A Look at the Evolution of Flight Training

Although the laws of physics have not changed since the beginning of time, flight training has evolved and continues to do so. Join us as we look back on some of the key changes to flight training over the past 40 years.

In the early 1980s, VCRs became more popular and began appearing in many homes.

For people who couldn’t fit a face-to-face ground school into their lives, ground school videotape courses, such as those created by King Schools and Sporty’s, provided the opportunity to get aviation education delivered by an experienced CFI in the comfort of the learner’s home.

Eventually, these prepackaged, go-at-your-own-pace ground schools made the transition to DVDs, and later, the internet. The onset of remote training options helped expedite the process for some, provided a ready resource to be used as a refresher as needed and filled gaps in instruction for learners whose instructor, perhaps as a freshly minted CFI, did not have the experience or depth of knowledge to impart as compared to the seasoned professionals at Sporty’s or King.

Before the ’80s, the wearing of ear protection in general aviation aircraft was largely pilot preference.

Headsets, according to those who started their aviation careers in the time of radial engines or early jets, were awkward, uncomfortable, and offered limited hearing protection. Hearing loss went hand in hand with being an aviator.

But by the ’80s, technology improved and the wearing of a headset became more accepted as pilots made the connection between cockpit noise and vibration with pilot fatigue. Headsets became a safety wearable.

In 1989, Bose set the aviation world on its ear—pun slightly intended—with the release of the first commercially available acoustic noise canceling headset.

In September 2022, Lightspeed introduced the Lightspeed Zulu, an ANR headset that also provides a warning of carbon monoxide levels in the cockpit. According to the company, since the release of the unit, it has heard from some 100 clients who say an annunciation provided by the device warned them of a potentially deadly situation.

Does anyone remember learning about the Terminal Control Area? These days it’s referred to as Class B.

In the early ’90s the FAA decided an alphabet system would work better, and pilots who wanted to fly in the United States learned about airspace classes A through G, memorizing visibility and cloud clearance requirements.

Chapter 3 of the Aeronautical Information Manual has the details and is most helpful as you wade through the concept of controlled and uncontrolled and special use airspace.

If you learned to fly before 2000, you probably learned to use an NDB for navigation.

These days, NDBs, still depicted by a magenta puff ball on the VFR sectional, are harder and harder to find—like phone booths, they have been replaced by new technology.

The NDB was created in the 1930s and used by both the military and commercial carriers. It operates using amplitude modulation (AM radio), and tracking to one is as simple as dialing in the three-digit frequency and flying the aircraft by making adjustments so the NDB needle is pointing straight up, which will take you to the station.

Station passage happens when the needle falls, pointing to the tail of the aircraft. There is no on-off flag, so you have to listen to the Morse code identifier throughout the operation.

The technology for the VOR was developed in the ’30s, but the widespread installation was delayed by World War II.

In 1946, VORs started to appear on hillsides and at airports, many of them military fields and later civilian airports.

Unlike the rudimentary NDB—which was still a step up from dead reckoning—the VOR provided the next level of navigation precision. Radio frequencies dialed into the navigation equipment, while needles provided course deviation information by showing deflection right or left of the course centerline.

Victor Airways—known as “highways in the sky”—were created between VORs to form common routes for flight planning purposes. The VOR has an on-off flag, so you can see when it stops transmitting when you’re in range or out of range of the station so you don’t have to constantly monitor the Morse code identifier. 

Alas, like the NDB, the VOR is rapidly being replaced by newer technology, so the FAA began to systematically decommission (or cease repairing) VORs around the country. Some 234 VORs were shut down beginning in 2020 with an additional 225 to follow until 2030. 

GPS, satellite-based navigation was developed by the U.S. military in the 1970s.

In 1983, Reagan announced the technology would be available to civilian commercial airliners. By the ’90s it was appearing in GA aircraft—first in portable devices that could be used as backup navigation and later in units hardwired into aircraft. The technology revolutionized navigation for VFR pilots who found that instead of struggling with paper sectionals, all they had to do was push a “direct-to” button for the desired airport or waypoint, and the magenta line would take them directly to their destination. It is not foolproof, however, as the magenta line can take you right through controlled airspace or terrain, so the pilot still needs to pay attention.

The satellite technology led to the creation of Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) approaches that, while nonprecision, provided greater accuracy than the 1940s era VORs and NDBs. WAAS made it possible to establish more precise instrument approaches at airports that previously used VORs or NDBs or never had an instrument approach before.

These days, teaching a learner how to use GPS has become a balance of teaching how to communicate, navigate, retrieve information, and load and activate instrument approaches within the GPS without becoming totally dependent on the technology.

For this reason, savvy CFIs start the learners with pilotage and paper sectionals. Once the learner has mastered those, GPS is introduced.

In the early 2000s, Avidyne, Garmin, and Dynon introduced glass panel technology to GA aircraft.

Instead of having multiple round analog gauges that sometimes had the pilot’s head moving side to side, they could focus on a single computer screen that used vertical tapes for airspeed and altitude.

Like analog counterparts, the information is color coded. Green for normal operating range, yellow or amber, for caution and red for, uh-oh, we’re in trouble. The attitude indicator covered the entire screen, which made it easier to interpret.

There was a learning curve. Instead of a ball in an inclinometer to detect a slip or skid, the pilot referred to a horizontal line at the base of a triangle at the apex of the attitude indicator. Instead of telling the client to “step on the ball,” CFIs used the phrase, “step on the line.”

Pilots learned to use touchscreens, toggle switches, and soft keys (so named because they are actuated by software) to bring up and clarify information. Pilots wishing to fly glass had to become familiar with a new raft of acronyms—AHRS, PFD, MFD, etc.

One of the first things instructors had to contend with was the learner becoming buried in informational overload and delayed interpretation of information.

With a typical steam gauge, looking at the needle is like looking at an analog clock that doesn’t have numbers on it—you can still determine what time it is at a glance. With the tapes on a PFD, you can’t just glance, so you must read the number and process the information. There is a tendency during takeoff to pull back on the yoke or stick to capture the speed rather than holding a pitch attitude and letting the speed come to you as the aircraft accelerates.

Simulating a failed  instrument in a glass cockpit also became more of a challenge. CFIs learned to use strategically placed Post-it notes to cover the information.

Glass cockpits were heralded as a way to make flying safer, as the units featured backup batteries in the event of an electrical system failure. And when something did fail, there was no guessing because a great big “X” appears over the malfunctioning item or annunciator lights that spelled out the issue.

CFIs learned how easy it was to distract and bury a learner in the panel during flight—and put them behind the airplane. Teaching the panel on the ground with the aircraft plugged into an external power source or using an G1000-equipped FTD or AATD to teach procedures became widely accepted practices.

Here again, video-based learning aids provide the student with resources that can be reviewed multiple times.

Transponders were first developed in the 1940s, beginning with the Mode A transponder that would transmit a four-digit code. ATC could detect an aircraft, but there wasn’t altitude information.

High-profile accidents in the ’60s and ’70s involving midair collisions between airliners and GA aircraft made the argument for the Mode C transponder to be added to aircraft that had engine-driven electrical systems.

The Mode C transponder—the namesake of the veil in Class B—transmits a four-digit code that allows ATC to determine the position via an altitude encoder. Part of a pilot’s training was learning what airspace required an aircraft to have a Mode C transponder, and they were required to memorize the transponder codes—VFR flight (1200), hijack (7500), radio failure (7600), and emergency (7700).

In 2020, ADS-B (automatic dependent surveillance broadcast) became the law of the land. Basically speaking, if the old rules required a transponder in that airspace, ADS-B Out is required there now.

ADS-B allows pilots to see nearby air traffic. It can be a little surprising because you can set the ADS-B to pick up aircraft so far away that you see them on the tablet screen but not  out the window.

Unlike the transponder that requires a ground-based interrogation signal, ADS-B Out allows the aircraft to broadcast its position and includes the tail-number identification of the aircraft. A working Mode C transponder is still required even if the aircraft is equipped with ADS-B Out.

One of the challenges of being a pilot is learning new technology. This is particularly true for flight instructors who may be working at a school with round-dial panels or first-generation glass but find themselves working with a client who owns the latest and greatest panel or aircraft on the market.

While the technology is consistent—a GPS in one aircraft functions the same as any other—the user interface changes between avionics manufacturers. Instructors must be knowledgeable and well versed on various types of navigation in addition to the diversity of the technology in the panel.

We don’t know what the future holds for us in flight training, but we’re certainly know that learning will continue to take place.

This column first appeared in the October Issue 951 of the FLYING print edition.