1st Year on the 737

Well, that went fast. I have already completed my 1st year on the 737!

First things first, I would like to apologise to everyone who has sent emails over the last year or so. I have completely dropped the ball on this front, and I must admit that I was not checking them. I guess life got a bit busy, and this fell to the wayside. However, I am as passionate as ever about people not paying extortionate fees for flight training. Over the last few days, I have reconnected and tried to catch up and respond. If I have missed yours, please resend it, and I will get back to you.

There has been an influx of sponsored flight training programs. I would recommend that anyone eligible apply for all of them.
Tui MPL
Speedbird Pilot Academy
Jet2 FlightPath

For those of you finishing training, recruitment is still the best I have ever seen. Hopefully, this means that you can find a flying job quickly.

I can see it has been over a year since my last post. There are many reasons for this.

1. Most flights are very similar, and you would get bored if I made a post about every flight.
2. The last year was spent completing my type rating, line training, recurrent training and studying the company manuals. This was on top of a very busy summer of flying.
3. This was always supposed to be a training blog. I guess it is harder to find enough topics to speak about post-training. To be honest, I am still a bit surprised that so many people have told me they have read my ramblings.
4. While it would be nice to share more, the views on these blogs are my own. It takes careful planning to create posts that only share what I should.
5. I never actually realised it had been a year.

As things stand, I have just short of 600 hours on type, and the flying is a world of difference compared to what I was doing on the ATR.
The ATR was short hops from the UK to destinations in the UK and near Europe (Ireland/France), with flight times of 1-2 hours.
On the 737, I have done positioning flights as short as Birmingham to Manchester and scheduled flights as far as Manchester to Cape Verde, with a flight time in the region of 6 hours.
With my airline, the destinations have been the typical holiday destinations around Europe & Africa. Think Canary Islands, Greek Islands, Cyprus, Egypt, Tunisia, Cape Verde, Croatia, Spain, Portugal, to name just a few.

I am close to having the hours to unfreeze my ATPL, I currently have just over 1200 hours total time. Unfortunately, COVID set me back in regards to flight time as I spent most of 2021-2023 out of the industry. I returned to IT due to my previous airline putting me on unpaid leave.

 

Questions that I have been asked.

Do I still enjoy the job?

Absolutely! I can not imagine working in an office ever again. The views, the people, my colleagues and the aircraft all make the job very enjoyable.

Hardest part?

Late night finishes. I am a morning person; I would much rather report at 5 am than finish at 3 am. Landing at 3 AM took some getting used to.

How is the 737 to fly?

I like it, it’s weird as it is a bit of a relic from long ago (obviously updated), but it is a very hands-on aircraft, and in many ways it is like flying the twin you did your CPL/ME IR on. You take the autopilot and autothrottle out on final and fly it the same way you did your MEP.

What is more challenging to fly? The ATR or the 737?

Good question! They both have their challenges.
The ATR is a very advanced turboprop, but it is no match for the 737 in terms of automation. For instance, it has no autothrottle.
It had huge propellers, so slowing down wasn’t an issue; you had instant power available, and the sectors were also much shorter, so you never had as much downtime in the cruise between takeoffs and landings. I would say the workload was higher on the ATR.
The 737 is a jet, so descent planning is much more important.  It won’t “go down and slow down”, so again this adds to the workload.
The engines don’t react instantly like they do on a turboprop, so you need to be on top of your speed, as you can’t instantly recover by putting the power on like you can on the ATR.
There is more automation, but the systems are more complex.
They both have their challenges. I would not say either of them are “easy” aircraft to fly, but both were very rewarding for different reasons.

Do I enjoy working for my airline?

I understand I haven’t named them, but yes, I enjoy working for the company I am now with. We have a good route network and a good company culture.

Any plans to change type?

No time soon. While we work hard on the 737, I do enjoy the amount of time that I get to spend at home. I am sure if I were younger, the allure of a hotel on a beach in some exotic destination would be more tempting. That said, never say never, the widebody aircraft do have their appeal. On top of this, I have already done 3 type ratings, and to be honest, I am not in a hurry to do another one.

Best View?

I love London by night. It’s an amazing city, and there’s no better feeling than coming home after a long day out.

Next goals?

My next target is to unfreeze my ATPL and build my flight time on the 737.