April 7, 2008 - Factory Flight Training in the Kodiak Begins

April 7, Sandpoint Idaho. After years of anticipation, I'm actually going to get a chance to fly the Kodiak. Not just "play" with it, but for one week get the whole attention of Steve Zaat, Quest Aircraft Company's Customer Service manager, and main flight instructor. Steve O. meets Steve Z. The exercise: "factory training." Not a stranger to this type of airplane (1,000 hours of Cessna Caravan flight time, 1,700 hours of Beechcraft King Air time), I still feel excited. I've been working as JAARS' representative to Quest for several years and watched the Kodiak develop from just a concept. Not least in the curriculum is getting functional knowledge of the Garmin G1000 integrated flight system, their state-of-the art navigation and flight display (http://www.questaircraft.com/index.php?filename=avionics.php). Hopefully by the end of the week I will be flying the Kodiak and handling the Garmin to such a level that I can earn the Quest certificate of completion, earning me qualification to be in command of a Kodiak on my own.

Steve Z has done a good job with the FITS (FAA Industry Training Standard) curriculum, though there are a few areas where I strain to understand this new training philosophy. Each flight lesson involves a complete scenario of numerous landing sites, an instrument flight plan, and selected emergency drills. As acting Pilot in Command, I am responsible to look at the flight's scenario description, calculate the fuel needed, airplane loading, and all the expected performance. My name goes on the flight plan and dispatch form for every flight.