Two simple words are surely not sufficient to express how it feels to watch as your dreams play out before your very eyes. Two simple words are surely not sufficient to describe the sensation of achieving something you were certain was out of reach. Two simple words are surely not sufficient to encapsulate the highs and lows of what went into eight years of hard work. Two simple words however, was all I was given by my flight examiner. In this case, these two words were sufficient. This time, these two words were “you’ve passed”.
At the end of August 2021, I took two weeks off from work to spend all my time at the airfield. I had the last few parts of the Private Pilot’s Licence syllabus to finish off and it was my intention to take my skills test to obtain my licence at the end of the two weeks. A seemingly perfect plan. In reality, it was going to be an almighty challenge given the unpredictability of the weather in good old Blighty.
Despite the intensity of the training, the time-pressures to get everything completed as well as the steep learning curve I faced during those two weeks, it was some of the most enjoyable and rewarding flying I have done to date. I completed my qualifying cross-country; a flight over three hours and 150 nautical miles where I landed at Lydd and Southend Airport. As I buzzed around the Kent countryside, I saw many of the places I had spent time growing up. That was special. I found that when you fly regularly, day-in, day-out, that is when you really start to build good airmanship as well as confident and safe practices. You learn from those around you and you become part of the culture. This is not to say that you cannot build this from flying more sporadically, but personally I felt real growth as an aviator through those two weeks.
It was the Wednesday of the second week when I was due for my mock test. The mock was run by my instructor under exam conditions to determine whether or not he was prepared to formally “recommend me for test”. It was an odd feeling. I’d been used to having a laugh with him on the ground and in the air, but the necessity to simulate test conditions took precedence. Being completely honest, throughout my whole training, I could not have asked for a better environment to learn. It was professional, safe and efficient, but not without a few laughs along the way. I had spent the best part of 40 odd hours squeezed into the cockpit of a C-152, side-by-side with my instructor. It was strange to know that he would now judge my flying for the purpose of an exam, rather than for constrictive feedback in the post-flight debrief. Besides some minor trouble finding my second waypoint on the navigation route, the mock test went pretty well and certainly gave me confidence ahead of the real one the following day.
To say I wasn’t nervous for my test would have been a lie, however the feeling was fleeting and only appeared to be the case up until the test actually started. Cliche as it may be, as soon as I got strapped in and put my headset on, I felt a sense of relaxation. I’d prepared for this moment. Mentally I’d prepared for a silly amount of time; physically, I’d worked hard both on the ground and in the air in the in the six months prior to this day. I was ready. No doubt I was talking far too much, pointing out every little landmark that we flew past. But this helped me and it showed the examiner that I knew what I was doing.
After the flight was done and we had shut down the engine, my examiner told me he would meet me inside in five minutes time. My head was spinning. I felt like I had flown well but was there something that I had missed that he was going to bring up the debrief?! I was more nervous now of being told that I hadn’t made the cut, than I was before the test started. After what I felt like the longest five minutes of my life, the examiner walked in. As casually as you would greet someone first thing in the morning, he shook my hand, smiled and said “you’ve passed”.
We had a good conversation afterwards talking about next steps but it all felt like a blur. All I wanted to do was throw my hands up and shout at the top of my lungs. I had taken my first flight over eight years previously. Since then I had been waiting for this day. Every move, every decision and every plan that I made, was with this day playing vividly in my mind. It was surreal. How can I even begin to put it into words?! The significance of this moment for me could not be understated. For the first time in a long time I felt a sense of a calm. A sense of fulfilment. A sense of genuine, true pride in what I had achieved. But this was by no means the end of what I sought; this was merely the beginning of an even longer road to attain something spectacular. I was one step closer to living the life I truly wanted to live.
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