Rain Check

This morning dawned cold and wet. A glance at my watch confirmed what my body had been telling me for the past 20 minutes; it was time to get up. I poked my head between the bedroom window curtains to find light snow falling outside. The forecast called for a mix of rain and snow for the better part of the day, and it seemed as though, so far at least, the forecasters were spot on. With check marks already placed beside most of the items on the weekend to-do list, I had most of the morning to myself before having to get ready for dinner with family in the afternoon. As I make my way towards the kitchen to arrange some breakfast, my bike, gleaming in the dull light of the living room, catches my eye. For a second I entertain the thought of throwing on a few layers and going for a ride into the river valley, but a second glance at the now heavier snow falling outside allowed the less adventurous, some would say, more rational part of my mind to be convinced that finding something to do inside would probably be a better idea. Sitting down at the table to some toast and milk, I leafed through a mountain bike magazine left there from the previous evening. It's glossy pages told stories of everyday people, trails ridden and adventure found. In the days of my youth , I would live for mornings such as these. Logging trails entwined in the woods around my house with which I had become quite familiar, would take on new personalities under a thin blanket of spring snowfall like today's. I wondered what the 17 year old me would think of my sitting inside on a day like today.

On one of my early trips home after moving west I can remember while driving with my Mom, a country song which professed the benefits of living ones life as though they were dying, came over the radio. After the song finished, Mom nodded in agreement, and remarked that we could all do well to live our lives as though each day were our last. I have thought about this song a fair amount since that time. I don't completely agree with the statement that we should all "live as though we are dying". If this were truly the case, there would be a great number of people who would not go to work, pay the bills, or do the dishes and would end off the day with quite a bit less money in their savings account than they did at the start. In all likelihood though, they would wake up the next morning to find that they were not only still very much alive but that there were still dishes that needed to be washed, bills that should be paid and a job at which they would be expected to show up. I have since come to the conclusion that a more sustainable goal would be to live each day so that if you were so unfortunate as to pass away at the end of it, that you would pass away happy. I suppose in either case the root message is the same, and that is to simply make the best of each day. Looking at things from a bigger perspective, its odd that more often than not, it is death that motivates us to make the most of our days, and not a general desire to make the best of any given day. Maybe that's an oversimplification or maybe on some level, we all require that period at the end of our life's sentence in order to drive us to live our days to the fullest.

With that thought fresh in my mind, I finish the last bite of my toast and head to the closet where I pull on a long sleeved shirt and my snow pants. Pushing off from the front steps of the apartment building, the snow crunches underneath my tires as I pedal out to the street. I spin my way through the light Sunday traffic of the dozen blocks which lie between me and the river valley. The river valley is shrouded in a mist this morning, and as I begin my descent into the tree lined trails below, wet snow starts to collect on my glasses. With each successive flake collected, my view of the world ahead becomes progressively smaller. I navigate my way down through a maze of roots which are doing their best to throw me from my bike. I clamber my way up the next uphill section while my wheels become heavier with the mud that is now sticking to my tires. Building speed on the next downhill, the mud gradually losses its grip, and flings itself up unto anything that is in the immediate vicinity. I stop at the bottom of the hill cold, wet, covered in mud, and smiling. I am sure the 17 year old me would be proud.

Back at home, under the soothing heat of the shower, I again pause to think about this business of making the most of each day. Whether or not I have lived this particular day to the fullest so far could probably be debated, but whether or not it should be debated is another matter altogether. Helen Rowland once said that "The follies which a man regrets the most in his life are those which he didn't commit when he had the opportunity." Maybe we could all be so lucky as to only regret the dirt garnered when we have dared the cold, muddy, adventure laden trails and came back smiling and not the trails avoided for fear of coming home dirty.

Something on Efficiency

Watching the fuel flow gauges the other day while enroute to north eastern BC, I wondered where, in a world where most everyone is becoming more environmentally conscious, the aircraft that I fly fit in. A glance at the flight plan showed that over the course of our day flying, we would burn approximately 2700 Lbs of fuel, or about 1500 litres. Compared with the typical car, those numbers seem to be disproportionally high. Relatively speaking, for every hour of operation, the Beech 1900 burns about enough gas to fill the tank of my Jetta 7 and a half times. Of course, trying to fit 19 passengers into my Jetta and then driving them 450 nm in an hour and a half, and I would find myself coming up a little short on a way to accomplish this. It makes sense then, that to make any useful comparison between the two, those numbers must be brought down to a common denominator. In reports on vehicle efficiency, it seems as though Litres of fuel consumed per passenger per kilometer is the favored common denominator for making comparisons of this type. For curiosity's sake I have also dug up the performance numbers for the Dash 8 200, CRJ 200, Boeing 777 200, 747 200, and the DC-10 30. Some of the numbers which I arrived at surprised me, others were much as I suspected.

On the highway, my Jetta burns on average about 7 L of fuel for every hour of driving. Commuting around the city, with it's inherent multiple starts and stops the fuel burns get pushed up to somewhere around 10 L for ever hour driven. To come up with a number that roughly averages out highway and city driving, I estimated 8.5 L of fuel consumed per hour. Since most aircraft performance numbers are cited in terms of fuel burned in pounds per hour, I converted my average Jetta fuel burn of 8.5 litres, to 13.6 pounds of fuel burned per hour.

Next 13.6 pounds per hour fuel burn is divided by the 4 passengers my car will hold, to come up with a figure of 3.4 Lbs. of fuel consumed every hour for each passenger on board. This is of course often not the case, as most of the time my car has a maximum of two people in it, but in order to determine the maximum efficiency my car could attain, I assumed a full car load. Next I divided the 3.4 Lbs. of fuel that the Jetta consumes for each passenger by the average speed which I drive, which works out to about 75 km/hour. Now we have a figure of .045 pounds of fuel, or .028 L consumed for every kilometer for each passenger in my car. Stacked against the aircraft I could find performance numbers on, the Jetta fared quite well when full. Take out three passengers though, and the Jetta's fuel burned per kilometer per passenger jumps up to .11L. Driving style has a huge impact on efficiency as well. With my mild mannered grandmother like driving, I can average about 550 km before my 55L fuel tank runs dry. Throw in a few afternoons worth of hard driving, and you can watch your mileage head south proportionally.

The Beech 1900 can hold 19 passengers, 21 people including the crew, will fly at 463 km/h, and burns about 750 pounds of fuel per hour for an average 400 nm trip. Longer flights will increase the efficiency as fuel flows at higher altitudes drop significantly. This helps to offset the fuel consumed to climb the aircraft up to the higher altitude. On shorter flights, often the fuel savings realised at higher altitudes does not justify the amount of fuel required to get the aircraft up to that given altitude. To get around the impact that flights of different lenghts or at altitudes can have on the overall fuel efficiency, I have simply used cruise fuel flows. For those who are interested in determining the efficiency of the overall flight, adding about 7% to enroute fuel burns for taxi, take-off, climb and approach seems to get you in the ballpark.

With a fuel flow of 700 pph, and 21 people on board, the 1900 is burning 33.3 pounds of fuel per hour per person. With a cruise speed of 463 km/h, we will be consuming .071 pounds or .039 L of fuel for each kilometer traveled, for every person on board. This puts the 1900 into the same fuel efficiency category as an Impala sized car in the city, or about 11L/100 km.

The Dash 8 200, DC-10-30 and 747-200 came in with .031, .034 and .037 litres of fuel burned per passenger per kilometer respectively, which would put them all into the realm of

somewhere around the efficiency of a mid-size car.

The CRJ-200 came in at the top of the list with .041 which works out to about the equivalent of 13 L/100km. That puts the RJ somewhere close to what a Ford F-150 will achieve on the highway.

The Boeing 777-200 surprised me the most with it consuming .022 Litres of fuel/km/passenger. Put into automotive terms, it works out to about 6.7 L/100 km, which is almost exactly what a 2009 Toyota Corolla is advertised to achieve on the highway.

To a certain degree, how efficient a vehicle is, is not only dependant on the vehicle design itself, but also on how it is operated. Much like refraining from racing from one set of lights to the next in a car, there are steps which can be taken to reduce fuel consumption in aircraft as well. In the wake of higher fuel prices last summer, many companies, including the one with which I am employed, implemented a reduced fuel burn program, where crews would reduce their cruise speed and correspondingly, reduce how much fuel was consumed on a given flight. The result gave us a average cruise speed which was reduced by 2%, while we saw a reduction in fuel consumption of 12.5%. Not a bad trade off really. A number of years ago several tests were conducted to find the "optimum speed" which would allow passenger cars to travel the furthest distance on the least quantity of fuel. It was discovered that somewhere around 90 km/hr most passenger cars efficiency peaked. Driving any faster, or slower than this speed, would result in more fuel being consumed for a given distance traveled. Environmentally speaking, the damage that may be caused to the world around us by going faster is really quite intangible. Even for those who are concerned about the effect of their actions on the environment, driving 110 on the highway instead of the more efficient 90 has no immediate impact that they can readily see aside from that they will arrive at their destination a few minutes earlier. Even climatologists cannot agree on what impact specifically consuming more fuel will have on the world around us.

At the end of the day, regardless of whether or not I am actually helping the environment, I will aim to drive my car, and while I am at work, fly planes in the most efficient and safest way I can. If it turns out that I helped out in some small way, all the better. If it is discovered that global warming was nothing more than an inevitable upward swing in the temperature of our planet's atmosphere, then at the very least I can smile in knowing that with each time I filled the fuel tank in my car, I saved about enough money to buy myself a popsicle. With the extra time it is going to take me to get to where ever I am heading to, I will also have a little extra time to savour it.

For those who have made it all the way through this post,.

Instructors and Students

Sometimes it can be a rather unique sort of relationship that forms between an instructor and their student. I am sure this fact is true with many teaching situations, but I'd be willing to guess that it is likely more prevalent in flight instructing. During my time as an instructor I found that with many of my students it was almost with a feeling of paternal pride that I would watch them progress from being a person who knew little of how to get a aircraft off the ground and back down safely, to someone who could fly safely off on their own. There were the obvious milestones which mark the progression of a typical student pilot that were cause for pause and a feeling of pride; the first solo, completion of cross countries, and ultimately the flight test. Sandwiched within those major milestones were moments where as an instructor I would sit back and smile to myself, as a student overcame a particular obstacle which had been holding them back, or came to fully understand a concept that had eluded them prior to that point. In many cases, after a student's training has been completed, the flight test usually marked the point where, like college kids moving out on their own, you would bid your students farewell and hope that all you have taught them has prepared them well for the real world which awaits.
Driving home yesterday evening after meeting with a former student to look over a flight manual of his own construction, I must admit, that even while it had been over a year and a half since we had flown together, the pride I felt in looking over his manual far surpassed any of the previous milestones which came before it. Perhaps it was the attention to detail which he paid to even the smallest bits of theory, or the broad scope in which he covered a great many topics, or perhaps it was the pursuit of knowledge, not to pass a test, but rather to be the most knowledgeable pilot possible, that was most impressive. Maybe though, it was those intangible things which cannot be either taught nor learned, namely a curiosity which drove him to ask questions and seek answers above and beyond what would ever be required on any exam, and a display of determination to perfect his craft that caused my heart to swell with the pride of a teacher whose student's knowledge came to surpass the collective total of lessons given.
You are a true Guru Andrew.

City Centre Airport

It seems that the vultures are circling once again, their gaze focused intently on 144 acres of land that is home to 85 establishments employing approximately 1000 people.

Looking back out the side window of the plane this morning after a right turn on departure, I catch a quick glimpse of that controversial parcel of land, its 144 acres coming alive with the aircraft that call City Centre home. In recent months the future of the Muni has once again been called into question. Many are of the opinion that the airport should be closed, and the land made available for development while some make claims that access to northern communities and the medevac flights that service them are of greater importance than whatever development could potentially sprout from the land currently being occupied by the field. Being a pilot based out of the city, my opinion on the matter is undoubtedly quite biased in favor of keeping the airport open. It would be easy, as a pilot, to argue that the airport should remain open for no other reason than for a love of aircraft and the airports that they serve. Unfortunately sentiments such as these cannot be assigned a price tag as easily as the value of the land the airport rests upon.















The City Centre Airport is deeply routed in the history of Canadian aviation, and aside from the practical reasons for its continued existence, its historical significance is, to put it lightly, without peer. The Edmonton City Centre Airport first came into being in 1926 after the Edmonton and Northern Alberta Aero Club received a $400 grant to transform an area of farmland into the air harbour it would be designated as later that year. In 1929, after the City Council approved spending 35'000 on the then three year old airfield, Jimmy Bell's air harbour, as it had been known, was renamed after former Edmonton mayor, Keith Alexander Blatchford, and became Canada's first licensed airfield. Under it's new title, Blatchford Field saw many of western Canada's early aviation pioneers lift off of its sod runways and turn northbound for the uncharted territory which lie in wait. Among them, Wop May, whose aviation related endeavours included instructing, a tour as part of the RAF during WWI, and in 1928 amid much media attention, completion of an emergency flight to Fort Vermilion to deliver inoculations to the town, after a man who had fallen ill was discovered to have diphtheria. Over the course of the next 35 years, the airport would become a cornerstone of commercial and military aviation, not only in the Edmonton region, but for North America as a whole. In 1939, Blatchford field became the Royal Canadian Air Force flight training centre, while 4 years later the North American record was set when 860 aircraft passed through the the #2 Air Observer School, as the field had then come to be known.

As the 1950's ushered in an era of larger aircraft which would require longer runways, the search began for a site for a new field able to accommodate the new generation of aircraft which would serve the Edmonton region in the decades to come. In 1963, The Edmonton International Airport was completed, and with that completion, the City Centre airport was slated to close. Fortunately, political opposition saved the field, and over the course of the next 45 years, the airport would change names three times, and operate under several political mandates. In a 1995 referendum, 77 percent of Edmonton citizens voted in favor of consolidating scheduled air traffic to the International Airport, while the City Centre Airport would be kept open to serve general aviation and corporate traffic. By 1996, the consolidation process had been completed, and the City Airport settled into the role it would play until the present time. Under the results of this 1995 referendum, the City of Edmonton entered into a lease with Edmonton Airports on March 25, 1996 to have EA manage the City Centre Airport for a period of 56 years to 2052. In 2008, the City Airport once again fell under political scrutiny as the City Council and Executive Committee requested and heard several reports which "outlined the challenges and opportunities associated with the ECCA (Edmonton City Centre Airport) lands". The review of the Airport looked at the issue through various assessments ranging from economic and land impact, to historical impact. The results from these assessments are scheduled to be heard by the Executive Committee this June.

Those in favor of closing the City airport cite reasons that primarily centre around further development of the land around the airport. Not only would the land the airport currently occupies be available, but areas which are under a height restriction due to their proximity to approach paths could potentially see upward growth. NAIT, an airport neighbour to the east is reported to be currently operating at maximum capacity at its City Centre location, and could develop westward if the airport were to close. However, NAIT has obtained a 61 hectare site that could see development of a south campus south east of the Ellerslie/Hwy 2 Intersection. Perhaps due to a lack of funding, or a lack of students to fill such a facility, NAIT has yet to put forth plans to develop this south site. In a report released by the City in May 2008, four examples were given of projects that experienced constraints due to their proximity to approach paths, including expansion at the Royal Alexandra Hospital, The AMA building, and Aurora Development projects north of 105 Ave and west of 101 St. In each of these cases it was not a matter of projects that were proposed but were not permitted to pass due to approach path restrictions, but rather had to be changed to meet the demands of the area which they occupied. One would be hard pressed to find a building in the Edmonton area, or any urban area for that matter, that has not been affected in some way by zoning restrictions, just as the four examples given in the City report were.

Ultimately, many of the above arguments can and will be argued as valid reasons both for closing and keeping the airport open. Whichever way the decision finally does go, it will likely remain, until it's end, a battle of those who stand to gain, versus those who stand to lose. It is the unfortunate nature of decisions such as these, as with most decisions, that the height of the prospective gains, and depths of the losses will only be realised after that decision has been made.

Mountains and Preseverence

It has been said that standing next to a mountain makes you feel small while standing on a mountain makes you feel big. For the past few months I have stood at the base of a mountain which I have been feeling rather small beside, and have been having trouble mustering the drive to climb. The mountains looming ahead are my Airline Transport exams; the climb the required studying. The excuses and distractions that I could potentially come up are quite plentiful, and I could probably even convince the skeptics that my excuses are valid. Unfortunately making excuses is much like trying a sip of your father's beer as a kid; finding that it tasted like something mom could have used as a substitute for the soap she used to clean your mouth, and nonetheless smiling like you are the greatest 5 year old in the history of five year olds. You may be able to convince those around you, but ultimately you know that your excuses are invalid, and that at five years old you thought beer tasted horrible.
I have never been much one for simply studying to pass an exam. For all of my training thus far, I have operated under the idea that one should study to understand the required subjects and in the process be able to pass the exam, as opposed to studying to pass an exam, and hopefully in the process gaining some understanding of what you are being tested on. Sometimes the disheartening thing about studying material though, is that it uncovers just how little you actually know and after two months of studying I am starting to find that I have more unanswered questions now then I did in the beginning. Confucius once said that "Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance" and if that is true, then perhaps it is only now that I am really learning. I suppose, just as with anything else, there are always multiple ways of looking at any given situation. I can look at my new found lists of questions to answer as a frustrating task or as an opportunity to learn. With each perspective, there is a corresponding, and fairly predictable outcome.
Do I clamber my way up the slope, grumbling but eager for the view held at the top, or do I realize that I am indeed lucky to be climbing this particular mountain and that the struggle to the top will be just as much the reward as reaching the summit?
More questions still, but maybe it will be in the continuing to ask questions that I will find the answers that I am looking for.

Here is one of the sources of my inspiration to continue to ask questions and seek their answers.