A promise

To the 0 readers i have haha, this is a promise to make more posts on this blog.
I usually just post stuff on my dailybooth, tumblr or facebook note when I'm lazy.

But as my final year as a student pilot comes to a near close. And so begins my journey of a commercial pilot, if I still have this, it would probably have more content of right now unknown things.

We shall see

Happy New Year!!

ONE presentation to go

I got one more 20 or so minute presentation on our applied research project and its progress so far.
then i'm free..

i also found this today

http://www.senecac.on.ca/school/aviation/irc/

I remember it being taken. You can tell that I'm smiling :D

AABI conference

AABI stands for Aviation Accreditation Board International
They have a conference from July 14 -17, 2009 here in Toronto/Markham and Seneca College is helping to host it.

I haven't really read much about them but I know that they have this conference twice a year and there are representatives around the world.

Part of their agenda today was a visit at Seneca College's campus at Buttonville Airport. I helped with the tour of the hangars and simulators around and I got to meet some people. They probably won't remember me but it's a good thing to volunteer for these kinds of things...networking is key!
The very few people in my group that I toured around came from Boston, Missouri, Seoul Korea, umm someone from FRASCA...and so on. Most of them are representatives of other aviation colleges/universities around the world.

I didn't get to take any pictures but it was a good experience overall. A lot of them were amazed at how many hours we get for our four year degree program for the tuition we pay...and that our airplanes are highly maintained, and our simulators are state of the art and available for use 24/7.

I was actually looking through the website of an aviation university in the states and they offer a Masters degree there in which I am currently interested in pursuing after (but maybe not right after) Seneca. However I am also thinking something along the lines of studying Meteorology further, because the weather is just an exciting thing to study.

Just this past weekend, the weather forecast was thunderstorms the whole morning. However, the thunderstorm (which was a good one) passed and was gone in about an hour or so..and after that it was blue skies (with some clouds of course). Which actually allowed our trip to Wasaga Beach near Collingwood with my family to continue and actually enjoy the sun...and just as we were leaving the cold front was approaching and more thunderstorm headed our way.

One thing I learned..weather can either:

get better
get worse
or stay the same--but not for long.

Finally done exams!

YES! It is true, the good news must be preached, I am finished second year exams. And now I'm left with the sad truth that I still don't have a coop position and the time is rapidly running out!
If I don't get a job and fail to go on my knees and beg to be on the flightline, I may have to stay an extra summer and not graduate with the rest of my class! Now that is sad...however I'm done exams and all I can think of is enjoying every minute of it!

Books to read, parties to go to, and all other shenanigans are all lined up for me...

Speaking of lines, yesterday weirdly enough while studying for Meteorology Exam, I happen to randomly look up in the sky outside my bedroom window and see contrails. There were two at the moment, one seemingly chasing the other.

A few minutes later I happen to look up again (we always look up don't we?) and see four contrails even though the first two were almost unnoticeable, it was still pretty cool as they were all parallel lines which were probably from the same airway/air route.

I learned that contrails are one of the many things that could help you understand how the weather is like aloft, even though it seems clear blue skies, it could help you understand on the ground how the weather will unfold in the next few days or so.

Contrails of the same route, meaning they are parallel to each other can give a good indication of winds aloft. If they break off easily, it means there are some pretty strong winds aloft...if they slowly shift to one side, it could be fairly light (light for that altitude) winds. And the way they move can give you an indication of where it's coming from or if there's some change in wind direction/speed along that route.

Another is when the contrails are long and seem to stay for a long time, that means that it's fairly moist in that atmosphere even though there are no clouds to be seen around. It could tell you that weather should be coming in soon or in a few days.
If the contrails are short and seem to stay just behind the aircraft, it could mean that it's fairly dry and probably very cold in that altitude of the atmosphere.

I think there may be more things that contrails can tell a pilot about weather coming up but I can't think of it or haven't learned it at the moment.

Goneometers, engines failure, and 5 babies!

So I had two exams this week and well one was quite interesting and the other saddening.
Tuesday a bunch of us went to this fairly new library which I always pass through but never noticed before. It was a pretty cool library, it looked so new and high class but I'm sure there are way better ones out there. I was never a library goer before but I'm definitely becoming more interested in them, besides they are free so why not!

Tuesday we studied from 1pm to almost 9pm talking all about Avionics. We had the exam the next day and I thought it was going to be okay. I turned the cover page and read the first question...what the ADF is a Goneometer!?!? Well most of the exam I knew what the question was asking but I don't know if I answered each question fully. Goneometer question...I took a wild swing at it and we'll see what happens in a few days.

From one exam to another, I had my Flight Propulsion or "engines" exam today. We learned all about gas turbine engines and we also had a pretty big project to do throughout the semester. It was a really interesting course and I'm feeling confident about the exam and nervous at the same time seeing as it is an ORAL EXAM. Basically, we go to see our professor (who happens to be a very smart person btw) and we discuss our project and pick one question out of a hat about anything we learned over the course. So I guess luck had something to do with it seeing as my lack of luck resulted in a question in which I did not study fully. I have studied every other topic except for this one. It was about fuel metering with plungers, I had the idea, except I had switched two variables. One variable was the result of the other instead of the other way around which I thought was correct and it wasn't. I also didn't do well on the project as I totally mistaken the whole point of the project and it wasn't specific and detailed enough for my engine.

With that, I'm here stuck with my very first engine failure...safely on the ground.
But hey at least I don't have swine flu ...err H1N1 influenza.

I wonder if raccoons produce a similar effect, because today 5 baby raccoons were extracted from my closed attic that is probably a couple of weeks old. The "exterminator" or "wild animal person" took the babies from the attic and placed them in a box near my backyard so that when MAMA raccoon won't go hiatus when she comes back with her babies gone. Hopefully she finds them in the backyard, relocates them and they become a happy family only to go through our trash in the future.

I love the wild animal guy's facial expression.

Avionics class

Today was another reminder why I don't like school that much. Talk about punishment or imprisonment, I (along with 40 others) had to endure 4.5 long, repetitive, monotonous hours of presentations about various navigational aids/systems.

I was one of the four more basic navigation systems that presented last week. They were:
ADF - automatic direction finding
VOR - VHF omnidirectional range
ILS - Instrument Landing System
EGPWS - Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System
MLS - Microwave Landing System

and today:
TCAS - Traffic alert and collision avoidance system
RNAV - Area Navigation
ADS-B - Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast
LORAN-C - LOng RAnge Navigation

it was actually quite a list of topics that we had covered in that class. Unfortunately, the sad undying fact still remains that we have to get examined on these system for Final Exam which is coming in about two weeks time.

I can't wait!

As for the weather, it looks promising at least for the next 7 days starting tomorrow.

With the news about SCV,
It was actually replaced with an engine that was suppose to go on another Bonanza in Maintenance so that they could fly it back here. Both the failed engines are currently being investigated by TSB and I believe, Continental - the maker of the engine.