I
In
October of 2006 14 year old Kevin La Rouche became the first student graduate of
the flight simulator program at Orville Wright Middle School
to fly a real airplane. Kevin
completed task one through for during the first semester of the course, logging
about 50 hours of simulator time before taking his first real flight.
During the flight Kevin had an opportunity to demonstrate the knowledge
and skills that he had acquired during flight simulation training.
Kevin used the same Cessna 172 that he used for training in class.
His instructor was Ismar Avdic, an FAA certified Flight Instructor, and
was asked to write a brief report on his students flight.
Kevin joins over 30 simulator program graduates to continue their
aviation education in a real aircraft. Kevin's
father joined Kevin and his instructor on his first flight and snapped these
photographs.
As a professional pilot
and certified flight instructor, I teach at many flight schools in the Southern
California area. Recently I became
involved in a special project that started at Compton airport with young people,
ages 9 through 15. The Flight Sim pilot program by Barry is the simulator training program that not
only teaches kids how an airplane flies, but more importantly, teaches them how
to fly a real airplane.
Last Sunday I evaluated
a young gentleman, Kevin La Rouche, on his first flight adventure in a real
Cessna -- 172 M. As with my experience with all of the kids from this program,
Kevin had a good level of aviation knowledge and had developed good flight
skills in coordination and control of the airplane. In general, flying the real airplane has not been a problem.
For this I have to give credit to the Microsoft flight simulator software
and Mr. Barry Trop for these achievements.
During Kevin's first
flight he exhibited a good understanding of the primary for components of
flight, and he was able to control the airplane by himself during the taxi, take
off, and climb configurations of flight. Kevin was able to establish the
airplane in level flight and hold altitude.
He showed me that he was able to maintain airplane pitch configurations
for climbs and descents. It is
amazing to notice that Kevin had no doubts or concerns about flying a real
airplane versus flying the flight simulator.
From my personal flight training experience I can state that without the
simulator, this level of flying skills takes from 10 to 15 hours of instruction
in a real aircraft to replicate what Kevin accomplished on his first one hour
flight.
It is my great honor to
salute these young aviators and their goals of continuing their aviation
education with this program.
Again, congratulations
Kevin, good job pal. Keep working
hard!
Ismar Avdic CFI
