{"id":18198,"date":"2026-09-20T10:50:23","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T08:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/?p=18198"},"modified":"2026-09-20T10:50:25","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T08:50:25","slug":"road-to-the-left-seat-hello-embraer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/road-to-the-left-seat-hello-embraer\/","title":{"rendered":"Road to the Left Seat: Hello Embraer"},"content":{"rendered":"

After having sat in the right seat for nearly 9 years, it’s time for the next step in my career. I look forward to taking you along on this new adventure of mine and to share my unfiltered story with you once again. Welcome to my ‘Road to the Left Seat’!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

August 20th, 2026: the official first day of my Type Rating on the Embraer! It’s going to be a busy few weeks with a lot of new information coming my way, but I’m really looking forward to it. Time to leave the Boeing 737 behind and to embrace the bicycle of the skies!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Type Rating<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Because KLM is currently training so many new pilots, there simply aren’t enough instructors available to facilitate all type ratings in-house. That is why some colleagues, myself included, are being trained by an external company first. Afterwards, we are legally required to follow a so-called Operator Conversion Course to make sure we can operate the aircraft according KLM’s standards. This does mean that my training will take slightly longer, but we’ll just look at it as extra training and make the most of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The training usually looks something like this:
Type Rating<\/strong>
– Ground school
– Flight safety training
– Simulator training (11 sessions of 3h30)
– Skill test
– Base training \/ ZFTT (more on that later)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For me and my colleague, who is training to become First Officer, it will look like this:
Type Rating<\/strong>
– Ground school
– Simulator training (11 sessions of 3h30)
– Skill test<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

OCC<\/strong>
– Ground school
– Flight safety training<\/em>
– Simulator training (4 sessions of 3h30)
– Proficiency exam
– Base training \/ ZFTT<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Ground School<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The initial phase of training consisted of a 3-day Computer Based Training (CBT) at home. In these lessons, you get a good overview of the technical side of the aircraft, how the systems work, all its limitations and so on. Those who have done CBTs before know how extremely… exciting… these trainings can be. Personally, I was just constantly trying to find similarities between the Boeing and the Embraer, but that wasn’t a very successful mission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the CBT’s, we had our first classroom day where we got an overview of what to expect from the training and we learned more about flight planning, weight and balance calculations and the general performance of the aircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On our second and already last classroom day, we practiced some basic procedures in a mock-up, which is a fancy way of saying cardboard panels with pictures of the cockpit. This was very insightful though, as the instructor was able to help us make more sense of the cockpit we would soon be sitting in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Future of Training<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It may have just sounded like we were suddenly training procedures on day two already, but just like when you’re flying an airplane, you also want to think a few steps ahead during the type rating. It’s a very busy period, so if you can already study in advance, it will allow you to go into the actual training with a lot more headspace. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is why I had already completed the CBT’s a week in advance and had trained the basic procedures in the airplane already. Well, not in the actual airplane, but in a virtual one!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

KLM Cityhopper has provided us with VR headsets, allowing us to jump into the cockpit wherever we are. I was surprised by how immersive and real it felt and it gave me a good idea of how sitting in the actual aircraft would feel. You can train procedures easily and there’s even a memory game which challenges you to locate various buttons and switches quickly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides being a useful way to train, it was also a nice being able to show Ellen, family and friends what my office will look like!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Now that we’ve covered the basics of both theory and procedures, it is now time to head into the simulator! It’s also at this moment I realize that I will now have to go and sit in the left instead of the right seat…. Cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Thank you for reading this new post about my Road to the Left Seat! Should you have any questions whatsoever, don\u2019t hesitate to get in touch via my Instagram: @bobthebelgian<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After having sat in the right seat for nearly 9 years, it’s time for the next step in my career. I look forward to taking you along on this new adventure of mine and to share my unfiltered story with you once again. Welcome to my ‘Road to the Left Seat’! August 20th, 2026: the official first day of my Type Rating on the Embraer! It’s going to be a busy few weeks with a lot of new information coming my way, but I’m really looking forward to it. Time to leave the Boeing 737 behind and to embrace the bicycle of the skies! Type Rating Because KLM is currently training so many new pilots, there simply aren’t enough instructors available to facilitate all type ratings in-house. That is why some colleagues, myself included, are being trained by an external company first. Afterwards, we are legally required to follow a so-called Operator Conversion Course to make sure we can operate the aircraft according KLM’s standards. This does mean that my training will take slightly longer, but we’ll just look at it as extra training and make the most of it. The training usually looks something like this:Type Rating– Ground school– Flight safety training– Simulator training (11 sessions of 3h30)– Skill test – Base training \/ ZFTT (more on that later) For me and my colleague, who is training to become First Officer, it will look like this:Type Rating– Ground school– Simulator training (11 sessions of 3h30)– Skill test OCC– Ground school– Flight safety training– Simulator training (4 sessions of 3h30)– Proficiency exam– Base training \/ ZFTT Ground School The initial phase of training consisted of a 3-day Computer Based Training (CBT) at home. In these lessons, you get a good overview of the technical side of the aircraft, how the systems work, all its limitations and so on. Those who have done CBTs before know how extremely… exciting… these trainings can be. Personally, I was just constantly trying to find similarities between the Boeing and the Embraer, but that wasn’t a very successful mission. After the CBT’s, we had our first classroom day where we got an overview of what to expect from the training and we learned more about flight planning, weight and balance calculations and the general performance of the aircraft. On our second and already last classroom day, we practiced some basic procedures in a mock-up, which is a fancy way of saying cardboard panels with pictures of the cockpit. This was very insightful though, as the instructor was able to help us make more sense of the cockpit we would soon be sitting in. The Future of Training It may have just sounded like we were suddenly training procedures on day two already, but just like when you’re flying an airplane, you also want to think a few steps ahead during the type rating. It’s a very busy period, so if you can already study in advance, it will allow you to go into the actual training with a lot more headspace. That is why I had already completed the CBT’s a week in advance and had trained the basic procedures in the airplane already. Well, not in the actual airplane, but in a virtual one! KLM Cityhopper has provided us with VR headsets, allowing us to jump into the cockpit wherever we are. I was surprised by how immersive and real it felt and it gave me a good idea of how sitting in the actual aircraft would feel. You can train procedures easily and there’s even a memory game which challenges you to locate various buttons and switches quickly. Besides being a useful way to train, it was also a nice being able to show Ellen, family and friends what my office will look like! Now that we’ve covered the basics of both theory and procedures, it is now time to head into the simulator! It’s also at this moment I realize that I will now have to go and sit in the left instead of the right seat…. Cool. Thank you for reading this new post about my Road to the Left Seat! Should you have any questions whatsoever, don\u2019t hesitate to get in touch via my Instagram: @bobthebelgian<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18256,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[182,170],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-to-the-left-seat","category-pilot-career"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18198"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18264,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18198\/revisions\/18264"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/v1-training.com\/nl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}