Pilot: Going Commercial 2

Hello steemites,
@ceepee will always be at your steemit door step to tell you about her life and little pilot world.
Couple of days back, I blogged about my experience into the jet world as a commercial pilot fresh from flying school. Talked about the ground, oral and written part and promised to tell you about the practical(flying) aspect.

As a pilot, for you to fly an airplane, you have to get rated on a type of airplane. B737-300/500 series was my first choice. As I was excited to be a jet pilot. It was so fascinating because I have always imagine flying the jet plane. The jet planes are usually faster than the propeller engine plane.
The B737 is quite a heavy weight aircraft and fast too. So training and trying to catch up with speed was not going to come easy. A lot can happen within seconds.

There are a lot to do. I was light weight, so I was really concern about handling the controls. I had to do a little weight thing to gain some extra muscles....hehehehe.
I got into the cockpit, seeing all these lights, switches was kinna confusing. I had to know the function of every light and switches. Well I already know them on paper, but using them is quite different than reading them.

There are the checks, callout and flows to know and follow. I had just 6 flight to learn( 1 hr per flight), then my checkride( test flight) and boom, I am certified to fly Boeing 737 300/500 series.
Now the challenge was though. First 2 flights dint go well at all. I could barely meet up with the speed, the controls were heavy, landing was terrible and crashing like it was my hubby( well thank God it was a simulator, so I didn't kill anyone....hehehehe).
I had these flight control yoke I would use to practice day and night. At last, it got better and I was up to speed.

Then it came to dealing with emergencies. My worse fear was the engine failure on takeoff. It is simulated, but I have to be able control the plane and be able to land without crashing.

Here it how it works, once you take off, one engine fails, you fly the plane with only one engine. First you adjust the power settings to one engine functionality.
Next you trouble shoot, to see if the power loss can be recovered, if not,You make a mayday call(emergency), inform your crew and your passengers and get the plane back for landing. All these have to be done in less than 1minute. Flying with one engine failed is every pilot nightmare. Is much more stress than you can think off. But as a pilot, you have no choice, you have to do it because it can never be ruled out.

Here i am, you can see me trying hard to get it right. These other 2 guys were my sim partners.
And the guy behind was the flight instructor.

Question people ask me every time is why would a pilot not know that there was a technical fault and decided to fly a plane that the engine fails after take off. Well, I do not think any pilot wants to end his/her life or career that quick. Neither would any one intensionally want to fly a plane with technical issues, just to show they are super pilot.
Yes experience helps to know how to control and take care of certain emergencies. But these things can happen anytime. Some common cause of engine failure after takeoff are birdstike or blockage of some sort. Which happens to 1/1000 by the way.
But as pilots, we fly safe, we take all necessary precautions for safety. We value lives. I still maintain, that flying is the safest means to travel and is absolute fun.

Entering the Jet world for me was though, couple of times during the training, I wished for many things. I wished I was bigger and had the weight to hold the rudder(one of the flight controls) to maintain a straight and level flight during engine failure. I wished I could walk away. But my $20,000 was staring at me and telling me you can't throw me away just like that. I had to do what I have to do. Practiced more on my spare time, gave up more hours of sleep. And finally, I made my check ride( flight test) on the 7th flight. I was in the jet world before I new it. It became easier as I started flying regularly. And now, it like a child's play.
Glad I got through.
Glad I am a jet pilot today

I aspire to be a being a beoing test pilot. I will workhard to achieve that. I think I just want to know what it feels like to stress the plane to its limits. Funny yeah....I guess my desire and love for risk taking got me into flying in the first place.

I hope you enjoyed reading my story. Will tell you more about flying and would love to answer your questions too.
Enjoy your weekend y'all