Month: June 2007

The helicopter instructors at East Coast Aero Club spent today doing some recurrent training in simulated engine failures and 180-degree autorotations with a Vietnam vet who has tens of thousands of hours of helicopter time. For 25 years, he ran a helicopter flight school with a lot of Japanese students. “They would come to our school through the U.S. Commercial license and then go over there for about 10 hours of training and some ground school. They would take their checkride in an R22 and fail the first few times. Most of them gave up after that.”

How hard is the check ride in Japan?

“I would fail it,” this expert pilot said. “The checkride takes 2.5 hours and involves a three-leg cross-country. You aren’t allowed to use any navigation equipment. No GPS. No VOR. The instructor forces you to fly off course for 15 or 20 minutes. Then you have to use an E6B to calculate an intercept angle to the original course and figure out a new ETA and fuel consumption.”

You have to use an E6B while keeping your hands on the flight controls? “Yes.”

We went around the room. Paul said “I couldn’t use an E6B while flying an R22.” Joris said “I couldn’t use an E6B while flying an airplane.” I said “I don’t think I could use an E6B while sitting here at this conference table eating a sandwich.”

Now we know why it is rare to find a Japanese who is unqualified for his or her job.

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I’ve written two new articles on photonet:

• Canon 16-35 lens review
• Guide to Victoria Falls

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At a dinner party a week ago, a woman talked about one of her friends from professional school. He was the nicest guy in the world, friendly, optimistic, happy. Everyone was shocked when he married “a total bitch.” The marriage has now lasted 15+ years with no signs of friction.

I offered my theory: “Happy people can marry anyone and stay married. They are dating someone who isn’t so great, yet their mood is good and they don’t feel any strong motivation to change their circumstances, so they slide from dating to marriage. Fundamentally unhappy people, however, are always trying to change something in an attempt to become happy. They will break up with partner and search for someone new, thinking that a new partner will make them happy. They keep doing this until they are 40 years old and desperate, never realizing that it wasn’t their circumstances making them unhappy, but their genetics.”

[A more refined version of this theory could be “The ratio between one’s innate happiness and one’s expected happiness predicts the likelihood that one will marry young.” For example, if you are happier than average, but expect every day to be as fun as the best day of your life, you will keep searching.]

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From the June 2007 AOPA Pilot: Orville Wright quit high school after junior year. Wilbur finished four years of high school, but did not receive a diploma. Bill Lear (Learjet) also did not graduate from high school. Texas has more public-use airports than any other state, with 389 airports. Alaska is second with 312, then California with 263.

I spent part of today flying with a young U.S. Air Force officer. She has about 100 hours of airplane time and is completing an instrument rating. I introduced her to the Robinson R22 and she didn’t do anything clumsy or dangerous. For that I am very grateful. It is such a pleasure to teach people who are good learners and good pilots. You don’t have to work hard. You don’t get scared. You pat yourself on the back at the end of the day and call yourself a great teacher, taking credit for their inherently good flying skills and intuition.

Plan: Fly the R44 to the E 34th heliport in Manhattan on Thursday, dropping off a friend for a business meeting.

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