Category Archives: CPL & ATPL Training
Cathay Pacific Cadet Selection
Well one week ago today, I was in London at the Cathay Pacfic Offices going though the tests and the interview for selection towards the Cathay Pacific Cadet Pilot scheme. On Monday, a couple of people had heard good news from CX and and are jetting off to Hong Kong(HKG) next week for round two. As the days went on, hope began to fade until the email popped into my Inbox…the dreaded “we regret to advise that you are not successful on this occasion” email.
This of course isn’t the end, I can reapply in a years time, and over the months try and better myself in the areas which I don’t think I did as well as I could have. There are many other routes to becoming an Airline Pilot, this was just one of them. Its only my second attempt at getting onto a cadet pilot course, the previous one being with Etihad.
For now its back to the drawing board, reflecting on areas which I can improve on. From there I will work on a plan to better myself and hopefully learn enough to help me through the selection process. HR Interviews have never been a strong point of mine!
Etihad Cadet Update
It’s been a while since I’ve updated my Etihad Cadet application process, but after the tests in London I was unsuccessful. There are rumours going around that only 9 people out of 600 picked for the tests got a “maybe”, that just shows you how hard the selection is, and quite right, so it should be!
Due to the economic turmoil at the moment Etihad Airways announced that they will be unable to conduct further cadet pilot assessments this year. They are therefore postponing the planned selections in New York, Toronto and Singapore until further notice.
I was impressed on test day at a very nice hotel in Windsor. The assesors, who are pilots themselves, gave a presentation at first, which just fuelled people’s appetitie for what was on offer! Was a perfect way to start the day and get the nerves settled and then fired up for the tests. The tests will remain a secret thats for sure, so don’t come asking!
I wish everyone applying for this the best of luck, and remember if you don’t get it, what ever you do, don’t give up!
Flying Fund. How many hits would it take to fulfill?
After being unsuccessful with my latest airline sponsorship selection test (only 9 out of 600 got a “maybe”!) I sat down and looked at my facts and figures for the past 4 months and tried to work out exaclty how much it would take for me to possible raise the money to pay my own way through flying school. This has always been my target, but web developement has been something I have taught myself, and its taken a while to get to grips with the finer points on monetising and getting traffic.
A quicklook at the stats:
20,000 impressions made me about £300. My target to pay for flying school is £60,000! So staying at the same kind of conversion rate as I’ve been experiencing over the past few months, it would take in the region of 4,000,000 impressions to generate the kind of income required! Obviously 6000 impressions a month isnt going to cut it, since it would take about 600 months at this rate to get my target!
Etihad Cadet Pilot Sponsorship – Stage 1
On the 17th of February I’ll be jetting off to London to take part in the first round of tests for this years Etihad Cadet Pilot Scheme. Fingers crossed I’ll do my best on the day and will just have to wait and see what they think. A good nights rest before, and a good breakfast should set me up nicely for these tests. No one knows what exaclty is in the tests, but thats the whole point I guess! So far my preparation has consisted of practice IQ tests to try and get my brain back in gear!
Good Luck to all who are sitting the tests!
The Year Ahead
I’ve been a bit slow in posting this, but its kind of my new years targets for 2009! Basically I never really did much in 2008 so now its time for change. Below is a list of targets which I hope to achieve this year. Some are related to my websites, some related to swimming, and some related to my flying.
- Pass the first (and hopefully the later stages) of the Etihad Cadet Pilot Scheme. First round of tests are down in Windsor in February. If I can do that, thenit’s up to them if they want to select me. The first stage consists of 6 tests, spread of six hours, so its going to be a big healty meal the night before, good nights sleep, and a good filling breakfast to set me up for the tests.No one knows for sure whats in these Etihad tests, butI’m assuming (i know, should never assume!) that there will be lots of mental maths, english, general knowlege and some logic or spacial awareness tests.
- The last two months have been a record breaker in terms of earnings, its still no where near my £70,000 target, but its heading in hte right direction! So over the next few weeks, I hope to turn each of my “minisites” into proper good looking, usefull sites based around each of the topics which I have chosen already. Hopefully this will further increase my earnings from these sites, and if I wasn’t selected for the Etihad scheme, then I might be able to pay my own way through flying school.
Cadet Pilot Sponsorship
It took a month, but Etihad replied to my application for their Cadet Pilot Sponsorship scheme. Its easy to understand why it took them so long, this is by far the best offer of sponsorship for cadet pilots out there at the moment so there are literally thousands of applicants for those 12 highly valued spaces!
Applicant are invited to send an email to Etihad stating which location they would like to attend for the selection tests. You can choose from London, Frankfurt, Johanesburg, New York, Sydney and of course Abu Dhabi, which is where Etihad is based.
So its fingers crossed, head back into my books for revision, and I wish every applicant the best of luck. Its important to remember that its not just your grades that make you a good pilot, a lot is about the kind of person you are.
ps. For those of you who already hold PPLs or CPLs, hands off! This is a sponsorship for ab-initio pilot onlys!
Fajja’s Flying Fund Launched!
Today (15th Sep 08) sees the official Launch of “Fajja’s Flying Fund“. It may seem cliche, but for as long as I can remember I have wanted to become an airline pilot. I have worked hard at school and put myself through Univeristy studying Aeronautical Engineering, and now I find myself so close to reaching my goal!
There is however, one major stumbling block…the money! I have passed the CAA Class 1 medicals, I have passed the Aptitude tests, now the final step is raising enough money to enable me to pay for the course. The course with CTC flying school costs in excess of £60,000. At the moment I am nearly 8% of the way there, which is a great start, but I need something extra to build up my capital in addition to my day job. Which is why I decided to try this.
Basically when you buy a square of 100 pixels, you are buying a spot which you can upload your own picture (nothing naughty mind!) and have it link directly to your own website. Thus you are buying a square of advertising for a minimum of 5 years.
Anyone who buys an advertising square will in effect be buying a link to their site which will remain active for a minimum of five years. You can choose to upload your own image to the squares during the purchase process (nothing naughty mind!). Each square is made up from 100 pixels. You can choose to purchase 1 or more whole squares, remember the bigger your picture, the more noticeable it will be! The pricing of the page works out to just under what the total training fees will be. There are 10,000 squares, which will be sold at $12 each equating to a total of$120,000 once all the blocks are sold. This works out at roughly £61,000 which is what my prefered course with CTC costs.
The fee for each pixel is $0.12 which means that a single square containging 100 pixels can be purchased for $12. Factoring in that the site will be active for a MINIMUM of 5 years, that means you are paying $2.40 per annum for a link to your site. Thats pretty good since some sites, not even big sites, can charge around $40 per month!
Fingers Crossed, and thank you in advance for your support.
Glen aka “Fajja”
Airlines Offering Sponsorship
Well as you can see my flying fund isnt climbing very fast if at all! I have been trying different ways than the norm to earn extra money but it hasnt really taken off…yet!
Since I don’t have the vast amount of cash required i have been trawling the interweb for airlines who sponsor people with 0hrs flying time and take them right through to that Right Hand Seat. Out of 20 airlines i picked out my head 5 airlines have cadet schemes. The only downfall, for me anyway, is that they require you to be a full time resident in their country. The airlines I found are:
- Singapore Airlines (must be a singapore resident)
- Etihad
- Qantas (Australian Passport or permanent residency required)
- Virginblue.com.au (not 100% sure but think they do!)
- Lufthansa (site was in German so I might be wrong)
- Cathay ( must be permanent Hong Kong resident )
So there you go, i’ll add to this when I find more, hope it helps some people out.
Preparing for Flying School Interview (take 2)
Well it’s nearly time for me to head back to Bournemouth and try again to pass stage 3 of CTC’s selection procedure. In the past 18months I have taken in their feedback and tried as best as I could to answer each question they raised. Hopefully this time, I can prove I really do have what it takes! I have never been very good at “selling myself” in interviews.
From the feedback last time the main qualities which they highlighted that they were looking for are; leadership skills; self awareness; motivation; communication; responsibility; reliability; dynamism; team working; high standards; flexibility and and understanding of the Airline Industry.
In the past 18 months I have had a change of job, change of location, learned new things, pushed myself in my swimming, and at work I have tried to make the most of it, by learning about myself in a professional environment and improving where I can.
Wish me luck!
Cadet Pilot Schemes
Knowing how hard it is to trawl through the net looking for every single airline which offers cadet programmes i decided to make a wee list here to share with everyone.
- NETJETS CADET PILOT TRAINING PROGRAMME
- THOMAS COOK AIRLINE PILOT TRAINING SCHEME
- EXCEL AIRWAYS AIRLINE PILOT TRAINING SCHEME
- FLYBE ASSISTED PILOT TRAINING SCHEME
- Flybe cadetship and PTC
- Highland Airways Cadet Pilot Scheme
- REX PILOT CADET SCHEME
These are just a few courses in which the airlines have a lot of input into the courses and some pre-select student for employment as long as they meet all the standards that they require. The days of full sponosrship are gone. These schemes you still have to find a way to finance yourself, although getting onto one of these courses means that certain banks will give you a loan to cover the majority of the course fees as long as your can secure it. That’s where i’m struggling. I don’t own a house, nor do I have hundreds of thousands of pounds in the bank! Which is why I have made a few websites to try earn some money ontop of my regular job. I shall keep adding to this list when I find more, and feel free to suggest new ones by leaving a comment.
