A Hornet Guy's Indoc Gouge
I’m a Hornet guy who put 0.0 joules into learning about the airline industry prior to showing up at Indoc on 11 April. That is a totally tenable position based on my unsurpassed four days of experience. Most of the military guys have looked to the commuters to fill in our numerous blanks, and here is some of the stuff I’ve learned while trying to look informed this week. No promises that there is any value below.
By the beginning of week 2 you will need to be complete with computer-based training that doesn’t work on Mac. The training requires Java, Flash and Acrobat reader, and Apple firmly refuses to allow Flash on their devices. I run Ubuntu (a linux distro) and the learning management system (LMS) works for me. In short, I run Mozilla and installed JRE and Flash as described here and and acrobat as here. I am not a computer science major, but LT Google serves me well on the DIY computer front. Feel free to PM me if you have questions but my last name is not Torvalds.
A car really isn’t required as the hotel (Staybridge Atlanta Airport in Hapeville) is walking distance. A shuttle is available to and from training each day. The hotel has free (clean and nice) laundry. You provide the detergent. The Staybridge provides breakfast and dinner each night. Both are good and they have real (non-Pilsner) beer and wine each night. Gratis.
Our drop happened shortly after lunch but the instructors characterized that as late due to unspecified issues with the drop. All but one of the NYC MD88s went to my portion of the SSN order, which had no choice. Lots of discussion here on drops so won’t descend here.
You will get your employee number in the mail with instructions to set up your deltanet accounts a few days prior to the start of indoc. The instructions will direct you to do the LMS training before you report, but that is impossible. In order to update your personnel data (address and contact data) you have to contact the chief pilot’s office at the number on the website. Many in our class did not do any of this and it didn’t matter. My sense is that the instructions for all of that are for non-pilot new employees or that the system has evolved but the instructions have not kept up. In short, do not sweat it unless you want to set that stuff up.
I missed the 7 April deadline to set up my wife’s travel to the dinner (2nd Monday) and the staff helped me out. Don’t be me, it didn’t buy me any points at home.
Our last day of indoc is Thursday 21 April (standard 9-day flow, I understand) and my first sim is 6 May. Some of my class starts as early as 3 May. I’m done 3 June (with any luck). Delta offers you positive space travel until simulator checkride is complete and allows you to commute home when you have a break in simulators greater than 48 hours. I have three of those. I reserved all of my travel yesterday when the simulator schedule came out. Positive space means you have a seat like a paying traveler. You can standby (non-revenue or “non-rev”) from the day you get your employee badge. 26 of 30 got their badges on day 4. Four of us are getting ours “manana.” Jumpseats (different from a non-rev seat, as the non-rev implies in the back of the airplane) requires entry into CASS (maybe “cockpit access security system”, who knows), which takes weeks apparently. I hope to be in CASS prior to doing sims, but it might not happen until mid-May.
I have no airline experience but I am savvy enough to understand that my SPARKY helmet bag is likely to promote eye rolling. The commuter folks tell me that LuggageWorks makes a good 22-inch roll-aboard. It’s pricey but with all of this gear I figure if it lasts 5-10 years the amortised cost is close to zero.
No more flight cases for pubs, they issued us a Windows Surface on day 3 with a Jeppeson app and a content locker that updates all of the pubs you need to fly. Both the Captain and the FO are required to have a charged one to fly. Compared to the electronic flight bags my beloved former service issued, this is well executed. So for a second piece of luggage, some of the guys recommended one of the Aero Coast cooler bags. I have purchased neither thus far.
No idea what to do about a headset. Still working on that one but there is some discussion on this board to which I can add nothing. Lots of $ at this point when there aren’t a lot of extra ones laying around.
Speaking of pay, training pay is $3910 per month. During training you get paid “current,” which means like I was used to. Since our first five days ended on the 15th, we got $500 on the 15th. That will continue until you start flying (don’t understand whether OE counts as flight pay, but I’ll find that one out). The detail to understand here, though, is that flight pay is paid one month “in arrears” [commence middle school giggling]. I’ll skip the details because I’ll screw something up, but understand that the switch from being paid for “this month” to being paid for the previous month (really, that happens) means that there is going to be a month with very little--maybe zero--dollars on the pay slip.
There are three uniform companies that come talk to the class on day 3ish. Abbots should be familiar to the USN-types and is generally considered the best quality of the three, I think. M&H and Crew Outfitters are the other two. The commuters recommend the pilot shirts from A Cut Above Uniforms and say that the Van Huesen shirts turn yellow and do not hold up to continual use. Navy service dress blues jackets will work for the coat if you are done using them in the USN. For uniforms it seems like you’ll need:
- 1 jacket. Mandatory wear only Nov-Feb.
- 2+ shirts. I’m going to get at least 3.
- 2+ pants. You’ll want to have one pair of pants that matches the jacket. For wear without the jacket (Mar-Oct) some folks talk about buying black slacks from a store of your choice.
- Black shoes. Uniform regs specify plain-toe (no stitching on the toe). Lots of discussion in the class that boils down to “does that mean NO stitching at all.” The instructors squirm. Recommend applying judgment, keeping in mind that you’ll be wearing the black shoes in question for OE and your probation flying.
- Black belt, small plain buckle.
- Delta hat. All of the uniform shops sell hats and most of the commuters rarely wore them and actually looked to the military guys for hat expertise. I’m bummed I can’t fold it and put it in my right leg pocket.
- 2+ Nametags. Can be ordered from the uniform shops and take three weeks to arrive.
- 2+ Delta wings. On the shirt and the jacket at the same time, as they have to be on the shirt if you take the jacket off.
- Epaulets for the shirt.
- Hat emblem.
Recommend you put together a class cell roster on day one. Somebody in a class of 30 is going to oversleep at some point.
I assure you something above is completely wrong and make no further assurances. Hope to see you out there. Please add Nowledge.
--Sparky
Last edited by SparkySmith; 04-14-2016 at 02:02 PM.
Reason: Forgot to finish the sentence on black pants.