This is what's really going on

I really really want to work at Southwest Airlines. It has been my goal almost since the very beginning. They really take care of their people. In order to work for Southwest you have to get a 737 type rating. Basically, any aircraft over a certain weight requires you to have training specific to that aircraft and then have a check ride by an examiner to certify that you can indeed fly that specific airplane. The 737 type rating costs anywhere between $7,300-$10,000 for the least expensive version. So in September I decided to apply for 2 different scholarships through the Women in Aviation scholarship program. One was through Continental and one was through Delta. Each required a lot of work. For example, I had to write an essay for each. I had to get my driving record (waited in line for 3 hours in CA for my record.) I had to have a certain number of letters of recommendation. I had to have my past 10 years of where I lived and where I work. All my flight time had to be broken down into very specific categories. The list goes on and on. When I wasn't working I was laboring on this scholarship stuff. Finally in November I sent in all my information.

At the beginning of December I contacted my friend who works at Southwest and jokingly said "when are your people going to hire me?" He told me that Southwest was planning on hiring first quarter of 2011. I was so excited. I told him that I had 1000 hours pilot-in-command but not too much more than that. Most airlines require 1000 hours pilot-in-command for them to even look at you. Pilot-in-command means that you are the captain. Then he asked if I have a four year degree....Yes, I do. He asked if I was a check airmen. NO. Check airmen are they guys that give line checks (we have to have one a year) and train the new hire pilots. Lastly he asked if I had my 737 type rating. I told him that I didn't have one but I had applied for a scholarship. The problem is that I wouldn't know until the end of February if I received the scholarship. Then if by some miracle I did receive the scholarship I wouldn't be trained until the summer sometime. He told me that I should really consider just going and getting a type rating because no one knew when they would open up the application site but when they did it would be HUGE to already have my type rating. Apparently, they are more inclined to give interviews to people with the type rating.

He had my head totally spinning. Here I had just spent hours upon hours working on these scholarships and now he thought I should just go buy one. Because Southwest is my ultimate goal I knew I had to put myself in the best possible situation to get hired. MAN, that means I have to go buy a type rating. I talked to Brandon and, of course, he was totally supportive. Did I mention that type ratings are between $7300-$10,000. YIKES! "Hey honey, I know that we don't have ANY furniture in our house, but do you mind if I spend $10,000 on a type rating?" It definitely takes a special person to marry a pilot.

I started searching the Internet and calling around to all the simulator centers that offered type ratings. There are a variety of programs and prices. The 737-200 is the cheapest type rating to get because no one really flies the 200 anymore (ok maybe Aloha Cargo but not too many others.) The nice next generation 737 simulators programs run closer to $17,000. "I would like the 200 please." I discovered that Pan Am sim center was running a special offering the 737-200 for $5000 for the month of December and January. They told me it was a 12 day program. It is really difficult for me to take that much time off work but for that price I had to go for it (It ended up being closer to 16 days but whose counting.)

So now I had decided on a place and had decided on the 17th of January to start. In order to lock in the date and get training materials I had to deposit $1500 but if you didn't give 30 days notice to cancel it was non refundable. Unfortunately they didn't have a partner for me yet. I didn't want to put down the money and take the time off work just to discover that they still didn't have a partner for me (then not be able to get the money back.) It was pretty frustrating because I couldn't start doing the at home study material until I put down the deposit. So I recruited my own partner. I saw my buddy Don Reilly at work. He and I were partners in the simulator when we became captains at Skywest. I remembered that he wanted to work at Southwest too. I told him I was getting my type and asked him if he wanted to do it with me. He had to go home and talk to his wife, figure out the money situation, and figure out time off from work. In the end, January 17th was too soon for him because it was the end of December and we still had to do all the at home training materials. We decided on February 7th.

To make matters crazier, I was due to have my simulator training in February. I basically had to study for my Skywest training and my 737 training congruently. Did I mention that I also worked 100 hours in January (had to try to pay for my type rating.) This was a month void of much pleasure. We were required to do 40 hours of computer based training and they sent us 3 or 4 manuals to read. We also had to memorize flows and limitations. The computer program logged every minute you were on. If you even left for 1 minute to use the bathroom it logged you out.

My Skywest training was on the 4th and 5th of February. I worked on the 6th and then drove to Vegas to start my type rating training.

The materials that we received to study were really weak. I went to Vegas not knowing what to expect. Luckily, we had a great guy named Don McMahon who did our training. There were 2 other guys doing training at the same time. One was a Skywest first officer named Stuart Short. He is really cool. His partner was Henry. Henry is an engineer who occasionally flies sky divers. Henry drove me crazy at first but he grew on me. We had 2 days of ground school. It was mostly airplane systems. Then we had a few days in the mock up (basically a poster of the inside of the airplane.) This is where we practiced our checklists and procedures. Then we had an oral exam. That was a big snafu because I was told it would be at 8. I got up early to review. No one was at the sim center. I had no idea who to call. The examiner showed at 10 (which was when he thought he was suppose to be there.) Then we were in the simulator for the next 8 days. We had one day off. I felt pretty comfortable a few days into the simulator and was glad that it was going smoothly. There was one day when they introduced manual reversion (you lose all your hydraulics) and flap asymmetries that I crashed a few time. My arms were so tired from the manual reversion that I crashed a few times on the asymmetry. The next day that we did them it went smoothly enough. I wasn't told that the training would be 15-16 days so I had to call off my four day trip for work that I had scheduled in order to finish up my training and take my check ride.

Monday the 21st (the day before my birthday) was my check ride. Don and I had to be there at 5:45am. I didn't sleep very well the night before. I was totally nervous. We briefed for about an hour and then jumped into the simulator. I went first. The very first maneuver I screwed up. It was a steep turn and I had been nailing them all week. I was just tense and nervous. I rolled in too fast and got dizzy. It was really disorienting. I thought I failed right there. My examiner told me to relax. The rest of the ride went really smoothly until the very last item. I had to do the flap asymmetry. It was a different version then the one I had practiced in the sim. The long and short is that I had to go around 3 times and finally landed it on the 4th time. I could explain exactly why this was happening and the conundrum I was in but no one who reads this blog would understand anyway. After I finished my partner had to go. We didn't get done until 2:00pm. Can you imagine being tortured that long?! We both passed and the examiner was very fair. I just left feeling a little let down. My training all week had gone so smoothly that I was disappointed in myself the items I kind of screwed up. I was so glad to have the whole thing over with but just felt a little sad. When Brandon called to see if I passed I think he was surprised when I said yes and then started crying. I think I was just really tired and emotional. And that's what really has been going on. All this craziness had prevented me from writing about life or reading any blogs. It's a good thing I have a little sister that will occasionally give me that big updates.