Contact phase of 60 training started two weeks ago. Classes began before that, but we only got as close as cockpit training devices and disassembled models and pieces. Two weeks ago, we began flying the real thing. Each of us has something over 10 hours of stick time now. The check ride is Monday.
In that time, the 24 of us have had the following incidents. Two people broke the tail wheel locking pin. They were given the broken pins in the expectation that they would be worn on the same chain as the dog tags. I have had jet fuel spray into my face. It does not sting the eyes. After a trip to HAZMAT (to turn in all the clothing that contacted the fuel) and another to Central Issuing (to replace said clothing), things continued as normal. One guy in class had three aircraft fires in two days. All were on the ground and relatively minor; his crew was issued another aircraft each time and they were still able to fly.
Today, the aircraft in front of mine in the traffic pattern had an actual engine failure. With the weather we’ve been having and the minimal loads we demand of the aircraft in training, it was easily able to sustain flight and land the aircraft at the stagefield without further incident.
In the event of a precautionary landing (it would have technically only been a forced landing if continued single engine flight had been impossible), all other aircraft stay put. The ones on the ground stop, engage their parking brakes, and wait for clearance to move. The ones in the pattern, like mine, simply fly goarounds continuously until we get clearance to land.
The air traffic controller at the stagefield was not prepared to deal with an emergency. In the confusion following the PL, he cleared an aircraft to take off just as another was performing its goaround overhead. The pilots noticed and avoided a midair collision by over 200 meters. That margin was deemed unacceptably close by every person concerned.
Flight school is safe. Every building on post is named after a dead aviator, but the information panels describing them are full of tales of their valorous deeds in combat. It wasn’t until I got to this basefield, where the Army’s been training its utility helicopter pilots for the last 40 years, that I started noticing placards with the words “Killed in Training.”
Sometimes it hits you that the risks associated with your profession may not be trivial.
Well, if anything does go wrong, at least you get a building named after you.