Today was the first flying lesson in Ireland. I thought, this might be a good start for a Blog, as the training will probably take longer... But maybe I should start from the beginning.....
Ten years ago, I started my first attempt to do a Private Pilot Licencse for European Countries (PPL-A). This one was denied due to the fact, that with hearing aids someone needed to fail immedeately. Also I had visual problems not meeting the given requirements...
For different reasons I gave up for nearly ten years doing the licence in Europe.
On April 13th 2013 legal requirements were changed completedly by the European flying authorities. And believe it or not for one time in favour of private pilots...What happened, is that hearing aids are authorized and visual restrictions downgraded, so about three weeks ago I finally passed my medical class 2!!
The next step was to find a school, where to do the licence. Due to legal restrictions I need to do a full licence again even having already experience. My decision was quite quickly made to turn over to Atlantic Flight Training Academy (AFTA, www.afta.ie) in Cork, Ireland.
This decision had several reasons:
1. Nice and very warm welcome since first contact
2. Help in any kind of question
3. Situated at Cork International Airport (EICK), which has quite a huge traffic. So trained from the first day to taxi, start, land, etc on a busy airfield.
4. Not so far from where I am actually living...
So what will I have to fence?
- 45 hours of flying and
- 20 hours of theory....
- Loads of procedures to learn
- the whole airlaw and air restrictions in Europe to learn
- absolutely stunning views of Ireland
- a huge amount of money to pay (which is the main reason why it will take longer to do the licence)
And so today was the big day. I went to AFTA this afternoon and made my first instructor led flight. So one hour (plus briefing and debriefing) of pure joy. Didn't do that much, as it is quite a long time, that I sat as commander on board in an airplane... But things will probably evolve in the next couple of months.
I will blog over my experience each time I got a flight lesson. How often this will be mainly depends on the financial situation. But I will try to do 2 lessons / month. So updates should come every two weeks.
Here some pictures about, what are the views from app. 3000 ft in the sky. All pictures were taken with a smartphone (sorry for the quality....)...
