You've heard me say it before,
instrument flying is all about better radio communications.
Hey, everyone, Jason Schappert here of MZeroA.com,
and you are listening to the Instrument Pilot Podcast,
brought to you by our number-one-rated, top-rated online ground school.
Visit MZeroA.com to learn more and check out that brand spanking new
instrument pilot course in there for you as well.
It is outstanding,
and the team has just put so much effort and love into that.
Also, before I dive into it too much, assuming you're watching this today,
this came out on Thursday,
April 15th, 2021,
tonight at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time,
I'm going live because today is MZeroA's 14th birthday.
That's pretty exciting.
Thank you. I can't even believe it.
It's absolutely amazing, we're doing a great birthday anniversary/Sun 'n Fun,
because it's Sun 'n Fun week this week celebration.
Head over to MZeroALive.com to RSVP,
if there's still spots available by the time this comes out
because we're doing it via Zoom and I want to see you on Zoom to celebrate.
So, very, very excited for that, MZeroALive.com to check that out
and to learn just a little bit more about that.
Why are radio communications so difficult, especially in the instrument environment?
And, how can we better ourselves and get better prepared
for instrument radio communications?
Allow me to share with you a story.
In my private pilot training--
And, I hope you might have a different story.
Maybe, you're in between.
Maybe, you're working on private now, just thinking ahead.
I love that attitude as well.
Maybe, you're deep into instrument now and you may have realized this.
I wish I would have taken my radio communications
at the private pilot level just that much more serious.
I never got VFR flight following.
I flew out of a pilot-controlled/uncontrolled airport.
The only time I ever talked to a controller
was for my three required takeoffs and landings at a towered field.
That's it.
I became a private pilot,
only talking to ATC for three laps around the pattern full-stop landings.
And, I remember diving into instrument flying
and could somewhat fly the airplane,
yet, was falling behind it because I had no clue what was being said,
I was scared to talk on the radio, more so than talking,
I was scared to say the wrong thing.
Anybody ever been there, scared to say the wrong thing on the radio?
I've been there before,
and that is a very tough place to be, so often,
scared to say the right thing, or the wrong thing, I'm sorry,
on the radio.
So, I had some things stacked against me, and I wish during my private pilot training
I wish I would have gotten VFR flight falling on my cross-countries.
It wasn't on the PTS then.
It's not on the ACS now.
So, you're not required to do it, but I'm here to tell you,
if you go on to become a CFI and CFII one day,
please, make sure your students are getting VFR flight following
because it's going to make their instrument transition so much easier
because it can be so challenging to do that.
Radios will hold you back.
Because, when you fall behind the airplane, especially, in the instrument environment,
the further you fall behind,
the harder it is to catch up.
And, often, I find once you fall behind, it can be pretty darn close to impossible.
If you don't change your mindset to more forward-thinking,
you will never get even caught up with the airplane,
let alone like we always classically say, staying ahead of that airplane.
It's how students fail checkride.
They make one mistake.
They miss one radio call.
They bust one steep turn, whatever it is.
And, that problem haunts them,
even though they continue to hurdle through the sky at 90 knots.
Radio communications are no different.
You goof up, you say something dumb, you didn't understand,
and you're still going through the sky at 90 knots
but you don't totally understand what just happened a mile ago behind you.
But, that may not be that important.
What is probably most important is the second right now,
to stay with that airplane rather than falling behind that airplane.
But, it's so easy when you get these radio calls,
"2-3-Mike-Zulu, you're 5 miles from the final approach fix,
Base turn left hand, 330, maintain 3,000 until established,
cleared ILS Runway 36 to Ocala."
And, you catch your breath, and you look over your CFI and go,
"What did he say?
What did she say?"
Anybody would give your CFI that look where you just look to the side, like,
"What? Back me up here?
Can you help me out?"
We've all done that before.
If you haven't, you will do that.
It's human nature, sometimes, because it can be so challenging,
radio communications, especially those, and our clearances and everything else.
And, I just want to briefly share with you today
how radio communications don't have to be a jailer that they become
and put you in this prison because you're not proficient with them.
Now, maybe, you're one of the few rare ones
who just loves radio communications.
You fly out of a busy airport, like a PDK or something like that,
and you're good.
You had to be good at it.
It was sink or swim.
Or, you're a first responder, you're in the military,
so radio communication was just such
a big part of your life in your career, anyways.
Those people, it works out so well for.
But, for normal people, man, radio communications can be tough.
And, I find, if you fly in the pilot- controlled/uncontrolled environment,
you feel safe there and you feel terrified at a towered airport
because it feels like the wild west.
And, the opposite is true.
If you fly out of a PDK, a towered airport, you feel at home there,
you go to a pilot-controlled/uncontrolled airport,
and that feels like the wild west.
We have to find some balance between these two
and use the services and the technique at each airport.
I'm diving into this, really, in-depth recently,
putting the finishing touches now,
by the time you're hearing this, on "Aviation Mastery," the book.
Hopefully, shipping late May is the goal with that.
And, as I'm putting the touches on that, man,
the radio communications chapter just takes so much love,
because I'm learning so many great new techniques,
and I'll share some with you here.
And, some of these new techniques, I'm realizing that, wow,
radio communications don't have to be this burden, this challenge, this fear
that so many of us have.
And, I'm going to give it to you--
just share with you some techniques we can work through,
the first and foremost.
If you're not using a service like LiveATC.net
to listen to it and immerse yourself,
that's one of the three keys of aviation mastery, is immersion,
if you're not immersing yourself in this,
you're going to fall behind.
But, there's ways to immerse yourself.
You could put LiveATC.net on
and passively listen to it in the background.
And, that's not a bad practice.
But, if you, and I imagine this is you because you're listening to this,
you're always looking for ways to level up your game,
level up your flying, level up your thinking,
a way to level all of this up now is to sit back and say,
"Let's listen for an airplane."
I don't care what it is.
It could be JetBlue 1-2-3.
"Okay, I am JetBlue 123.
I hear JetBlue 123."
They call ground.
Next, they're going to call tower.
I follow their taxi that they're going to make.
They're told this taxi here.
They call tower. They're here.
I follow this, and I pretend, and I listen to the radio,
and I respond to the radio calls as if I'm JetBlue 123,
and then grab the next plane, 2-3-Mike-Zulu.
Whatever it is, grab these little planes from ground to takeoff to approach,
or from approach to tower to ground, whatever that is,
and pretend you are that plane.
And, you know what?
Here's the best thing to do.
You're JetBlue 123.
Keep working in the background.
You're an IT.
You're in telecom, whatever it is.
You're working from home.
You're working at the office.
Put your AirPods and listen to LiveATC and try to do your work.
You should do your work.
It's what pays for your flight training.
Do your work, listening to live ATC, and you're still JetBlue 123,
and you're working, you're working, you're working.
When you hear JetBlue 123,
you write down what you said, you research, and you do all that in your mind.
You read it back like you would, and you get back to work.
And, then, you're working on closing this big business deal
or whatever else you're doing.
You hear JetBlue 123 again.
And, that is training your mind to go from another task,
like flying the airplane,
to keying in on a specific tail number or flight number,
because, perhaps, you've been in this situation before,
and I just shared this on Inflight Coffee a few weeks ago,
how difficult it can be, even something like a tail number change.
There's many times when I fly the Tecnam, which is 2-4-5-Tango-Alpha,
yet I call myself 2-3-Mike-Zulu.
I think that was dumb, Jason.
I have to correct myself with ATC, and ATC is confused, and I'm confused,
and I'm behind the airplane, right?
It's so easy to get confused in those circumstances.
It's so easy to fall behind the airplane because of that,
even something like a little tail number change.
This helps you practice.
This helps you in the multi-tasking department as well.
Another tool, and I shared this and will continue to share this,
especially, after our birthday celebration, April 15th at the end of April,
whatever the last Thursday of April is.
I don't have the date in front of me.
I'm going to do another great livestream.
So, that'll be on MZeroALive.com as well,
after the birthday celebration to RSVP to that as well.
I love just doing these Zoom calls and, again, seeing your smiling faces.
That's what I'm all about.
One thing we've been practicing a lot is switch roles.
By that, I mean stop being the pilot talking to the controller
and this time be the controller talking to the pilot.
When you can switch the role and know what tower is going to say to you
or what you believe tower should and will say to you,
you are now thinking ahead of that airplane.
So, instead of calling up, pretend someone calls up.
"Ocala ground, Skyhawk 2-3-Mike-Zulu."
What would they say?
Think about it.
"2-3-Mike-Zulu, this is Ocala ground, go ahead."
How would 2-3-Mike-Zulu respond?
"2-3-Mike-Zulu north T-hangars, Information Alpha, VFR west."
You are Ocala ground in this case, how would you respond?
"2-3-Mike-Zulu, Information Alpha is current.
Runway 36, taxi via Alpha, Alpha-1."
When you can switch roles and start to think like ground
think like tower, think like approach,
the world can become a better, safer place, because you are doing what?
You're staying ahead.
You're thinking ahead of even the human on the other side,
which allows you to, then, stay ahead of that airplane
when you flip-flop the role like that.
It can serve you.
And, radio communications can serve you.
You can practice your clearances.
We are working, actually,
vigorously on a system for you to better practice radio communications.
I can't share too much and let the cat out of the bag too much,
but it's going to be a big deal,
and there's a lot of very, very cool things that we'll be sharing.
So, very excited about that, very excited to share that with you all.
It's just going, once again, to continue to serve you
as you work to better yourself in radio communications.
That is what we're really after and always pushing for,
making these safer, smarter pilots who go beyond the ACS,
go beyond just the basics of things.
That's what we're after.
The other aspect of this, I didn't plan on sharing this,
but knowledge isn't power, knowledge is potential power,
that I have shared a million times.
You can write down your clearance and read it back perfectly,
but do you know how to program that in your GPS?
Do you even know what all of it means, fully?
So, again, you could be an expert at radio communications,
but you must also be an expert in applying those radio communications as well.
That's where I want you to be.
That's where I need you to be.
How about that?
That is where I truly need you to be when it comes to our radio communications.
So, MZeroA Nation, you are a blessing.
I don't know how else to put it.
It is incredible to get to do what we do for a living.
It doesn't feel like we have a job.
I just have such peace in what we do every day
and serving you all, and I hope you feel that passion.
I hope you can borrow some of this passion, if you feel like you need it,
whatever that may be,
borrow some of this confidence, maybe, there's some wisdom in here,
to go out and pursue mastery in aviation, not just in radio communications,
not just landings like we talked about last week.
Mastery is a quest, not a score on a test.
And, you have to continue to go above and beyond
in every little thing that you do.
So, MZeroA Nation, you are incredible.
You are just a gift to what we get to do here every single day.
And, I just want to thank you for that.
I want to thank you for continuing to push beyond.
It's incredible to call you family.
Sorry to ramble so much, I'm just passionate about you all,
and I'm passionate about safety,
and I'm passionate about just making safer, smarter pilots.
If there's anything at all we can do
this week, this month, this year to make you that safer, smarter pilot,
please, please, please, don't hesitate to reach out.
Thank you for the great reviews.
Thank you for the thumbs-up on this video.
Thank you for just everything that you do for us.
Be sure to check out MZeroALive.com,
AviationMastery.com, if you need a copy of the book.
Have an amazing rest of your day.
And most importantly, remember,
that a good pilot is always learning.
Have a great day, everyone. We'll see you.