[akiselev]

Thank you for all the insight!

How different are the T-37/38s from common civilian trainers like the 172? How good were the simulators back then (I haven't use any sims outside of consumer stuff so I have no real point of comparison)?

What do you mean by pursuing training without rush or struggle? Looking at the cost of fuel and rental for the first thousand hours, let alone the cost of the jet with new TFE engine, I'm much more scared of stretching out the training so much that I'm always rusty.

> to add a little to this since I started thinking about it, while the total flight time seems fairly low, we would go fly in absolutely any weather short of an actual thunderstorm, and the IPs for the most part made the students do the flying/navigating/communicating/planning/etc. Flying close formation in drafty clouds with pounding rain would humble a low-time pilot, and occasionally it'd be bad enough to get a grunt out of the mostly drowsing (it seemed) graybeard in the backseat.

That sounds scary - I've been taught so far that bad weather is one of the leading cause of GA fatal accidents thunderstorm or no. Were your trainers or the jets themselves just better at withstanding adverse weather? Or are we civies too risk averse? I can't imagine doing it in close formation.