach you the patience of a saint, and I mean that. There will be naturally gifted students, soak up everything you say, and be the most comfortable people to teach how to fly. Some do not possess the same aptitude. All students will make a mistake at some point, and you will calmly allow them to make it to a certain point where you must intervene. The more instructing you do, the further you will let them take these mistakes as your experience of the exact moment a mistake becomes dangerous is widened. But there will be students who just struggle to get certain things right, and this is the part that will teach you your Buddhist level of calm and patience. They are the ones who will push you to find their way of learning. This is an exciting concept to grasp because it forces you as the instructor to admit (to a point) that if your student does not understand something, it is down to the way you are teaching them. It is your responsibility to figure out how best to teach them. Are they practical learner? Or do they need a bit of ground school? To summarise this part of the blog, the experience I received being a flight instructor was crucial in my progression into Business jets and Airlines. I would not be where I am without it.
Stories that stand out to me
It was a warm summer afternoon; I had met my student who was there for an hours trial lesson, the first flight on a journey to the Private Pilot’s licence. On Departure from Fairoaks I heard those dreaded words over the radio for the first time; “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, we are a formation of two aircraft and I have just witnessed my number two have an engine failure, I cannot see him and I must return to our airfield due to low fuel” We were heading towards the South Coast so I said to the radar controller that we would head towards the aircraft last known position to have a look.
After 10 minutes of circling, my student spotted a downed aircraft in a field surrounded by a group of interested but slightly bewildered cows; we discovered that the pilot had been trying to reach the radar controller, but they couldn’t hear him. We acted as an aerial and relayed his exact position and phone number to attend the emergency services.
The next time I was tested, I was on a navigation exercise with one of my students, Geoff (who now has a share in an aircraft at Fairoaks), toward the end of that summer. We were around the Petersfield area when smoke started coming out from behind the switch panel of our PA28; it’s incredible how quickly my mind went into ‘cinematic mode’, my first thought was ‘, this isn’t happening, this doesn’t happen to me’, after that half a second of disbelief two things popped into my head, the first - I need to make the smoke stop. The second - point the aircraft somewhere I can land if it doesn’t.
I put us on a heading towards Goodwood, which was our nearest airfield, making sure at every point we had a field we could dive into if we needed to. I made a ‘Pan’ call (which let air traffic know we had a situation of urgency on board), and I put the 7700 (Emergency) code into my transponder for the first time. It is incredible how making that radio call and entering that code makes you feel safe and looked after. You know that even in the worst-case scenario, help is coming. I turned off all the electrics until the smoke started to subside, then turned the radio back on to find the radar controller advising me he had pre-notified Goodwood of our arrival and to call them on the radio if we had time (The beauty of these emergency calls is that it can get people working for you on your behalf so you can concentrate on the issue at hand).
We were on the ground three and a half minutes after the initial smoke came out of the panel; it all passes so quickly yet seems like an age when you’re in the situation; it is impressive how your mind can process so many bits of information in such a short space of time.
To Summarise
I mention a lot when advising those in an early stage of their training or careers that every door that has opened for me I have walked through, unexpected though they have been, I have regretted none of them, and they have all been fantastic experiences. There are so many more names not mentioned in this blog of people I met and still have close bonds with. One of the many reasons Fairoaks was a no-brainer for basing our simulators is the community feel and long term friendships we have formed as part of this airfield. Long may it continue.
Purchase a flying experience in our Boeing 737 Simulator at Fairoaks Airport and try for yourself here. We can offer training and experiences from both our Boeing and light aircraft sims and can’t wait to meet you! But stay, before you fly with us, grab a coffee from either SEMET Aviation or the Fairoaks Café, enjoy a walk around the airfield looking out for all of the different species of birds and wildflower and enjoy the entire Fairoaks Airliner Experience.
Thank you for reading. Please do get in touch.