SurClaro Flight Simulator Resources

Posted: Sat May 06, 2006 7:51 am Post subject: Pilots pastime?

O.K., I would love to know what airline pilots do on really long flights. Once everything is just right, what's next? Sudoku? Landmark spotting from 35000'? Browse Surclaro on the laptop? And another thing. Does an airline pilot have his/her meal right there in the cockpit or do they actually go sit down somewhere else to eat? I guess "spilling a coffee on the dashboard" gets a little more serious when it's a 747. Laughing

Posted: Sat May 06, 2006 9:20 am Post subject:

On long haul flights pilots are allowed to do everything that doesn't interfeer with their abilities to stay focused and spot a problems within the reasonable amount of time. Reading a book is one of the more frequent things....newspaper too, and stuff like that. Listening to the music is a no-no as far as I remember....
Most of the times, on flights over 6 hours the relief crew acompanies the pilot and the copilot....so normally, once settled on cruise, the crew is replaced, and then goes to the cabit for a rest (where everything is allowed....)
On the other hand, meals in the cockpit are also performed....there is a picture of it that I saw once....in a 737-300 classic Smile

And about the cofee....well, just don't spill it Very Happy

Posted: Tue May 09, 2006 11:40 am Post subject:

i've seen a picture of an LA-class nuke sub cockpit, it had a beverage holder (which atm held a cup of coffee) next to the big red "nuke em' " button Razz

Posted: Tue May 09, 2006 7:14 pm Post subject:

LOL, I guess an aircraft or submarine is the last place you want to hear "Ooops"! Shocked

Posted: Wed May 10, 2006 2:11 am Post subject:

it is
and its probably as common as saying roger
no joke i am a pilot and it ooopps is like common practice

it takes a lot of mstakes before you have a problem
or one uncorrected mistake

Posted: Mon May 15, 2006 11:51 am Post subject:

I have to say, meals are important on long flights. Pilots have to have food to recover their energy and stay focused. They need some way to keep themselves entertained so jet lag doesn't fatigue them too much. For example, in your car on a long trip, you have a radio, CD, or tape goingthe whole time. Or just the pilots carrying on a good conversation about the plane they're flying. But once again, they cannot lose focus.

Posted: Mon May 15, 2006 10:43 pm Post subject:

I dead headed home on a Boeing 767 (in the jump seat) I'm a CRJ pilot so I'm not used to REALLY long trips. The captian used the SAT phone to do an interview with an AM radio station when flying over the toronto area.

Thought that was sorta funny.

Posted: Tue May 16, 2006 2:30 am Post subject:

LOL, got me smilin'. Laughing

Posted: Sat Nov 25, 2006 4:17 pm Post subject:

I know for myself when I was flying, I always listened to the ADF on a local radio station for as long as I was in range. I flew helicopters for a major oil company in the Gulf of Mexio for over 10 years both simple and complex aircraft. The average day was between 4 to 6 hrs flight time of which you were actually in the seat for 8 to 10 hrs. Hot as hell in the summer because some genious thought a black heliport deck was a good idea. No a/c in the aircraft because it robbed power. You just had to sweat it out.
We also talked a lot on internal freqs to keep each other (different aircraft) alert. My favorite was flying IFR because I could get cooled off and I loved Instrument flying anyway.
Bordom and complacency was the biggest killer. Also inexperience. A lot of good pilots tried to over extend themselves by getting into bad weather and wound up loosing it.
Civillian flying is a whole different world than the military. I enjoyed both but had more fun shooting rockets at night. Nothing like flying at 140 kts tree top level. Now that was REAL flying...

Posted: Sat Nov 25, 2006 6:50 pm Post subject:

Amen to that lol Laughing