Sample pages from the new ACET course.
NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS – Civil Air Patrol’s new Air Crew Emergency Training course is now available online through the organization’s eServices site for members.
The course, found in eServices’ Learning Management System, targets both instructors and crew members. Designed to provide the material and tools required to teach the course, it also focuses supplying information that will help build the members’ knowledge, confidence and basic skills in:
- Interpreting flight control positions and instrument indications, as well as charts and navigation instruments.
- Using radios and proper phraseology to communicate needs and intentions in an emergency.
The course materials are presented in detail, in part because of the possibility that participants may fly regularly as mission observers and can contribute to the operational risk management and crew resource management of the flight. The course’s main purpose, though, is to provide training to nonpilot mission observers, furnishing them with the basic knowledge and skills to respond to an emergency situation in the cockpit should the pilot become incapacitated.
Accordingly, it provides a thorough introduction to the concepts and instruments needed to fly a plane, navigate and communicate.
The course not only integrates the information necessary to familiarize the student with procedures and equipment,it also increases the student’s understanding and retention of that information by including actual hands-on flying experience.
The training should leave participants with the knowledge and self-assurance to maintain control of the aircraft during an emergency “as well as provide the basic skills needed to confidently handle the situation and bring the aircraft to a survivable landing,” said Joe Piccotti, chief of aircraft operations at National Headquarters.
The course isn’t required to qualify as an aircrew member to support missions, but any nonpilot mission observer could benefit from taking it, Piccotti said.
The course “provides an outstanding opportunity” for such crew members, he said. He credited the project to the leadership of Lt. Col. Leslie Vazquez, in cooperation with the Federal Aviation Administration’s Susan Parson, as well as National Headquarters’ aircraft operations, information technology and distance learning staff members.
“It was truly a well-orchestrated team effort that produced this superb educational product for Civil Air Patrol,” Piccotti said.
