Episode 439: #1 Reason Examiners Fail Private Pilots

Going to talk about iPad failures during checkrides in a minute. Number one reason people fail checkrides a day is problems with the iPad. But first, yesterday we had this gentleman here to stop by for a visit, Jared McKay. He even told us we need a fifth screen because he's up here times four. And he said you need another screen because you don't have me up here for instrument as well. So he is a hog super fan. Does. Did his private pilot with us, did his commercial pilot with us, did his instrument rating. That's not shown. We do have a picture. And then his CFI and CFI 2. So these were all him using hogs for all of his courses. I even made a video for him years ago after he failed his first private. And we had a long discussion about that yesterday. We just, it was pretty amazing to have somebody come in who is on the wall times four. We had a blast. And he's going to come back at another point and we're going to sit down and do a video for you. So proof how people use our courses for all the training. And he's been out, he's got about 900, almost a thousand hours now. He's been instructing, he's out doing tours. And God's a great jump on his career in just a few years. One of the examiners that we talk about all the time is legendary examiner Jerry Ventrella. And at Heli Expo, during an event with a bunch of instructors, he flat out said the number one reason people are failing checkrides today is problems with iPads during checkrides. Okay, so we know this is our problem. So we want to tell you about one problem that we've seen in the last 30 checkrides in the last 30 months. And it was an iPad freezing on a checkride. And this gentleman had a chart underneath his iPad. And we'll. I'll just go ahead and put it on, show you kind of how we did it. Chart underneath of the iPad. So they take off on the cross country. And shortly after takeoff, before the first checkpoint, iPad freezes, locks up. So of course the examiner sees it, knows what's going on. And all this gentleman had to do was pull out the chart, even do this, pull up part way out where you could see it or pull it out, lay it on top. Either way, he had the line marked on the chart. So he freezes. And when the examiner sees that he just asked him a question, he said, so are you sure you're on the right course? And this gentleman in a Moment of panic, thought the examiner was trying to trick him, and he turned and started flying 180 degrees the other direction. So you can imagine how that turned out, right? So on that note, there's lots of different reasons that you could have trouble. One of the ones that Jerry Ventrella mentioned was people will get good with the iPad, but when it comes to, like a diversion and they have to move off their course and spread the screen and move the screen around, they're not always good at computing the numbers and distances where on a map, you know, old school, as we knew like two fingers was like 10 miles, we could quickly. With a map, no matter what, you can measure distance. So a lot of people are struggling with the whole distance thing. So when people come here, we just say, I don't care what you use. You know, you could have your phone here and an iPad. That way you've got a backup. You could do an iPad here and iPad here if you wanted to. What I recommend is exactly this. At minimum, iPad with a chart underneath. And everybody says, well, you can't hardly get charts anymore. You can jump on Sporty's or one of the other online stores and you can have a chart in just a few days. I go ahead and buy them every time. So we always have new ones. That way there's nobody can say, oh, well, I couldn't get one. Well, bullshit. Here's a chart. You're going to use it. At minimum, put your line on there, your landmarks, your courses, so that you have a backup. A lot of times some of our people have just said, you know what, I'm just going to use the chart. And I'm like, cool, why not? You're only on your, let's say for your private pilot, you're probably only going to go to the first checkpoint or two. So ultimately, as nice as the iPad is, it's almost could be more of a hindrance. It just depends on how much you use it. So what I'll say is use whatever you want, but have a backup. Have a backup plan whether you're going to do an iPad in your phone. You know, you could have a mount here for your phone. If you don't want to use a chart, use the iPad, use the phone. Or have an iPad here and a second iPad over here, or maybe you've got a GPS you can use that you're familiar with. Just make sure you know and understand how to use it. Have a backup plan. Don't get in with just one. And what we do with everybody here of course is before the checkride. I say, okay, what do you want to do for your test? How, what, what do you want to use as far as combination of navigation for your main navigation, your backup. Okay, good, let's go over here, let's sit in the aircraft and let's get you situated. Figure out before you go fly, come, because we've all done this where you just kind of throw things together and you take off on a trip and then you didn't kind of organize things quite the way you might have wanted it. Well, when you're in the aircraft trying to fly a helicopter, reorganizing this is a major pain in the ass. You don't want to be doing it during flight. Just take this, take the time when you're not flying, sit in the helicopter, get your knee board, your iPads, whatever navigation tools you're using and just make sure that they work for you. You know, even like checking with control movements. This is a big one. Like for me, the first time I use this I'm like, oh, I'm hitting the cyclic. So I had to make sure that I adjust these when I go fly farther up so that it doesn't interfere and hit the cyclic. So the time to figure out ahead of time what you want to use and how you're going to use it and what is your backup. And Heather just said, do you want to give a plug to moagear.net these are called badass knee boards. So if you just go to Google and search badass knee boards, you can look these up. And I always like to say I have no paid endorsements, but I endorse this because he sent these to me just out of the blue. One day I get a couple in a box, a black one and a brown one. And they actually laid in the box for a couple years before I decided to try try one out and decide I really, really like this thing. So as a favor to him, I occasionally plug these. So if you're looking for one, just go to Google, look for badass knee boards, type it in, it'll come up. Since that time I've actually bought these and used them as giveaways during special events just to kind of help this kid out because I know he works a full time job and this is his side gig. So I do plug these for him just because I really like it. And everybody that's that's been here because believe it or not, I have people that will come here working for a private commercial or cfi. They've never Used a knee board and I'm like, well here, try this one out, you know, and they'll end up going, wow, I want to order one. Or we have a lot of guys that bring the larger knee board. That's mainly for airplanes that doesn't work in a helicopter. So add on guys will come in with a bigger one sometimes and they try the smaller version. They go, oh wow. And I'm like, this is built for helicopter pilots. So a plug for badass knee boards. And then so today we'll highlight Steven Carlson is one of our past FAC members. Steven is another one of those that came from a flight school in Florida where three guys all came from the flight school in a short period of time. And again, Steven liked the school, liked his instructors. He didn't have a problem with them specifically. And he wasn't really having a problem with the training other than they couldn't get him done. He had 160 hours again. That magical 160 number I think is about where he was at. And he just was tired of messing around. He came up here and we finished him up in a few days. And Stephen was fun too because he. I'll put a link down below for a video that he did with me. Prior to coming here for this final approach course. He was on a country wide tour in a Bell Long Ranger and going around Atlanta at flight schools and talking to people. And he stopped here and did a good video about what we do here at HOGS and how we help people get through their checkride. So we'll put a link down below that. You can check out that video if you'd like. What we're doing is we're about a third of the way through, I guess or so, not the third, but close. We're coming on a video every day with just things we've seen in the past 30 months since we started the final approach courses in the R44 and now the R22 as well. So we're just coming in giving you things that we're seeing that are current with problems on checkrides, tips, things we see, things that might kind of help you out from, you know, possible headaches and heartaches you could run into. So subscribe the channel and click the bell so you're notified of the next videos. And if you're interested, Heather's holding the camera. You can text or call her at 574-767-1797. We've got an open schedule right now, R22 and R44 available to help you finish Checkrides. We could get you in right away, like now, like get in the car and start driving. See you here in two days, that type of thing. So that number again. 574-767-1797. And we'll see you the next video. Peace out. When you feel the pressure to fly, but know the right decision is to stay on the ground, hit the hogs. No go and live to fly a new day. Helicopterground. Com.