Trial Flight for 30 min?

[lazylemon]

Hi everyone,

I am currently staying in UK for study exchange until June.
I heard there are some flight schools which offer 30 min flight training that I can try to control a plane with an instructor next to me.
Wonder if this is true? how much around does it cost?

Thanks.

[weirdfish]

Yeh there are places that offer 30min lessons, although it's not really a lesson as such, more a pleasure flight with the opportunity to touch some of the controls.

Depending on what you want long term will determine how much use such a flight will be. If you just want to say you've done it then it'll do the job. If however, you're seriously looking into learning to fly then I would say you're better off doing the more commonly offered 60 minute trial lesson.

As for cost, it depends a lot on where in the uk, but around London I reckon you need to think £175ish for a 60min trial lesson. Probably £120 for 30min.

[JimKing]

Quite a few clubs do them, it depends on your aircraft choice and location as to the cost. But as a guide should be around £100 in the north.
Here is an example of one:
http://www.carlisle-flight-training.com ... page=trial

[QSD]

We do a 30 min trial flights from Redhill in the Katana for £99, and a tenner more for a 172. They are definitely not just a joy ride - a typical 30 minute trial flight would consist of a 15 minute briefing on the effects of controls, 10 minutes taxying and about 20 minutes in the air. I do the take off and initial climb until trimmed at our departure altitude, then hand over to the Student who would fly the rest of the sortie until it is time for the descent and landing, when I would take over again. I try to make the flight geographically interesting. In a 30 minute lesson we can overfly Chartwell (Winston's house) and Hever Castle. In a 1 hour lesson I can pick off several more castles/big houses, including the impressive Bodium, and we can generally complete Exercise 4.1in full while we are doing it.

Most students are surprised at how much stick time they get on these trial flights.

We also do a 40 minute aerobatics trial flight in the Slingsby - longer briefing and 30 minutes in the air so that we can get to some decent airspace for the aeros. As well as the general handling, I teach the student how to fly an aileron roll and I'll demo a loop and stall turn if time permits.

[Paul_Sengupta]

The other thing is if you just want to go up in an aeroplane and have a go at the controls, tell us where you are and one if us will take you up!