Flight Training at the Marine Military Academy

In the following video you’ll meet two flight school students and their instructor, Mitri Garib, from the Marine Military Academy’s aerospace program.  They will briefly demonstrate part of the pre-flight check of a Redhawk Cessna 172, explain how they became interested in aviation, discussion the flight training program at the Marine Military Academy and demonstrate the Redbird FMX full-motion simulator used by the program.

 A Brief Video Overview of Marine Military Academy’s Flight Training Program

 Video Transcription

pre-flight checking an aircraft
Student pilots perform a pre-flight check with their instructor.

For the pre-flight we are going to follow the checklist .  We will be looking to make sure that we don’t have anything loose or missing or anything of that sort.  Ok what is next?  Next is the horizontal stabilizer and elevator.  So you got the stabilizer both the horizontal and vertical stabilizer.  And again you want to check the condition of the leading edge on both of them.   Make sure they are free from anything that’s going to disruptively affect the airflow on them  so you want to make sure it’s nice and clean just like it is right now.

This is the flying portion of our aerospace program.  It consists of both classroom time and time in the air.  What you see behind us here is a Redbird Cessna 172 being refurbished with a Redbird whole new avionics package,  new engine package, all kinds of new upgrades.   The other portion of our aerospace program takes place in the classroom in Blaschke Hall where we have a full-motion flight simulator from Redbird, as well as a desktop flight simulator and we’re both currently enrolled in the ground school, which we are taking sixth period as in the extra class.  And, it means a lot to me as I always wanted to be a pilot every since I was a little kid I have been very interested in aviation, and it feels good to be a part of it.

Every since I was little I wanted to be a pilot.  I remember when I was ten years old I used to always go to this store and buy the new simulators that came out.  And then I bought  an actual moving chair, and I like it  I enjoyed always flying simulators and now that I have the opportunity to fly I’m really happy about it.

 

pre-flight fuel sample
Instructor from the flight training program demonstrates how to evaluate a fuel sample.

That’s enough.  You want to check the condition, should be clear because this is jet fuel so we got clear there’s nothing floating around in there. There’s no water nothing in there.  This came out right from the fuel sample there.

But as we turn on the engine basically what we are looking for is to make sure that everything is in the green.  If not we will see something red and that will get our attention, and we will try to fix the problem or deal with that as we need to.   This is a very, very user-friendly system and it’s a very safe airplane because of that.  You’re not doing any extra work.

Good afternoon, my name is Mitri Garib one of the flight instructors at the Marine military Academy I teach both the flight instruction and the CP six what they call it which is the class period six the aerospace program.  It’s basically set up in three parts.  One of them is a classroom environment.  The second one is that full-motion simulator that we use and the third part is actually getting in the airplane and going flying.    Everything within the program is set so that these students can get the most out of the time that they’re here at the end of the program.  Get their certification as private pilots.  Now we will be adding commercial and adding instrument pilots at a later time.  But as far as right now this is what we have set up.

 

Cadet Dickerson stands next to the Redhawk Cessna 172
Cadet Dickerson stands next to the Redhawk Cessna 172

All right so today is when the fun happens.  We finally get to come out to the airport and fly as you can see.  We just completed our pre-flight inspection with our flight instructor over there making sure the aircraft is airworthy and ready to fly.   Pretty shortly here we will be getting in the airplane and go fly.  I think we are going to stay inside the pattern here in Harlingen.  This is what you get to work for.  Everything that you learn in the ground school course makes sense as soon as you get in the airplane.  When it is in the classroom it is just a bunch of words, but when you come out here it’s translated into reality.

Before starting the airplane so will do this one first.  We will start from here, we’ll just call it complete.  And then when we do turn it on we will just go start the engine.  Pre-flight inspection complete, crew and passenger briefing complete, seats and seat belts adjust and lock, put mine on too.  Seat locks engaged, cabin door is closed and locked.  Ok, I will close mine as we leave.  Brakes, set and test they are there. Circuit breakers, circuit breakers are all in.  Right here we have a line of circuit breakers and you got some more here and those are all set.  Flight area? Looks clear make sure that there is no one out there. Looks clear. All right engine master. Engine master on.   Wait for that glow plug.  That glow plug is going to light up. There it is.  Wait until it extinguishes.    That’s what it says here, extinguish.  Flight control lamp extinguish. There it goes. There it goes and now press the start button.  Now once again make sure it is clear.  Yell clear outside.    Clear!

FMX flight simulator
Cadet Dickerson stands beside the a Redbird FMX flight simulator.

Ok, so this is our full motion flight simulator from Redbird, called the FMX as you can see on the side there.  I just got done flying it and man that thing is really cool.  We are so lucky to have it here at MMA.  And you know for me the aerospace program is one of the big draws to MMA.    And now that we have a really good strong program  with state of the art technology there’s all the more to love about it.  So this is a really great program especially with the flight simulator here so on days when the weather is not all that great or when your just not feeling up to going out to the airport you can log some simulator hours.  It is FAA certified as you can see.  So it is a really good useful  tool for flight training and I am very glad we have it here.

 

Cadet Dickerson performing a carrier landing using a FMX flight simulator.
Cadet Dickerson performing a carrier landing using a FMX flight simulator.

Pull up.  Turn.  That’s pretty good.  All right so you just landed the airplane on the aircraft carrier.  So congratulations right.  So what I am going to do now is reposition you over to Harlingen.  That’s where we are practicing our take offs and landings you know out there at the airport so.  Gulf on the left.  Air should be destabilized.  Looks good. Preline check is complete.  Lights on. Nice smooth landing.  Watch your air speed.  There you go.

The Marine Military Academy pilot training program features the Redhawk Cessna 172 and  FMX & TD2 flight simulators.  To learn more about our high school pilot training program  visit the Flight Training page of our website.

Marine Military Academy is a Private All Boys High School located in South-Texas.