Pilot Course

The BHPA Club Pilot (Novice) rating is only the start of your flying career. Anyone who is still a CP a year or two after qualifying, is in our opinion not taking their flying seriously.

We consider the skill level after qualifying with your school to be the same as when you'd just passed your driving test; you've only learnt enough to get through the test - you still don't really know how to drive properly. A few years, several dents and a couple of crashes should sort you out eventually, but surviving flying crashes isn't quite as easy as that.

As a Club Pilot, your BHPA third party liability insurance doesn't cover you if you fly away from a BHPA registered club site. So if you fly XC, it's like driving with no insurance - it's your risk. If you accidentally flew into restricted airspace and were caught you could face a fine of up to £5,000. Do you have enough money to pay compensation to someone whose aircraft you caused to crash? Any serious injury or loss of life could cost you and your family hundreds of thousands of pounds or more.

So, having had your CP rating for a while now, you're getting a bit more serious and want to become a true 'pilot'. You now want to learn properly and stop being considered a novice. This is normally achieved within your club environment over time with dedication, but a lot of people find this difficult to achieve because of work and family restraints. This is where we come in; we offer the whole package in one box.

In order to become a true Pilot, you will need to learn how to navigate, read aeronautical charts and learn much more about Meteorology, Air Law and Flight Theory, not to mention improving your flying skills and learning how to climb in a thermal*. Still interested? Read on.

The object of this course is to get you to do all the various practical tasks necessary for you to be awarded your BHPA 'Pilot' rating. It will involve flying at several different sites to get all the tasks signed off.

To qualify for this course you will need to have a minimum of 25 hours (more is better) airtime since achieving your Novice Pilot (CP) rating.

The course will include the following:

• A copy of each of the following books:
  • Mark Dale's 'Pilot Handbook'.
  • Brian Cosgrove's 'Pilot's Weather'.
  • Trevor's Revision Notes

• A copy of each of the following videos on DVD:
• Jocky Sanderson's 'Security In Flight' .
• Jocky Sanderson's 'Speed To Fly'.
• Jocky Sanderson's 'Performance Flying'.

• Three days flying to hone the following skills (the day and the order we do them will obviously vary according to the weather conditions of the day):
  • Develop your skills for strong wind take-off and landing.
  • Work on improving your turns to the point where you can demonstrate controlled 360 degree turns in both directions including turn reversals.
  • Take a look at your top-landing and slope-landing skills and improve them where necessary.
  • Practice spot landing techniques to enable you to land exactly where you want to - whether that's on the top of the hill, the slope or the bottom. This will involve improving your ability to judge your glide angles and sink rate and vary them as needed.
  • Try to fly as many different sites as possible to enable you to practice your site assessment skills and work on improving them if necessary.
  • Work on improving your ability to fly competently and safely in the company of others, ensuring you maintain a good lookout and comply with the Rules of the Air whilst also exhibiting good airmanship skills.
  • Work on the full speed range of your glider so that you will be able to safely demonstrate slow flight awareness and discuss the relevant symptoms and dangers involved in so doing.
  • Practice 'big ears' so you will feel comfortable with weight-shift steering while they are in. Discuss when it is safe to use them and when it's not and the reasons why.
  • Learn to maintain directional control whilst showing recovery from tucks of not less than 50%.
  • Discuss the techniques for avoiding and recovering from stalls and spins; and emergency rapid descent techniques like B-line stalls and spiral dives.

• One two-hour lecture on each of the following subjects:
  • Airlaw.
  • Theory of Flight.
  • Meteorology.
  • SIV and emergency techniques.

• Plus the following to finish:
  • A one-hour pre-exam Q&A session.
  • A one-hour & 45 minutes exam session.
  • The BHPA fee to mark your exam paper.

All flying will be under radio guidance where necessary (a radio will be supplied if you don't have one) with pre & post flight briefings.

If you already have any of the books and DVDs we will discount the difference.

The cost of the course is only £550.00. However, you will need to discuss this with our CFI before you can enrol. We've had people in the past apply to do this course, only to find they are not even up to our CP standard.

* Thermalling is a separate skill and is not needed in order to achieve Pilot rating. Once you've gained your Pilot rating, joining us on one of our foreign flying holidays will be the best way to learn how to climb in a thermal properly.