I was born on Veterans Day. My mother calls me each birthday and says that she remembers the day I was born: “Today is a beautiful clear day, just like the day you were born,” is how she often begins the conversation.
My 29th birthday was not a beautiful clear day. I woke up at a quarter to seven, looked out the window, and felt my heart sink: wind, rain, clouds. Not a chance of flying. My 3-hour first lesson was cancelled. Of course, the first lesson is not 3 hours of flying. A good 1.5 hours of that is paperwork and regulations, neither of which is affected by the weather.
There are two different courses you can take to become a private pilot, as recognized by the Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR).
FAR AIM: An early birthday gift from a friend
FAR part 141 is a professional training course that utilizes an FAA-approved curriculum (it primarily provides regulations of flight schools). FAR part 61 is an unstructured avenue to take lessons that will eventually lead toward a private pilot’s license (used by people who want to just take lessons, or who want to convert from a helicopter to a private pilot license). I am pursuing FAR 141 because I prefer a structured approach and because my employer is willing to reimburse some of my flight-related expenses, provided they follow a curriculum format that would fit with the company’s tuition-reimbursement program.
I began by purchasing an entire kit of curricula and instruments. I was a little wary of this. Did I really need all these books and instruments? It was heavier than my high school book bag.
I felt like I was in a position to be taken to the cleaners. I knew nothing about how to become a pilot, so I could easily be suckered into purchasing just about anything. After a little discussion, though, I decided it was worth it. Glen had come with me, and we made it my birthday present.
I then headed to the back of Dulles Aviation with Lucas for paperwork, which took about half an hour. I now have an entire file started on me! Then we took about an hour to go over regulations, and the course of study. One item that was particularly interesting had to do with flight patterns.
Lucas explained to me that when taking off, I would always fly to the left – in a counter-clockwise pattern. This made sense, until I realized that on my discovery flight we had flown to the right. I asked him about this.
Manassas Regional Airport has two runways.
On my first flight, Lucas and I took off from the short runway (Left in the diagram). Apparently, you fly in a pattern to the right when taking off from the shorter runway. I felt a modicum of pride at having noticed the discrepancy between the diagram and what had actually happened. I also wondered how this would work for my next time up. . . I had a little reading to do.
