More milestones

The flying lull continues but there have been some bright spots.

One of my students passed his commercial check ride, the other his private. It's a great feeling on both counts to see dreams come true.

On a more mundane level, my logbook now reads four figures.

Passing 1,000 hours was a surprisingly low-key event. For years I looked at 1,000 hours as an unreachable goal, now it's just another in the long string of numbers that dictate my life.

Numbers are everywhere -- and in many cases everything -- in aviation.

1,000 hours, in fact, means nothing.

1,200 hours, on the other hand, means you're qualified to be pilot-in-command under Part 135 IFR operations. That's provided you also have 500 hours of cross-country flying, 100 hours of night and 75 hours of instrument time.

1,200 is the next number that actually matters to me, and even then only a tiny bit.

10 hours of multi-engine time, despite whatever your big number adds up to, means you don't have enough to get hired by the airlines. 50 hours means you do. Maybe. 25 means you might. And 100 is better.

So 100 is also the next number that matters, although by the time I get there I may or may not have a desire to fly the line, and the line may or may not have a desire for pilots.

The 600 hours of dual given in my logbook, also, means little. It is certainly a crude accounting of experience, but the fact is one person could learn quite a bit about their craft in 600 hours while another could learn very little indeed.

The only milestone left as an instructor dictated directly by the numbers is the ability to train first-time flight instructors, which requires two years as an instructor but only a few hundred hours of instruction given.

So, an instructor who has worked part-time for two years and given 201 hours of dual can train new flight instructors, but an instructor who has worked full-time for 18 months and given more than 600 hours of dual can't.

That makes no sense to me, but that's how it goes in a professional life that is measured in six-minute intervals.

So 2, or 24 if you prefer to count in months, is also the next number that matters. It is also the only number that matters that, outside of continuing to breathe in and out, I can't do anything about.

15 matters too, as you need 15 hours of multi-engine PIC to qualify for a multi-engine instructor's rating, although in my case the exact number to get to the magic 15 is 11.6.

So there you have it. When it comes to the numbers, 11.6, 100, 1,200 and 2 matter right now.

Well, those and tonight's lotto numbers.

I'm not going to spend too much time thinking about the numbers, although it's hard not to when nearly every question, opportunity and paycheck relies on them.

I figure if I keep having fun the numbers will take care of themselves.