Harry Hopkins/Prestwick
A change of name, often reflects a change in direction, which is why the British Aerospace Flying College at Prestwick in Scotland, has been renamed BAe Flight Training. It is part of the company's new global-training strategy which has already seen the purchase of Ansett's 50% share of the previously jointly owned school at Tamworth, Australia, and which has been put in place to meet a fresh upturn in airline business. Ten years after the first entrants joined the original college, airline pilot ab initio courses are now being prepared and developed for a growing number of clients.
British Airways, one of the early customers for the College, originally specified a requirement for the "seamless transition from graduation to right-hand seat, with minimum further training". The courses still reflect this objective, although BAe Flight Training has now broadened its aims.
For a while, during the early-to-mid-1990s, the college decided that it could not be too reliant on regular custom from large airlines, with their continual fluctuations in demand, and so self-sponsored trainees were accepted. By 1995, 45% of the students, were being trained on this basis.
The recent changes at Prestwick, however, have seen a swing back once more in favour of airline or organisation nominees. Dr Sue Truman, director and general manager of the college since November 1995, stresses that the basic aim of providing quality training remains the same, but that there is now a flexible structure to meet particular needs, with course content and costs tailored to each airline.
The market is competitive, and airlines want high competence as well as low costs. A recent contract for two courses of 16 ab initio pilots, for Malaysia Airlines, was awarded only after inspection and approval by the Malaysian Department of Civil Aviation.
SHORT COURSES
The company also meets a demand for short courses. The Royal Air Force sent a batch of six trainees to the college for 16 weeks of preliminary experience and training in multi-engine flying, and Turk Hava Yollari (the Turkish national airline) also sends pilots for a four-month course in multi-engine training and Line Oriented Flight Training (LOFT).
BA sent back 56 rehire pilots, graduates of the Prestwick College, for refresher jet simulation before starting fleet training, while 16 new-hires received LOFT training in the electronic-flight-instrument-equipped aircraft simulator.
Training is constantly reviewed against varying demand, cost-efficiency pressures and changes to regulations. New technologies cannot be ignored. In general, ab initio training for airline pilots has taken on many features of the in-line training which pilots will experience later - computer training aids, advanced simulation, cockpit resource management (CRM) and an airline-type of operational environment.
"We have some concerns about going for a minimum ab initio airline-pilot course," says director of sales and marketing, Capt Chris Long, reflecting on possible trends, in future European Union standards for commercial training. "We have experienced the results of this approach with the self-sponsored upgrade market," he adds.
A 63-week course with 10h training in aerobatics, for example, is firmly recommended, as is certificated human-factors (HF) training. An element of command training is seen as a useful part of character assessment. To this end, a video camera mounted in the left-side windscreen scans across the cockpit, taking in both pilots, to help assess CRM awareness.
Chief instructor Capt Steve Green sees CRM as a vital component in basic qualification, to consolidate ab initio pilot training into crewing ability. "A few may fail a course, if a pass in HF/CRM is made mandatory. One customer already applies this criterion. Industry generally has to face the fact that poor HF/CRM factors may be just as relevant as poor basic pilot skills in accident causes. Such training must be an integral part of an ab initio course," he says.
Computer-based training (CBT) also forms a centrepiece of the training. CBT was still relatively new in aviation in 1989, when Prestwick's ground training was set up, and many ideas in this department have come from a European co-operative study on short commercial-pilot courses, in which BAe was represented.
The ground schooling trains pupils in a semi-conventional way - still with a lot of instructor/pupil interaction in class. Students can question the instructors directly, and "chalk-and-talk" lecturing has been adapted to "show-by-flow" - the flow being between classroom and stand-alone CBT teaching.
Prestwick's CBT training curriculum, known as WINGS, includes 350 lessons, divided into 20 modules, in seven subjects. In total, it consists of more than 250h of instruction. It was developed jointly, starting in 1991, by Swissair and BAe Flight Training, (which continue to share lesson design and production) in partnership with major CBT-equipment provider WICAT.
A specialised slide projector reproduces the advantages of "view-foil" screening, where overlays and pictures are revealed in stages. The graphics from the main CBT digital database are imported directly into the classroom, on to a 4m2 (43ft2) screen. Traditional benefits of view-foil screening include enhanced graphics; split screens; animations and other graphics, depicting normal and abnormal operations.
COMPUTER-AIDED INSTRUCTION
This imagery, supported by commentary from the instructor, is called computer-aided instruction (CAI). Many of the elements shown are identical to those which, the students see in the companion stand-alone CBT self-teach programmes used at the Training Centre.
Up to 18 staff undertook the initial development of CBT, in liaison with ground and flying instructors. A team of five graphics artists and four designers is retained during the syllabus-growth stage. Some will be released when the task becomes course maintenance only.
CBT will be available at the students' residence in 1997 for individual reinforcement of classroom teaching. It remains the proven tool for individual aviation studies and language training. Customers closely monitor overall pupil progress, requiring steady feedback and line-visits. Long says that considered, but not over-early, judgements must be made on rates of progress. An airline which has not specifically asked for assessment of future command ability (most do) is provided with comment if there is any doubt about the subject.
GLOBAL MARKET
With the link with Tamworth, BAe Training has a broadened product range and global market base. "We are looking for further benefits from close working relationships," says Truman. Cross-fertilisation of bright ideas between the two centres is expected to be a by-product.
Truman says that alliances with other training organisations, while not ruled out, are not imminent. Given the growth in aviation activities in the Asia-Pacific region, Tamworth is a priority concern at the moment. It is not just a base for fair-weather flying during the acquisition of early hours. "It must give overall benefit to the total training operation," says Truman. "We will pursue such overseas training in the near future, when student volume and lower costs offset travel and staff expenses."
Previously, the college used a school in Florida and, until March 1995, ran a 16-month trial in Kansas. It was costly to guarantee standards, however, even with an on-site standardisation team. "As a result, we understand the implications of overseas operations," says Long.
Meanwhile, back in Europe, there is the advent of a commercial-pilot training standard within European Joint Aviation Regulations (JAR). BAe Flight Training's pre-type-training packages are offered though BAe's partnerships with manufacturers Aero International (Regional) and Airbus Industrie.
Pilot training for an increasing number of small regional airlines adds the problems of different operating concepts and types which must be catered for. An increasingly common thread in the provision of new training is the increase in sophisticated avionics. "We have taken the initiative of developing optional training packages - in advanced flight-deck technologies and modern aircraft systems," says Truman.
Long adds that UK Civil Aviation Authority and JAR proposals for course material do not provide enough detail for a student to understand modern avionics. He is looking, too, at "postgraduate" courses for pilots whose experience is limited to simple cockpits. Truman stresses that the primary aim is to sustain the reputation of the college's products in a competitive market, particularly at a time of significant change in Europe.
"We do not want to put our quality at any risk. We shall continue to work with customers in putting forward all the options, while developing those best meeting their training requirements," she insists.
Source: Flight International
