I began my Private Pilot training at Skill Aviation, located at KUGN, Waukegan Airport, recently. I originally came here to take my Part 107 UAS Drone test and ended up getting a 95 on the test, thanks to endless studying for months on end. Proud of my score and excited to be surrounded by all the planes, I decided to sign up for the Private Pilot training course offered by Jeppesen and register as a student pilot at Skill. My Part 107 training is a great start toward entering the student pilot training program at Skill. I got much of the basics covered, like airspace, weather, weight & balance and basic aerodynamics down.
I’ll be training in the Diamond DA20. I was a little hesitant as I was leaning toward training in the Cessna 172. I got over that once I sat in it, it’s sleek and fun. I fell in love with Diamond aircraft right away and am already thinking of getting a DA40 at some point. My first training flight was a fairly windy day with lots of turbulence, wind sheer and a 15 knot crosswind landing. It was too much for me to land that flight unfortunately, so my CFI handled that one for me.
I had planned to build the simulator well before I started my training, but now I’m fully driven to get this started so I can use it as a home training tool, mostly to familiarize myself with the instruments. Better to train on the ground than while flying as it’s easy to become task-saturated in the air. I’ve been planning this for quite awhile, so can’t wait to get started on it.
