Flight Simming

The cravings to fly are getting worse.

I just located the flight simulator where I work and paid it a visit yesterday. It was heavenly. Absolute bliss. And actually you know what was even better than finally getting my hands on the wheel again? The look of absolute joy one of my students got after he flew. He's going to have that high all day. It's the best feeling to be able to pass on that type of excitement to another person. It was his first time ever flying (sim or otherwise) and his face just lit up like Christmas morning.

Enjoy it while you can. You were just given quite possibly the best and the worst addiction ever. ;)

In other news, my craving won't last long. I got in touch with one of the pilots after my last entry. He said I'd be welcome to fly with him, although he was doing his own training at the moment. That's okay - this month is pretty busy for me too. And I need to work on some more stuff on my own before then.

I was on the radios at the CAP last week. Had to cover for one guy who just didn't show up. It was okay - I got some extra practice in. Still a little nervous, but as Auntie says, that will fade in time. I practically made her come sit with me because the other guy was absent and I was too nervous to sit alone. I did end up calling out the wrong time because I had forgotten to take daylight savings time into account. Oops. No one else seemed to notice fortunately though.

The student who was on top of the world yesterday after flying the flight sim is still on top of the world today and is telling everyone who will listen about his adventures. The sim was on top of a platform that would move with it and they could simulate ANY condition you can think of - smoke in the cabin, bird strikes, snow, wind, rain, night, day, engine-outs... The detail was absolutely amazing. He also pointed out to everyone in the office that I crashed my plane during landing and he didn't. haha He was flying a Cessna; I was flying a jet with the majority of the instruments obscured. Which, I might add, made for very challenging conditions once the wind, snow and rain came.

I miss it. Even after 6 months, being in that chair made my body automatically respond to certain things - like staying straight and level with the pedals, and even using the trim. My students didn't know what trim was and for the little tiny exercise, they didn't really need it. My hand just went for the trim wheel by itself. "How do you know when to use that?" one student asked. The flight sim operator told him to let go of the wheel and if the plane moved up or down, to move the trim in the opposite direction. My student was afraid to let go of the wheel. haha That along should tell you how real it seemed.

I can't wait to go back again. Hopefully I'll get some real flights in as well pretty soon. At the very least, I know the aerobatic flight is scheduled for May 19th.