Categories: Flight simulator

Flight Medical keeping you grounded?

If you have been kept from flying. Maybe you are on a medication or had a recent medical emergency that has prevented you from getting into the air, there is still a way to satisfy that flying bug.

Many people would give up the dream of flight when they had something happen, but some of us just can’t give up that dream, even if it means we have to take our passion into a different direction. There are so many ways to get back into flying, and I want to show you how to get into flight… but maybe in a different way.

To Start, I have a Quick Story

I personally have not had a medical issue that has kept me from flying, however I do have a close personal story about this.

My grandfather was a pilot, who had an extreme passion for flight. He had so much passion for flight that he spent most of his spare time and money building a small 2 seater, home built airplane. This airplane was his pride and joy. He spent countless hours on it. He had the little plane completed, running and was getting it ready for the air when he had a heart attack, that halted his flying passion in it’s tracks.

That Didn’t Stop Him

Being dedicated to aviation, he wasn’t going to give up his passion that easily. He was going to find a way to get up in the air, or at least experience the feeling of flight.

At this time, his pilot’s licence had been taken away due to his medical, however he felt that getting into a smaller plane, under the lower flying regulations of an Ultralight would get him into a plane. With that thought, he couldn’t wait any longer and he got himself a working Ultralight. After some time and more research, it was apparent that he was not going to get past the medical for this and that he was not going to be flying the Ultralight aircraft.

So he pushed on… and continued to search for another way. He then realized that maybe buying a boat would give him another hobby, similar to flying that might help replace his flight passion.

This still didn’t work and just couldn’t replace flying, so he decided to get into remote controlled planes. If you know anything about the remote control aircraft, you know that this is not a cheap hobby, as most of them have miniature gas engines and high tech remotes to control all the moving parts in the same way a real plane would be controlled. This became his new passion. This was as close as he could get to flight.

Now my grandfather loved flight and unfortunately passed away before I got my passion for flight. It seems it was still passed on to me… maybe it’s genetic.

How I think I Could of Helped him

If he were still around, I believe I would have had the solution for him. I believe I could have got him as close to real flight as he could be. If I had introduced him to Virtual Reality Flight I know he would have dove in with both feet.

Yes, I’m sure he would have still made every attempt possible to get back in the air, but it would have been that hobby that got him as close as he could to his passion.

Are you Stuck on the Ground too?

If you are in a similar situation, where you think you are never going to fly again, or maybe there is still hope, but you have a long road ahead of you, then you should give VR Flight a try.

Flying in virtual reality can save you money, as well as keep your skills sharp. Maybe you know that you will never get to the point of flying but still want to be a pilot. This could be the best investment you could make.

How do you get started?

It is not overly complicated to get started. You need a good computer, a VR headset, some flight controls and a flight simulator like X-Plane.

Now, I could probably go over each of these items here, however I do have many other posts where I get into the different items that you need. If you are interested in VR flight, take a look at the following posts.

The first post will be the easiest way to get started. In this post I have my recommendations for all the items you need to get started flying.

Top 5 Things You Need for VR Flight

If you really want to know more about buying a flight computer, then you can take a look at my next link. Be warned, that I do get more technical in this post, so if you are not a computer technical person, then I suggest that you look into the link above, as it will show you specific computers that can run X-Plane 11 with VR.

5 Top Things You Should Understand When Buying a Computer

Here is my last link I will put on here. This is a video I made. It is a simple video from a take off where I cut the engine and do a forced landing in a field with a Cessna 172. Take a look, as it will give you an idea of what it is like to fly in VR. In this post, I also have a flight in a helicopter.

X-Plane 11.20 Beta – Flying the Cessna and Sikorsky in Virtual Reality

Hope you guys enjoyed this post.

Keep the Passion!
Dan

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