Upper Heyford

Here it is, the place I’ve been living since November! My flat is on the  second floor and is the one on the end on the left. Doesn’t look too bad in the sunlight, though it’s a bit more gloomy in the middle of winter!

Also, here’s a photo of the old ‘Skyking’ cinema from the US military days. It’s just one of the many old buildings that give Upper Heyford it’s unique charm! There’s a memorial website with a lot of information and many more photos at this address http://www.raf-upper-heyford.org/.

Back to Oxford

After an enjoyable couple of weeks away from text books and online question banks, I arrived back at Upper Heyford today to prepare myself for Phase 2 of Ground School! It feels strange saying that I will be going in to Phase 2 when it only feels like yesterday that I got here, though it is in reality 4 months ago. Another new class starts tomorrow, they will be the fourth to have started since we arrived. It’s a great feeling as the next big milestone for us is Arizona now, and I’m already counting down the days, 95 by my reckoning!

I also popped in to the school today to collect my results for our Phase 1 JAAs, and here they are:

• Principles of Flight – 95%
• Airframes/Systems/Powerplant – 93%
• Instruments/Electronics – 94%
• Meteorology – 97%
• Human Performance & Limitations – 97%
• VFR Communications – 100%
• IFR Communications – 91%

That means I have an average of 95% for Phase 1 which I’m very pleased with. My only slight disappointment would be IFR Comms, as it was a relatively easy exam and I was aiming for 100%, but at the same time 97% in Met is a surprise, and so I guess these things just balance each other out. Anyway, the overall result is a good one; the task now is to keep the momentum going into Phase 2 and keep that average where it is.

We pick up seven new subjects going in to Phase 2 which are as follows:

• Mass & Balance
• Performance
• Operational Procedures
• Flight Planning & Monitoring
• General Navigation
• Radio Navigation
• Air Law & ATC Procedures

It looks like there’s going to be a lot more maths involved with some of these subjects as they tend to revolve around flight planning, and performance calculations. However, everything should be a lot more practical and relevant to what we’re going to be doing in the cockpit so fingers crossed it may be a bit more interesting! I’ve attached a couple of photos of the books that we’re going to be using, including a close up of some charts from the Jeppesen  Student Pilot Airway Manual. Can’t wait to decipher those!

Finally, it has been really nice to have a break from the hard work of Ground School. Most of my time has been spent relaxing with the simple pleasures of the TV or even my XBox which has been in storage since I moved to Oxford. I also got down to Swansea last weekend and saw a few friends which was great, and then got back on Monday which was my birthday. Although I spent most of the day driving, we went for a nice family meal in the evening, and it was nice to see everyone, especially people I haven’t seen for a long while.

London, Carrow Road & Duxford

It’s been a busy few days since we finished our exams, though for once it’s been because I’m having fun rather than doing work. Thursday night was party night as a few of the boys headed off to London for a night of celebrations. Thomas and I caught the megabus which was about an hour and a half’s journey, but was cheap and took us straight to the centre of town. Without saying too much, we visited a few bars and a few clubs and a great night was had by all! Although I did completely forget  the tubes stop running at midnight so me and Thomas had to walk to Victoria (going past a deserted Buckingham Palace). We managed to just about find the bus and run for it, and arrived back in Heyford at around 4 in the morning. Out of bed then at 8 for the journey back home, and a nice dinner at my sister’s in Norwich.

I then made my first trip in a good few years to Carrow Road on Saturday to watch Norwich take on Yeovil, and absolutely hammer them on the pitch! Honestly, I’ve never seen such a one sided game of  football, our keeper only had one shot to save the whole game and we managed to stroll to a 3-0 victory. Not only that, but Dee, my sister’s fiancée, bumped straight in to Delia Smith and her husband as soon as we entered the ground! It was a great day altogether, finished off with a meal at Chiquito and a Sunday of Playstation 3 at Holly and Dee’s house.

Then today, me and a few of the guys from AP308 headed out to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford to have a look at the huge selection of historic aircraft they have on display. As well as sights of the de Havilland Comet, the Vulcan, the Viscount, the Shackleton and the flying Fortress, we were able to climb on board Concorde 101. It was amazing to see such an important and captivating piece of aviation history, and having a look around inside was something I never thought I would be able to do. We also got a  great view of the cockpit. It was a great day, and we were even able to relate some of our newly discovered aviation knowledge to what we saw!

Perhaps a few quiet days now before I head off to Swansea on Friday for a week of fun!

One Step Closer…

…to Arizona! As of 1 o’clock this afternoon I’m a free man for two whole weeks! The last of our exams were today which means we have completed 7 of the 14 required, assuming that we pass of course. It’s a nervous wait for our results now which we won’t get for a couple of weeks, but I am feeling pretty confident about everything so I won’t worry myself too much. It would be great to score in the 90s like I did for my school exams, but I know I made mistakes here and there, so we’ll just have to see. Anyway, there’s nothing I can do about it now! It’s a very strange feeling not to have any work to do as it’s all I’ve known for the last few months, and it’ll be hard at first to shake off that feeling of guilt when I think I should be doing work!

The best feeling is knowing that when we come back to Oxford on 22nd March we will be students in Phase 2, and from that date it’s almost exactly 3 months until we are on a plane off to the States. In fact, it’s pretty much 3 months from today that we’ll be finishing our second lot of JAAs! I really hope these next couple of weeks go quickly as I’m already eager to get started on our next subjects!

To celebrate the end of our exams a few of us are off out to London tonight, which will be great fun although I will be catching the bus back to Oxford at about 3 o’clock in the morning so I expect to be a zombie for most of tomorrow! I have plenty of time to recover though, and I really am going to make the most of these two weeks of freedom!

Margaritas and Enchiladas

It’s the night before exams and after a rather busy weekend it’s nearly time to get some sleep. Well, I still have a bit of ironing to do but after that maybe…

Last night was good fun; the dinner at Pedro’s was brilliant, although I did eat a bit too much and I think everyone drunk a bit too much as well! Also, the show was fantastic, and I was surprised to see the role of Marius played by none other than Gareth Gates! What surprised me even more was that he wasn’t actually that bad either.

Since then it’s just been a day of travelling and more revision today. I am prepared for the Principles of Flight and Systems exams in the morning (at least I hope I am) followed by a nice afternoon of revision. The biggest thing keeping me going at the moment is knowing that after tomorrow I’ll never have to do Principles of Flight again!

Revision

Despite being at home and all the distractions it presents, it’s been all work and no play for me this week! I came home on Friday afternoon after our final de-brief and have been sat at my computer revising ever since. As well as the resources that Oxford provide us with, we are able to access a database provided by Bristol Ground School (at a cost), which is actually made up of the same database of questions that the JAA use. It’s a very useful resource as it gives us great practice at answering the kind of questions we’ll be faced with in the exams. It is frustrating at times though, and with 5000 questions to wade through it’s a long, slow process too. Managed to complete all the questions once through by the end of yesterday…and started from the beginning again this morning! Hoping to complete each section again before the relevant exam, which means a few more days of hard work ahead.

One good thing to look forward to; it’s my sister’s birthday at the weekend and on Saturday we’re off to a Mexican restaurant in Norwich called Pedro’s and then off to the Theatre to see Les Miserables. Should be a nice break from revision. After that, it’s back off to Oxford on Sunday and the first of our exams on Monday morning.

Flying at Oxford

An example of the kind of thing I’ll be doing in a year’s time. For this landing I was sitting in the back seat. The aircraft is a Socata TB20 and we’re landing at Oxford Airport (EGTK).