Nine Months

I know what you are thinking, but 9 months is also the time between our pilot training cycles. I guess the FAA/Company figures that 9 months is just enough time to forget almost everything you know. They know pilots are lazy so they must be tested so they will study again and again. When I was a new hire that really wasn't the case with me because I did study more between recurrent training. Now, I find it very difficult to sit down and read this same ole stuff after 6 years of the same aircraft. It will put me to sleep in a heartbeat. I tell myself I know the important stuff. And I do, because I use it everyday. But what about the other stuff that you need when the going gets tough. That is where our excellent ground and simulator instructors come in. They keep us up to date on changes and what is important. We talk about incidents and accidents that have happened and how to avoid them in the future. We fly every kind of approach and emergency situation in the simulator. Even though we will probably not see them again until next year at the schoolhouse. There is probably going to be some experience that is not normal in a 30 plus year career. That valuable sim may make your decisions easier, or it might save you and your passengers life. That is why we spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to train just one of our pilots. For that one moment in time when we will need it. My moment happened last July out of DFW. It was 11pm and it was our first day flying together and our third flight leg. It just happened to be the Captain's first trip off of his Initial Operating Experience. That means right out of Captain training. He had been an FO on the S-80 for 14 years. So he had lots of experience in the right seat. This time he is in the left seat making the big bucks and the big decisions. We had an engine fire light come on at 600 feet above the ground. We handled the emergency the way we were taught. We were on the ground in less than 10 minutes. Everyone was safe and as it turns out the reason for the fire indication was a bleed air leak. There was not a fire. There was very hot air leaking into the Engine cowling. Things went well, but it wasn't exactly like the scenario's in the simulator. Our training certainly helped us stay calm and complete the proper actions. I was never nervous or worried. Just busy doing my job.

After recurrent training is finished I feel a certain sharpness and excitement about getting back into the books. It is stressful to put your license in jeopardy every nine months. It makes us better pilots. All that knowledge is stored into our gray matter. It is like insurance. Just in case we need it on a cold, dreary, wet, night.