On Thursday the 5^th of April I Cadets Hastie, Kayani A and Kayani QA met at the squadron at 1200 hrs.  We then left in Pilot Officer Kayani’s car; it took about ten minutes to get to the back of Glasgow airport where the flying school is.  When we went in we were told to wait, then we went through to watch the safety video that had special effects that would make Peter Jackson cry.  After the safety video we tossed a coin between me and Kayani QA to see who would go up first.  Kayani won and got into his flight suit, parachute, life jacket, helmet and to finish it of a nice pair of shades.  He was then taken outside to go into the plane. 

A few minutes later we were told that there was another plane ready to take one of us up so I volunteered.  After I was suited up I started to feel really nervous because I had never flown before, not even in a passenger plane and because I was scared of flying.  The plane that the ATC use mainly for air experience flight is the Grob Tutor which has a propeller, it may not be a tornado but it still was very enjoyable.  When I was seated in the small cockpit with side by side seats I was shown how to fasten my seat belt.  The pilot was very nice and talked to you quite casually.  In your helmet there was a head set so you could talk to the pilot quite clearly you could also hear ever thing traffic control was saying.  The pilot then asked if we could use the main runway of the airport and was given permission. 

When we were starting to go up the runway the pilot told me what he was doing and what controls he was using.  When we were up it was brilliant the pilot told me about the readings on the control panels and after a while I got to take control of the plane and did some basic manoeuvres.  We went to Loch Lomond and on our way back to the airport we flew over Xscape.  When it came to landing the plane it was very smooth.  When I got out of the plane I felt shaky and found it hard to keep my balance.  The whole experience was very enjoyable and all of the younger Cadets who haven’t been yet should try it.

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Garelochhead - 2114 Sqn

By Cdt Peter Hastie 

On Friday the 16 of March at 1900hrs myself, Cdt Kelly, Cdt Falconer, Cpl McGregor, Cdt Hall, Cdt Shah, Cdt Porter, Cdt MacKinnon and Cdt Fleming gathered at the Sqn HQ.  We were met by Fg Off Callan, Plt Off Kayani and Plt Off Allen from 1001 Sqn to travel by minibus to Garelochhead. 

On arrival we where shown in to a room behind the office that was soon filled with Cadet from 2114 (East Kilbride) Sqn who had organised the camp and 449 (Lanark). After being introduced to the Staff the camp was quickly split in to its various flights and billets. After this the Rolls-Royce Cadets, who were still in their civies from travelling up, were told to get changed into greens for the first of the five exercises of the week. This exercise was to build a weight bearing bridge, at least two feet in span. The bridges would be tested on how much weight they could bear and then on their maximum span. Flight A (the flight I was in) lost badly. After this exercise we then had lights out at 2330hrs to wake up at 0630hrs. 

After having breakfast we formed up in our flights for drill only to be drenched in rain, we were then marched off to our alternate exercise. The first exercise my flight was to do was the Confidence Course. This course consisted of a number of obstacles of varying difficulty, like a sort of an obstacle course; the first of these obstacles was a 6 foot wall complete with small pool of rain water that had gathered there over the course of the morning. This wall was not too difficult to cross and really got us in the mood for the course, until we charged round the corner and stopped dead in front of the next obstacle, a 12 foot wall! For this wall we needed one person at the bottom against the wall to be used as a large step on to the wall where two people already on the top of the wall would help them over the rest of the way. Unfortunately I was the cadet at the bottom of the wall who had to get a 14 stone cadet on to the top of the wall first. Unfortunately when it came to get over the wall I had to go for the time penalty, as it was almost impossible without a person at the base of the wall to help you. The next obstacle was a series of spaced out wooden steps, which as long as you kept on going, were easy. The next obstacle was a six foot drop which was simple as long as you didn’t look down. The penultimate obstacle was the monkey bars, just as you would find in a play park, only grown up and military. This was of great difficulty to me as I did not mange to get across whilst I was there, but in the end most of my team managed to cross it. The final obstacle was a rope swing, other than a few cadets not letting go soon enough this obstacle was done very quickly. After that it was just a short jog to the finish. In my opinion this exercise was the best out of all five and would have been even better if there was no rain stopping us for going on all the obstacles. 

We then changed exercises to a first aid car crash mock up. In this exercise we had to treat three people who had been in a car crash, two in the car and the one who they had hit. Other than a slight break in communication that without a divine intervention would most likely have caused Plt Off Kayani to die or have serious paralysis, the exercise went not bad. 

Our third exercise of the day was after lunch, at the tank farm. We had to dissemble a 12 by 12 tent, walk it 1.5 miles and then resemble it fully. Taking down the tent was easy but because there was no obvious leader it took us a while to decide how to get moving. In the end we decided to place the tent canvas that had been drenched with rain on a grid of some of the poles used to hold up the tent and then get 4 people to carry it on their shoulders. We then worked together at the end race for the best time, in the end we only missed out by 5min. 

The 4^th exercise was in an old abandoned building. We were shown how to breach a room and clear it and were split in to groups of 4 and told to clear the entire building of all staff (who were hiding) from ground to top. After diner and personal admin time, it was judged too wet for the original night-X, so we were sent back to that building to, as we had been shown, clear the building from ground to top only in the complete dark, armed with paper balls, and this time there was much more of the staff to find. I think our team got all of the staff who were there. 

The next morning after breakfast the camp was supposed to have a drill comp but as the base was covered in snow and hail stones it was cancelled and replaced with a quiz but unfortunately due to a mechanical problem with the minibus, us Rolls-Royce cadets had to leave early. 

All in all the camp was very well run with lots of good activities to do.

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