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Instructors provide training to pilots to take them from zero time to ready for the practical test. One thing instructors realize after teaching for a few years is that every student is different. As a brand new instructor, how do you recognize student challenges? If you identify them, how should you deal with them? For a new instructor, this isn’t something you learn in CFI school, this is something that comes with experience.

In this safety seminar, Dan Dyer presents a methodology for handling student challenges. This methodology is based on human cognitive behavior to consider how humans learn. Dan will present an eye-opening basis for how CFIs teach knowledge vs risk management vs. flight skills. If you think these are approached in the same manner, you will want to tune into this seminar to learn a more effective method for teaching.

Regardless if you are a brand new CFI just cutting your teeth on a new student pilot, or a CFI with several years of teaching, this seminar will provide you with some key insights that you may not have considered before. Don’t miss learning about strategies for dealing with student challenges. After this seminar, you will no doubt approach a future student challenge in a more effective way.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive of nearly 500 recorded safety seminars.

San Carlos Flight Center invites Commercial Pilot Nick Williams to investigate aircraft management. In this seminar, Nick will share how working with several large aircraft management firms has given him the knowledge to better operate and manage the aircraft he flies. For those who have never managed an aircraft before, it could be surprising how many intricacies and nuances have gone unnoticed over the years. This seminar will detail some concepts and strategies across ownership structure, financial accounting, maintaining, operating, and, of course, piloting your own aircraft. To conclude, he will share how his experience of operating and managing larger aircraft has helped him become a better pilot both inside and outside the flight deck.

Even if you are not an owner, this seminar will equip you with the knowledge needed to better understand the aircraft you operate. If you are an owner, join us to learn industry best practices and apply them to your everyday flying.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive of over 400 recorded safety seminars.

To develop this understanding we will further investigate the systems in a Cessna 172. San Carlos Flight Center invites Herb Patten, Chief Pilot to go beyond the information in the POH. In this seminar, he will highlight details of the inner workings of the induction, oil, electrical, and fuel system as applied in the real world. For example, have you ever wondered how the alternate air works in the Cessna 172? Or what triggers the “OIL PRESS” annunciator? Through a combination of diagrams, pictures, and videos, Herb will demystify how the various systems are implemented.

If you ever wanted the answer to the question of “How does that work?”, this seminar will provide answers to many of those questions and provide a framework to fully understand any airplane you fly.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive of over 400 recorded safety seminars.

Now is your opportunity to improve your weather IQ! San Carlos Flight Center invites National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather specialists Rick Canepa and Sean Miller to discuss how they create aviation weather forecasts. Learn about atmospheric soundings common to clouds and fog formation that impact aviation. Listen in as they explain the role of the aviation weather specialist and how they compose TAFs, analyze local weather patterns, and provide crucial weather information for pilots.

If you have always been intrigued about weather, don’t miss this seminar. Rick and Sean will be ready to answer your weather questions. Don’t be left in the fog – put this seminar on your schedule.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive.

As pilots, we love altitude. So much that we’ve created a bunch of different kinds of altitude: true altitude, absolute altitude, indicated altitude, assigned altitude, and two kinds of confusing ones – pressure altitude and density altitude. For many pilots, this can lead to a mental overload. Many pilots don’t have a working understanding of pressure and density altitude. Are they even real altitudes at all?

In this seminar, join SCFC CFI Shelby Rebholtz as he introduces and explains the terms “pressure altitude” and “density altitude” and demystifies their meaning. Although the word “altitude” is used, these are clearly not measures of altitude. In fact, they are measures of atmospheric pressure and density just converted into units that pilots can understand. Confusing at first, yes, but once understood they serve a valuable purpose in determining aircraft performance.

Although few things are as important to a pilot as knowing the performance capability of the aircraft before taking to the skies, measuring the critical factor – atmospheric density – is not something that pilots can do directly. Instead we use rules of thumb, conversion factors, and our best understanding of how elevation, pressure, temperature, and humidity are interrelated. If you’ve ever opened your aircraft POH to the performance section and felt humbled, this seminar is for you.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive of nearly 500 recorded Safety Seminars.

San Carlos Flight Center invites Alan Marcum, an instrument-rated pilot to discuss flying in the flight levels. In this seminar, we will learn about the advantages and disadvantages of flying high and the associated impacts on physiology, air pressure and density, weather, emergency planning, oxygen equipment, flight planning, and more. Many think of the flight levels as an escape from the weather below, but often that is not the case. Some challenges that come from extreme altitudes are ones you have never had to consider at low altitude.

This is a great opportunity to expand your current knowledge to greater heights. Join us to learn more.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive.

San Carlos Flight Center invites ATP, flight crew safety author, and flight instructor Dale Wilson to discuss some of the physiological and psychological limitations pilots exhibit when flying at night. In this seminar, he will touch on potential dangers associated with relying on outside references during VFR flight and the effects of flight conditions present on VMC segments of IFR flight at night. As our eyesight diminishes at night, our thought processes can too. While night flight brings reduced ATC workloads, often calmer winds, and cooler temperatures that help performance it is important to recognize the human factors’ limitations during this time.

Your decision whether or not to fly at night is based on a culmination of the knowledge retained within this seminar, and your re-evaluation of your night personal minimums.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive.

San Carlos Flight Center invites Assistant Chief Pilot Brian Eliot to describe the functionality of  these capable units. He will review the buttonology and knowledge required to confidently operate the unit in various IFR scenarios. While many of these units are being replaced with newer technology, renter or veteran pilots might still encounter them and should know how to operate them. Take the time now to become better acquainted with the operations of these units. Knowledge on your aircrafts avionics package is crucial for flight safety, and the KLN89B/94 is no exception.

There is a reason why they are still approved by the FAA for IFR Flight. Join us to find out how to use this capable system on your next flight.

Brian Eliot is San Carlos Flight Center’s Assistant Chief Pilot and resident expert for IFR training and Garmin G1000 avionics. He has been flying since 1995 and received all his training in the Bay Area. Brian previously worked as a broadcast engineer, a software developer, and taught computer science at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. He regularly presents at San Carlos Flight Center safety seminars and has a reputation for making complex concepts easy to learn and understand.

San Carlos Flight Center (SCFC) is the SF Bay Area’s most dynamic flying club, committed to building general aviation through safety, community, and adventure. AOPA has consistently recognized SCFC in their Best Flight School survey, most recently in 2022 as a Distinguished Flight School.

SCFC is committed to promoting safety in general aviation through our regular safety seminars and guest speaker programs. Livestream access is free for everyone, but recorded seminars are available solely to members at a later date. Click here or contact a SCFC member service rep at (650) 946-1700 for more information about online access to our web archive.