It's not terribly often that a Boeing vice president discusses her maternal instincts in public, but the charming Marsha Bell (pic below), VP first officer program(me) at Boeing's Alteon training division was doing just that in London today. Let me explain...
Alteon is currently hard at work devising a programme to train pilots to obtain the newly developed ICAO-approved Multi-Crew Pilot Licence (MPL). This is a licence for which pilots would be trained from scratch to be qualified airliner pilots so long as they fly in a multi-crew aircraft - which of course they all do anyway. It's a very big deal in China and India because it could enable them to produce the staggering number of pilots that they will need over the next 20 years quicker than is currently possible. We've written about it in the magazine and will be doing so again a lot I suspect.
One oddity of the MPL is that there is no ICAO requirement for the pilot ever to fly solo. And, as a large part of the whole idea is to cut training time, Alteon don't really intend that their curriculum - which is still under development - will include a solo flight. Although their customers could request it of course.
Alteon are going to use the Diamond DA40 four-seat trainer for the early part of the course, intending that on each sortie there will be on board: an instructor, the primary student acting as pilot-flying, a student acting as pilot-monitoring, and a student observing. Arranging for a true solo would obviously be an interruption.
However Ms Bell concedes that individual airlines may well decide that the value of the solo is worth a little extra cost, and individual regulators may conclude that they'd be happier if everyone goes through that "rite of passage". She sympathises with them, commenting: "Maybe it is the maternal instinct in me but I want these guys to have a first solo and cut their ties. But people who are perhaps less emotionally engaged always explain to me that it is just not necessary."
And she reflects, that maybe actual flight-time is truly overated, saying: "I have been around simulators for about 20 years and there are plenty of times that pilots emerge soaked in sweat from the simulator with a renewed appreciation of what can go wrong."
Alteon's first MPL course will be run in Brisbane and, as it happens, the Australian regulatory authority - CASA - is still thinking about whether it wants true solos or not. Perhaps you've got a view on that - leave a comment.
As a pilot (albeit not an ATP yet) I think the solo is a vital part of training. It might not have any measurable benefit, but it gives a student pilot that much more confidence in the skills they are learning. Flying with somebody there to back you up is one thing, flying solo is another.
What about emergency situations? Even in a multi-crew cockpit, things can happen that leave one pilot incapacitated.
eric
In my opinion, it is very important for student pilots to experience their solo.
I think it is a mandatory part of basic pilot training, in which the student will gain confident and most importantly gaining skills in piloting the aircraft and make a decision in an emergency without someone sitting there and assist.
Multi pilot training can be designed as an extension of this basic training.
Taufiq Firmansyah
ohetothks666 http://ohetothks666.nu/
ohetothks666
As a multi - thousand hour commercial pilot, I feel certain that the experience of being alone at the controls when things are not going as planned, teaches the self disciplin and self control to maintain control of an aircraft. You can't learn that in a simulator. The sure certainty that you and others will die unless you get it right is never present in simulation. Solo flight also teaches the self confidence and self reliance you seldom need, but is absolutely required on those few occasions when the outcome of a flight is in serious doubt.
David Bodley
Please note that India already has thousands of unemployed pilots. They are struggling to get jobs. So, it is unlikely that a country of one billion people needs to expediate the pilot license training.
Devinder Yadav
I qualified as an ab intio Flying Instructor at a rather tender age and I have kicked out about three hundred rookies on their 'FIRST SOLOS' accompanied by their required dunking on their safe return. Then commenced my commercial Flying Career in the right seat of the venerable Fokker F27, which simply required basic Flying and Handling skills, no matter what your qualifications. The many 200 hr newly minted commercial pilots pilots I have trained on the right seat, gained an excellent appreciation for the 'real world' of flying. Progressing to glass jet cockpits, I was training a fresh from flying school, newbie one day, when we approached the holding point.......I called for a wind check......my newbie was busy hitting his FMC keys. Asked what he was doing, he stated, that he was 'looking' for the wind direction !!!!!! ? Huh.........heard of the windsock ?
I fully support the concept of the MPL,through properly and carefully thought out processes. But real flying, and being able to go solo, to the field beyond the horizon........and know where to look for the wind ?
and .....Look Ma No hands !
As for economics, the Airlines would do anything and everything in their power to cut 'costs', but let's keep things in perspective OK.
Siva
Capt K Siva Raman
Doing solo flights is absolutely essential. A pilot needs the confidence and decision making foundation solo flights build. An example would be a pilot-incapacitaion incident... (these do happen) will that be the young pilot's first solo experience?
Cost-cutting in safety must not get more ludicrous than it already is.
Mauro