Pilot's Licence

[Ellen]

I have noticed several people here that have had pilots licenses or still do
and i thought i would ask

[Sandi]

Mine expired many years ago (never mind I'm not dating myself).


Sandi

[Debtv]

I love flying!!!!!!!! While flying you are in control of your destiny!

[Sarah_Faith]

Im still certain to this day that Ill at least get my private liscence

[4years]

I can't say I've always wanted one. But I do joke that I'll get a pilots license before a drivers license. I'm too insecure in my abilities to think hard on that though

[Susan]

I had a A Masters License for boats. The license allowed me to pilot commercial boats which carried passengers.

[beth]

"I said "hold on, i've got a licence to fly" and the caddy pulled over and let us by"









beth

[Ellen]

oh i should have mentioned i started to get my private license while in the airforce , got ten hours logged but then was transfered to a base without a flight school or aero club , i think it was because people tended to shoot at low flying planes near that base.

[stephanie_craxford]

As an ex paratrooper, I had lots of take-offs in Aircraft but not many landings.  I was always amazed watching the pilots fly when they invited us forward into the cockpits.

[Chaunte]

I love flying.

There is nothing like the smell and feel of a grass runway.  It's so much better than flying on hard, lifeless concrete.

An AA-5B Tiger is a poor-person's fighter plane.  Fast and light on the controls.  Just don't let the speed drop too much on final, or the short wings will drop you like a stone!

The C23 Sundowner is big and slow, almost 20 knots slower than a Cessna Skyhawk witht he same horsepower.  But it's comfortable.  There's elbow room!  It's a womderful platform for earning your instrument ticket.

I think every pilot has their favorite plavce they like to go when times are gray.  With your indulgence, I would like to share mine...

I was on the third and last leg of the long cross country flight I had to make as a student pilot.  The day was hot, hazy and humid.  By the time I left Watertown NY, I had enough of the heat, so I decided to climb to where the air was cooler.

It was a long climb in a Cessna 150.  By the time I reached Oswego at the SE corner of Lake Ontario, I had finally reached 6,500 feet (2 kilometres).  I turned west towards Rochester and home, then looked carfully at the vista before me.

The CN tower and Toronto was distant, but clear.  Lake Ontario was a silver shimer, made so by the lowering sun.  The Finger Lakes were spread out before me.  The Catskills to the south were green and lush.  Below me, the green checkerboards were every shade of green you can imagine.  The sky was cloudless and bluer and more vast than anything I had ever experienced before.

And for this one moment, all the world was perfect.  I was looking down on the Earth much as the Almighty sees it.  It was simple and pure, something to be cherished and not abused.  A great gift given to humanity; our one little green and blue speck in the universe that we can call home.

When I lifted off that morning, I was mistress of my destiny.  When my wheels finally touched down on the grass, I knew I was but a single part of something much larger.

I go here when I need to see beauty.  I go here to remind myself that we have a great gift that was given to all of us.  I see here that the great array of differences, combined together, make us so much more than the sum of the parts.

I go here to remind myself to cherish each other, and our home.

I wish you clear skies.

Chaunte

[Debtv]

Chaunte! What a lovely post!....and so true! To love flying is hard to express....but you did touch it with your words...thankyou~

Love
DebTV

[RachelW]

I'm instrument-rated and earned my commercial pilot certificate in July of 2004. I have a little airplane of my own, a Diamond Eclipse, that I zip around the midwest in. I've also done a little bit of seaplane flying, which is ridiculously fun! But my favorite flying experience was taking off at night into a low cloud deck. I took off and was in the clouds almost immediately. After climbing for a few minutes, I reached the top of the layer and saw the puffy, unbroken clouds beneath me, glowing from the light of a full moon. I was only a mile away from Earth but I felt like I was on another planet.

[Chaunte]

Flying at night is beyond words.  It's like flying through space in your own private starship.  Being "on top" at night really does give an other-world feeling.

I miss it soooo much.

Rachel, don't ever stop flying.  Once you stop and the funds start going elsewhere, it's almost impossible to start again.

Chaunte

[Northern Jane]

1980, trained in a Citabria - WAHOO!

[Debtv]

I just re-read this forum and have really enjoyed it...

Chaunte, what a cool post. What I see is a flight. In the air.....

I love flying....have you seen the....

Rainbow's Secret
*I climb into my craft and buckle up tight,
looking forward to the feelings of flight.         
Set free from the ground, I will soon be
back into my element where I'll be free.
*As I rev the engine and start to roll,
my perspective changes and time starts to slow.
The craft and I become one, one soul sky bound,
as we skip across the grass and lift off the ground.
*Our thoughts are as vivid and clear as the sky
contentment floods us as we tell the Earth bye.
Up, and up we climb, sleek, smooth and strong,
this is our element, our home, where we belong.
*The air is crisp and crystal blue,
so alone, so beautiful, so reality true.
Look! A band of clouds!  mmm an adrenaline sensation,
Sky castle clouds that need exploration!         
*A field of clouds never flown before,
we bank their way and listen to our engine roar.                 
Floating, like cottonballs hanging from a string,
we wonder what mysteries they will bring.
*They are round, misty, orbs of moisture floating free,       
and range in size from a big barn to a small city.
Truly big, round, raindrop castles all fluffy white,
each one hangs motionless, framed in it's own skylight.
*We fly into the flock of clouds, for a friendly visit,
and smoothly bank around one and just barely miss it.
Flying as close to the clouds as we dare 
our wings cut and slice through the morning air.                     
*We aim for the biggest round cloud, and shadows grow,       
with the sun behind it, the edges all glow 
We fly out the shadow into the golden sunlight,   
and the cloud explodes into the brightest white.
*Slipping between the canvas of cloud and the sun's glow,
we see the secret of the rainbow that only pilots know.
Painted on the cloud is a circular rainbow, perfectly round,
inside-blue-green-yellow-red-outside, a secret we have found.
*In the center of the rainbow is a dark blue shadow of us,         
surrounded by a round, flying rainbow that's glorious!!
Rainbow and craft fly across the white clouds face,
We fly together in formation, a head to head race!             
*As we bank around the cloud, the racing round rainbow,
flies into the lofty clouds mist, and now we know.
We know about the rainbow, we know why we fly,
it makes us one with wind and clouds, one with time and sky.

Love
DebTV

PS  know it a poem.....but very revalent

[Chaunte]

Deb,

What a beautiful poem!  It says so much, and more!

I have seen the rain- and snowbow circle my craft,
and touched the cold, crisp, winter air high above the ground.

I have raced the snow squall to the runway and met midfield,
and we called it a tie.

Fields of snow have passed beneath my wings
that turn mahogany brown with the spring's planting.

My craft has said, "Let's run and leap and play!
Let us dance among the clouds!"

And she has said, "Please take me home..."
And wondered if her wheels would ever touch the runway again.

By God's dear grace, I have felt the wind in my hair,
As four Pratt and Whitney's pulled us through the air.

I have stood at the waist-gun and top turret, too
And understood what the "Mighty 8th" flew through.

My home is not here, not on this earth.
Here, I am but a visitor.

My home is on the winds and clouds and stars.

Chaunte

[Cassandra]

What is it about the sky's that pulls us toward them so. I have had scant few hours behind the yoke but those few were so magnificent I can't even begin to describe them. Your poems are so poigniant. It is said that we are made of the stuff of stars. I am always reminded of the poem they used for a sign off before cable and satellite made TV a 24 hr deal.

I have slipped the surley bounds of earth and touched the face of god.

Excuse me now, I have to get a tissue for my misty eyes.

Cassie

[Chaunte]

Cassie,

I believe that this is the poem you were referring to.

Chaunte

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there

I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -

And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee
No 412 squadron, RCAF
Killed 11 December 1941

During the dark days of the Battle of Britain, hundreds of Americans crossed the border into Canada to enlist with the Royal Canadian Air Force. Knowingly breaking the law, but with the tacit approval of the then still officially neutral United States Government, they volunteered to fight Hitler's Germany.

John Gillespie Magee, Jr., was one such American. Born in Shanghai, China, in 1922, Magee was just 18 years old when he entered flight training. Within the year, he was sent to England and posted to the newly formed No 412 Fighter Squadron, RCAF, which was activated at Digby, England, on 30 June 1941. He was qualified on and flew the Supermarine Spitfire.

Flying fighter sweeps over France and air defence over England against the German Luftwaffe, he rose to the rank of Pilot Officer. At the time, German bombers were crossing the English Channel with great regularity to attack Britain's cities and factories. Although the dark days of the Battle of Britain were over, the Luftwaffe was still on the job of keeping up the pressure on British industry and the country.

On September 3, 1941, Magee flew a high altitude (30,000 feet) test flight in a newer model of the Spitfire V. As he orbited and climbed upward, he was struck with the inspiration of a poem -- "To touch the face of God."

Once back on the ground, he wrote a letter to his parents. In it he commented, "I am enclosing a verse I wrote the other day. It started at 30,000 feet, and was finished soon after I landed." On the back of the letter, he jotted down his poem, "High Flight".

Just three months later, on December 11, 1941 (and only three days after the US entered the war), Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee, Jr., was killed. The Spitfire V he was flying, VZ-H, collided with an Oxford Trainer from Cranwell Airfield while over Tangmere, England. The two planes were flying in the clouds and neither saw the other. He was just 19 years old.

[Cassandra]

That would be the one. And thanks for the background story on that too. I did not know it's history.

Cassie

[unicorn]

WOW... what an amazing experience y'all describe! I want to learn now...



tell me: what is it with tg and flying?
I've never met so many pilots together in my life...

does flying give you a different perspective on the world?

or, as a tg pilot i met in Amsterdam said: "nah, it's the oxygen deprivation when ur up high that f***s w/ ur brain"


(I'm inclined towards to former answer, btw)

anyway, I've just received info about the nearest flight school to my place... so... (yeah, as if, no time, no money.... but it's good to have dreams, right?)

cheers
Alex