After a long wait and different problems, I finially
got started on the last part of my training (Phase
5b). This consists of a minimum of 5 hours in the
simulator and 5 hours in an airplane (at Røros).
I started the simulator part on Monday 14th at
Torp after NEAR had made an arrangement with Aviatraining
about the use of their simulator while they were
waiting for the NCAA to approve their simulator.
This worked out fine for me as I only had to go
to Sandefjord instead of Ålesund. I went down
to Torp together with Henrik on Sunday evening.
We got two rooms in a building with a bunch of helicopter
pilot students, which was about a 1 minute walk
from the simulator.
It's been a while since I've flown multi engine
(with exception from the MCC course which was simulator),
so I was anxious to find out how rusty I was. The
biggest improvement for me was to get my scanning
right again and the engine failure procedures.
We started Monday with an hour long pass to get
to know the simulator. It was a PA-34-220 Seneca
simulator with 220 hp turbocharged engines. It had
all the standard instruments as well as a DME, HSI,
RMI and a Garmin 430. In the first pass I did slowflight,
stalls and steepturns before I flew back to Røros
for some touch and gos.
The next day we had another one hour flight in
the area around Røros, this time IFR. First
a SID, then NDB holding at Rambu, QDR/QDM intercepting/tracking
and an ILS approach.
Wednesday I got the chance to join the flight deck
of Widerøes morning flight to Copenhagen
(more here) before I was
scheduled for the simulator. This pass was flown
as a cross country fram Værnes (ENVA) to Røros
(ENRO). First I got 4 engine failures on take off
at Værnes before I started on the flight plan
I had prepared the day before. When I got to Røros
I did an ILS approach with missed approach, then
an NDB approach before I ended it with a single
engine ILS approach.
Thursday was the last day on the program and was
scheduled for the progresscheck where instructor
Longva was going to decide wheter I was ready to
move on to Røros for the flying part. After
an hour flight with SID, ILS and NSB approach, missed
apporach and engine failure I was done with the
check and passed.
If anyone reading this is going to do the phase
5b, I strongly suggest to practice the instrument
procedures at Røros on MS Flight Sim. It
definitely helped me focus more on flying the plane,
not having to spend too much energy on the departures,
holdings and approaches.
Hopefully I'll start the flight training at Røros
on Monday, and the way the weather is forcasted,
it looks like I'll be able to finish quickly.
