Week 85: just me and the skipper

As line training has continued from my base at Gatwick, I have been able to visit more airports in the European network. At the beginning of the week I had to days with a return flight on each, both still with a safety pilot riding on the jump seat. This is standard practice during the early stages of line training, and the safety pilot acts as a safety net to catch any missed SOP's during the operation. it's all well and good to say that the Captain should catch any slips, but in the early stages of training they are working quite hard already, so building in extra redundancies is nothing but sensible! Following my second day round trip to Seville in Southern Spain I had (thankfully) proven that I could operate as part of a two person crew, so was released to continue training with just myself and the skipper. 

Yesterday I had quite a busy day to use my new responsibility, doing a return to Basel and also a return to Barcelona. Basel was an interesting start, as there are many threats to be considered ahead of the approach, the most significant being the high ground which surrounds the airfield. Given there was quite a lot of low cloud the terrain wasn't visible, so maintaining the correct track was of vital importance to avoid a rather undesirable situation. 

Barcelona shared some similar threats, with high ground a major cause for concern. Added to this is the threat of birds flying close to the approach given the position relative to the Mediterranean, and the shear size of the airport itself means the taxi route can be pretty complex and getting lost is a fairly easy! To make matters worse I had briefed for the precision approach but on being transferred to approach the I was informed the ILS was switched off due to calibration,  so quickly had to set up for a non-precision approach, brief it, then fly the approach itself. To say my workload went through the roof would be an understatement, but any sort of experiences like that during training can only be good for my learning. On the way back to London we had an incredible view of these lenticular cloud as we crossed the Pyrenees, an indicator of wave lift which is perfect gliding. 

I had another early flight this morning, this time down to the town of Montpellier in the south of France. The day however didn't get off to the best start, as congestion in the skies meant we had a 30 minute delay from air traffic (a slot), so would be starting behind schedule. If that wasn't bad enough, the bleed function of the auxilliary power unit (the APU which is a small engine in the tail which provides electricity and pressurised air) failed so we lost all air conditioning in what was an already cold aircraft. The bleed air is also used to start the rotation of the engines during start up, so without a fully serviceable APU we wouldn't be able to leave. The solution was to use an external unit which is specifically used for starting the engines, but inevitably by the time it arrived and we had worked through the procedure we had been delayed further. That said, I learnt a lot getting to perform a non-standard procedure, another benefit towards my training.

Tomorrow I fly to Bordeaux and back, which will be my 19th and 20th sectors of line training. Sector 20 is significant as it is a progress check point, and my Captain is in fact the Gatwick base Captain, so i'm sure he'll put me through my paces! The reality is I shouldn't be worried but instead continue to do things exactly as normal. If I start changing things that's when i'm going to make mistakes, so ill avoid that at all costs.