Tag: Indian Air Force

My First Flight as a Trainee Pilot (Flight Cadet)

Anil Goyal

 “Sometimes, flying feels too God-like to be attained by man. Sometimes, the world from above seems too beautiful, too wonderful, too distant for human eyes to see.” Charles A. Lindbergh Growing up in India in the 1980s that too in tier II city, I would have been lucky if I got a chance to travel on a plane. Almost every child I had met, dreamt about becoming a pilot. Maybe this was just because we wanted to fly and reach the clouds above, or because we saw in cartoons and…

Light Transport Aircraft: Saras

Anil Goyal

Named Saras, after the Indian crane known for its grace and beauty in flight, the Light Transport Aircraft (LTA) has the design objective of being able to carry between eight and 14 passengers and extendable to an 18-passenger variant, in multiple modes of operation.  The flight-testing expertise and resources in India have matured adequately to undertake prototype flight-testing. The Light Transport Aircraft (LTA) program, SARAS a turboprop aircraft being developed indigenously by National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL) of Government of India, is the first civil aircraft program aimed at certification standard,…

My First Air Travel Experience

Anil Goyal

 “I believe that if one always looked at the skies, one would end up with wings.” Gustave Flaubert In autumn 1992, I was 20 going on 21; the “going on” part is important to emphasize for various reasons. I was sixth termer, an ordinary cadet of the prestigious National Defense Academy (NDA), Pune about to graduate in a few weeks. During the 3 years of training at National Defense Academy, we had been turned into “Jack of all trade but master of none”. It was only in the last term…

Women Officer of IAF: Outstretching for the Crest

Anil Goyal

I will come again and conquer you because as a mountain you can’t grow…. But as a human, I can. Sir Edmund Hillary Mount Everest, Sanskrit and Nepali Sagarmatha, Tibetan Chomolungma, Chinese (Pinyin) Zhumulangma Feng or (Wade-Giles romanization) Chu-mu-lang-ma Feng, also spelt Qomolangma Feng, mountain on the crest of the Great Himalayas of southern Asia that lies on the border between Nepal and the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, at 27°59′ N 86°56′ E. Reaching an elevation of 29,035 feet (8,850 metres), Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world. Sqn Ldr Toolika Rani (Retd) women officer of Indian Air Force has scaled many heights, including Mt…

First Love

Anil Goyal

Being the wife of a military officer is hard you have got to be OKAY with a lot of stuff which is not normal. It is very demanding and comes with its pleasures as well as pains. You have to got to hold it together personally socially and professionally. Rarely things go as planned. It may or seem surreal. Your role may seem old fashioned. The bottom line is: Military life is a life of sacrifice, however large or small, for service members and their families. Presenting a poem by Mrs Lakshmi Mini. Dedicated…

Marching Ahead, Women Officers of Indian Armed Forces!

Anil Goyal

Employment of women in the Indian Armed Forces is a practice that has been adopted in the last just over two and a half decades. However, as a concept, it is neither new nor novel as is evident from history which is replete with examples all over the world. Indian Air Force inducts women in all roles, including combat and support roles. As of September 2020, there were 1,875 female officers serving in the IAF, including 10 pilots and 18 navigators. The number of women joining armed forces is steadily…

Flight Test Engineer

Anil Goyal

A flight test engineer (FTE) is an engineer involved in the flight testing of prototype aircraft or aircraft systems. He/She has overall responsibility for the planning of a specific flight test phase, which includes preparing the test plans in conjunction with other analytical and/or systems engineers, overseeing the buildup of the aircraft to the proper configuration, working with the flight test instrumentation engineer to ensure the sensors and recording systems are installed for required data parameters, and preparing the manoeuvre-by-manoeuvre plan for each test flight (enshrined typically in a higher-level document called a “test plan” and then an operational document…

Formation Aerobatics Display Team: SKAT

Anil Goyal

Even the winds stop to stare at their daring acts. The formation aerobatic team and their gravity-defying feats at zipping speeds. Loop, barrel rolls, rolls, clovers, roll of top and hard turns every manoeuvre that is hard to fathom is done in perfect precision and position. In this article, we will meet one of the members of this team. I freely admit that learning this stuff is tenuous and demanding – even harder than being married. Two aircraft close formation – which is much easier and simpler would give me…

Flight Instructors

Anil Goyal

A pilot’s journey begins with a dream, shaped by a flight instructor. A flight instructor who believes in you, who fills winds in your sail, who lights the fire, and shapes your dream with feedback (truth) employing a medium of communication which touches the heart, mind and spirit. Teaching imparts knowledge and instructing imparts skills. Therefore a teacher is one who teaches you about a subject and helps you reach understanding and an instructor is one who instructs you on how to accomplish a task. In reality, quality learning experiences…