To be or not to be

[Wayne Pierce]

Things to ponder; To quote another thread from a "VIRTUAl" pilot.

One thing interesting i wonder is that since all the VA are called virtual airlines and not airlines,why do we not call ourselves virtual pilots as well? (sic)

True we call this a Virtual airlines. There are legal issues and could be really far reaching problems if we call our Virtual airlines by the name that we are virtually representing, i.e. American Airlines.

"I am not a real pilot, but I play one on VATSIM", I have seen this quote from another member. I like it and may make a bumper sticker with that saying.

Why not call ourselves pilots. I realize I am playing a computer game as a virtual pilot and I call myself a pilot for several reasons. One being, like flight planning, it takes too long to type in the words virtual pilot, so pilot is easier to use. We are using the term amongst friends here and we all know what we are referring to. I don't use that term for what we do in the real world for everyday conversation, I get looked at really strangely and they all move aside at the table.

It is like where I worked at, before retirement. We had several classificatons for the individual job; Fireman (politically changed to firefighter), Fire engineer, Fire Captain, Fire Chief, Fire inspector, .. But in the end were all referred to as Firefighters.

I remember the ol' Garbage Man, which got changed to Sanitation Engineer. We call the persons whom go through the trash looking for recycables, Urban Miners.

So being a virtual pilot or pilot is all the same here. It doesn't matter what you call me, just don't call me late for dinner.


WLP

[Maratib Ali]

Dear wayne,hawwww i thought you were a very young guy,about 18-25,you say you are retired,i wonder what you are doing these days,i am simply amazed after listening to a lot of words from father i actually thought that flight sim world is actually occupied by young people and very few are elder,but once i start flying on vatsim and meet people in VA's it becomes true that actually most people are elder's and few people are below the age of 24 wow.

[Michael Blakely]

I'm not a 24 year old, but I try to play like one. Just ask the people who saw me crash on my skateboard last week. Thank goodness I didn't crash on VATSIM, that would be embarassing.

[Wayne Pierce]

I'm not a 24 year old, but I try to play like one. Just ask the people who saw me crash on my skateboard last week.

Gosh, When I last rode a skateboard I broke my right arm ,cracked the number 14 molar, 8 stitches in my chin.

Let's see .... 1964 Haven't been back since.

PS. Vatsim wasn't even thought of yet.

[Theodore Martin]

BTW, some of the people in this VA are real pilots. Some in general aviation and some are actually airline pilots. So some can truly call themselves pilots and not virtual pilots.

I myself must stick with the virtual pilot tag and also fit into the "elder" category (but I'm not ancient like Wayne ).

[Theodore Martin]

You probably do more planning. Dispatchers help us out a lot in the real world, that's for sure. I don't mean to oversimplify, we do a lot of planning, just a different sort of planning because the dispatchers do all the leg work of weather planning, flight planning and filing, etc. In simple terms, we pretty much check the radar, check the METAR/TAF, check the gas and go burn some holes in the sky.

Do you RW pilots have to enter the flight plan into the FMC are is it already loaded/saved for you and you just have to confirm it?

[Maratib Ali]

One thing i can't understand is that if you are a real pilot sean,then why do you join a virtual airline,i mean you fly almost daily in the real world i suppose because that is your work,if i come home from work i just don't want to talk about it,i just want to rest,then why do you come home and still want to fly in computer at home? why are you still interested in virtual flying when in simulator here there,there is something unrealistic and everything is not correctly modeled plus flight attendant can't give you a cup of juice here,so why do you still want to do virtual flying,when you do something similar daily at work?

[Greg Gemelli]

You probably do more planning. Dispatchers help us out a lot in the real world, that's for sure. I don't mean to oversimplify, we do a lot of planning, just a different sort of planning because the dispatchers do all the leg work of weather planning, flight planning and filing, etc. In simple terms, we pretty much check the radar, check the METAR/TAF, check the gas and go burn some holes in the sky.

Do you RW pilots have to enter the flight plan into the FMC are is it already loaded/saved for you and you just have to confirm it?

I think some certain aircraft do have the capability to uplink the flightplan from ACARS, but not on the Embraer (at Eagle, at least). We manually input the plan, then crosscheck it against the release. Sometimes if I know where the plane is going next and I happen to remember the flightplan (ORD-FSD for example, is a really easy route) I'll put it in for them, but that's pretty rare.

We have "canned" flight plans in our FMS databases at SkyWest that are typically correct but you always have to cross check the route against our PDC clearance that comes via ACARS.

[Theodore Martin]

Sean and Greg,
Thanks for the info. I always like to compare my VA flying to what is required in the RW. That way I can model my VA flying to match and get even more enjoyment out of it.