A day in the life of a CTC cadet pilot

Well, my Module 1 mock exams are over and I now have just under two weeks until the real things, so this will be my last post for a few weeks. I realised earlier in the week that I hadn't yet actually made an entry on what I get up to here at CTC's ground school; so basically, here it is:

A day in the life of... me.

The Nursling Crew Training Centre

I live in Ashurst in the New Forest, maybe a mile or two down the road from Lyndhurst, one of the main areas in the New Forest. We are about 7 or 8 miles from the Crew Training Centre in Nursling, meaning we don't have to leave until around 8.30am.

Usually we start work at 9am, where we will be in the classrooms or, if very lucky the simulators; normally we have short breaks for a drink and a quick chat throughout the day, as otherwise you find that you're struggling to concentrate and getting a bit fidgety. There are several ground school instructors who are pilots, engineers, or military - they all teach more than one subject, so we meet them a few times throughout this phase of training. Most of us take in a laptop or an iPad so that we have question bank (a major tool along with CBT on our course) for when we have a spare five minutes. At first I found myself writing pages and pages of notes in class, although I realised a few weeks in that creating a supersize novel of all things aviation wasn't really going to help me - we are given handouts for our folders which are much more helpful and detailed and are fantastic for when you need to brush up on a certain topic or subject.

For lunch we either take our own or can purchase the CTC green tokens which entitles you to the canteen lunches. These are really handy, as it means I haven't got to get up really early to make a packed lunch, as well as carry it around the building all day! When we have finished eating, we head back up to a classroom where we either do a bit of work or relax a bit before work continues!

The earliest we have finished so far is 3.30pm, although that was due to us finishing a topic earlier and expected; normally we finish around 4, but the latest I have left so far is 7pm (although that was due to a sim session).

When we are back home, there really is very little time to spare as we try to use every last minute for work. As I have mentioned, at home we have the CBT, question bank and try to find various books and websites to explore and try to get as much knowledge in our brains as we can - the difficult part is trying to put something in without something else going out!

I really cannot think of anything else to add, so I'm going to leave it there and get back to revising!

Nearly there

My desk! All this paperwork makes it feel like a real flight deck...

Well, with Meteorology finished I have just started Air Law. This is a subject where it is just a case of learning everything, even though the syllabus is constantly changing. I am going to be doing this topic for the rest of this week before moving onto Communications next week... and then it is the mocks (yes, already!). Although a very scary thought I think that they will be good to give me a rough idea of just where I am and where my strengths/weaknesses are, so I can scratch up on certain subjects before the actual exams in the beginning of May.

CP104 started their Mod 1 exams today and it is very scary to think that we are the next to spend a week slaving over "A, B, C and D". After the mocks what happens is we have between 1 1/2 to 2 weeks to revise like crazy to make sure we are totally ready for whatever the CAA throw at us. During this time the instructors are fantastic, in that should we need any extra help on something, they are more than willing to give us the support we need to get the best pass possible.

Some of the best tools of the trade

I had hoped by now to have been to Bournemouth on a CBT day in order to shadow a cadet doing their IR (instrument rating), although I'm pretty sure I'll wait now until the Mod 1 exams are over and go towards the beginning of Mod 2, when I won't feel as guilty about going! It was mentioned by Nic (one of the ground school instructors) that it is possible to backseat in the full motion sims in the evenings whilst some cadets are doing their AQC (Airline Qualification Course), so I might try to do this at some point in the next couple of weeks. Expect more updates soon!

The motivation.