Fly Me Friendly

As of today I’m back crewing the balloons again – yay – it’s good to be back although my “day job” doesn’t let me do the crewing more than once or twice a month. At least it gets me out of an office and onto the field once again, working with aviation, meeting people and getting some exercise (sorely needed, I can assure you! :) Of course, the extra $$$ help too…

This morning’s session certainly proved for me that 6 months off crewing has left me a little rusty, even after the training session the other week. A few things have changed in the way we rig the balloons and between that plus generally getting back into the swing of it, I wound up forgetting to get the fan off the trailer. Nick (my pilot today) got everything ready to start the cold inflation, including the guys holding the mouth of the balloon open, and went to start the fan – ooops. Of course, I’m up the other end getting the velcros in when I hear the ramp drop on the trailer and realise “oh shit!” :)

Not the worst thing but still embarassing.

Oh well – a fun session and it’s great to be back doing it again.

As of today I now hold a First Aid level 1 certificate – woo hoo – I know how to do CPR and such. Go me :)

Training was held for Balloon Sunrise pilots & crew out at the Balgownie Estate winery in Yarra Valley. Karen & Robyn were our trainers and it was a lot of fun. Things are certainly easier than when I first got basic training back at school. Apparently they found people were taking too long to sort things out and not getting into the important bit (CPR) soon enough. Then there were also the legal aspects where people were paranoid about getting their asses sued if they tried to help, etc.

So, now it’s easier – yay :)

It all comes down to a handy mnemonic:

Danger
Response
Airway
Breathing
CPR
Defib

Some things haven’t changed, including the recovery position and using the Little Annie practice doll thingos – although now you get to use a funky face thingo that fits on and there’s one per person – gotta watch out for those body fluids, ya know :)

All up, a lot of fun and educational – ya can’t beat that!

This weekend has been a busy aviation weekend, that’s for sure. On Saturday, I spent the afternoon and evening attending the VATSIM Oceania 2007 Convention out at the Holiday Inn at Melbourne airport. The conference is all about operating flight simulators, ATC simulators and the whole “online experience” that people get these days. Amazing stuff.

I went out there with Carlo as a representative of his Flight Experience operation here in Melbourne. He was presenting there so we caught a few others in the agenda and then stayed for the dinner. Between the end of the conference and the dinner, we shot over to the airport for a couple of drinks while watching the aircraft come & go. While there we caught Virgin’s new Embraer E-170 jet come in and park – it’s doing flights around the country to train pilots, cabin crew and ground staff on the specifics of its operation.

On the Sunday I went out the Yarra Valley for a day’s crew training with Balloon Sunrise. We spent some time reviewing the crew procedures manual, then had some pizza for lunch and ended up taking a balloon out to a field so we could rig it, inflate it and deflate it, all without the pressure of commercial operations. The idea was that we could take the time to discuss what was being done at each step and review important issues, etc. Much easier to do in the daylight without passengers and with heaps of time to review, etc. It’s an idea that Rob’s been trying to get happening for a while now and it really did work well.

Of course, we wound up attracting a few people who thought we were going to launch. Not likely – it was getting rather unpredictable with winds puffing all around the place. The joys of a mid-afternoon inflate :)

After lunch and while the others were taking the balloon out to set it up, Peter took Marlon & I out for a flight in the company’s new helicopter. They’ve set up Sunrise Helicopters and are running a Robinson R44 (Clipper II) model based off the lawn in front of Balgownie Estate. NEAT!!! A quick 10 minute ride (sadly with me in the back – DOH! :) was a lot of fun then it was back to the training session.

So, quite the aviation weekend. Now, if only I could have added in some flying time where I was at the controls, well, then it would have been almost a perfect weekend :)