Students required to use fuel truck?

ASpilot2be said:
No worries. Easier a 207 than a King Air, or a Caravan. Although the single point attachment on Caravans is the best thing ever. :D
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I need 3 gallons a side in that amphib caravan over there, with no single point. Hurry up line boy!
 
Hacker15e said:
I'm failing to see what all the discussion and/or resistance is about.

It doesn't take a genius to either fill a fuel truck or put the fuel in to the airplane. Certainly anyone who is going to be expected to actually fly an airplane can be trusted with that task.

There are no legalities that I can think of that prohibit it, AND it is a useful piece of knowledge for a pilot to have.
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Exactly, at my fbo I had access to the truck, the planes and most everything else. If I wanted to take a plane up after hours, all I had to do was drive the truck to the plane, fill it, fly it. I'd settle up the flight time later... it was great having that level of freedom, and nice to be trusted to that level... something that I've lost in the 121 game.

None of that would have worked if I didn't know how to drive the truck... but, being required to do it is a little different. There were times where I wanted to shown and go.
 
I know this doesn't respond to the posed question, but I have noticed over the years that there is something "special" or "extra" about the pilots I have met who once upon a time fueled aircraft. They seem to have more love of aviation and a little more appreciation for their job. All in all, maybe it's not such a bad thing to expect students to be involved in the fueling operation.

P.S. No, I never worked as a fueler. The closest I got to it was taking a bath in jet fuel while laying on my back trying to get a fuel sample.
 
I don't see anything wrong with it, but I too went through a college program that also didn't have a line guy.

I still remember how odd it felt the first time somebody pulled MY airplane out of the hangar for me. I had been flying for four years.

Guess that odd feeling goes both ways.
 
I've fueled planes before (though normally not at my home airport). Right now, I won't be dealing with fuel in any way. I'll have to have someone else sump and then look at it. (I'm not taking the risk with the lead and the baby right now.) If somewhere I went asked me to drive a fuel truck and then take the fuel truck and fill it back up I would choose another school to go to. I didn't sign up to drive a big truck and wouldn't want to. When I fly, the plane is always already full and ready to go.
 
Ugh.

Sorry, guys - unless there is a price break for this "self-service" type thing, there is no way in hell I'm going to drive a fuel truck around and fill it while paying to rent the airplane. Self-service fuel pumps I don't mind, but I draw the line there.
 
Most fuel providers prohibit this. Either way, it doesn't sound like a good idea if a customer blew himself up fueling the airplane from a liability standpoint.
 
Looks like the majority of the schools that do the self serve fuel trucks are college programs. I know when I was at GAVTC the truck was owned by the college and was filled by staff not students. It made sense to me for us to use the truck. Other than the actual driving of the truck where is danger at over a self serve pump? I guess I just do not see how it is so OMGZZZ! dangerous to do this over the many other things that could be considered very dangerous in aviation ops. Some good examples would be: failing to stop in time at a self serve pump crashing into the tanks, prop chopping a wing of another aircraft full of fuel, tearing a wing off by not judging the distance of the hanger thats close to the ramp. All of these while unlikely are still part of the game we play. If trained to do the job it should be a non issue just like flying. Most of the helicopter world has had pilots doing the grunt work of fueling and even washing the aircraft as part of the job. Oil and gas helicopters are fueled by the pilots daily and its the pilots job to wash the engines at the end of each shift to remove the salt. I also value doing the fueling myself because I know exactly what is going in the tank and how much!
 
subpilot said:
So there is a flight school that has a policy that the students will fuel the aircraft Using the fuel truck. This includes having to take the truck to the fuel farm when it gets empty and refilling the truck with 100LL. I think that is beyond the scope of a student's responsibility and the school should have an employee who drives the truck. I don't even know if this is legal. What do you all think of this and is there any other school out there that has this same policy?
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There's no end to what pilots will complain about. Ok, they can hire that person to drive the truck, which will then drive up their costs, and therefore their prices. And then you'll be complaining about that. Drive the friggin' fuel truck. Or don't, and take your business elsewhere. But knock off the complaining.
 
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