I was warned in the waiting room of Pasadena\u2019s WeFly: \u201cThis is not an arcade,\u201d said flight trainer Corry Joyce. No, what WeFly offers is a professional-grade simulator, one that is traditionally used to train pilots. I am not a pilot, or a pilot-to-be, but I wanted a sense of how planes work, and maybe a chance to fly over my hometown. Only once I strapped into my seat, I found myself to be incredibly nervous. There was no danger here. Joyce, thankfully, would intervene at any mistake, and would helpfully remind me that, unlike real planes, \u201cThis one has a pause button.\u201d <\/p>\n
And yet to set foot in a WeFly cockpit is to be alternately in awe and overwhelmed. I was in a near 1:1 replica of the insides of a Boeing 737 Max. Buttons, knobs, switches and flashing lights surrounded me. And to fly a plane, I would have to let go of everything I knew about driving a car. Turning in the air, for instance, is much different than turning on a runway. And do I watch the screen, or look out the windshield? Often the former, even though I enjoyed buzzing Long Beach\u2019s Queen Mary, flying under the Golden Gate Bridge and circling Chicago\u2019s Wrigley Field. When it came time to land however, my palms got a little sweaty. Navigating height, winds and the steadiness of my plane was a challenge, one akin to handing a grade-schooler a calculus book, summarized Joyce. Let\u2019s just say I needed his co-piloting skills. And I\u2019m not great at math. <\/p>\n
Typically, WeFly\u2019s clientele, says Joyce, are a mix of aviation aficionados or non-commercial pilots. The space also gets a fair share of those with a fear of flight, arriving at WeFly with the hopes to conquer it. \u201cThey want a sense of control,\u201d Joyce tells me. But WeFly is also ideal for anyone who is amazed by air flight, or those who may someday dream of being a pilot. Though it uses \u201cMicrosoft Flight Simulator,\u201d it is no game. Sessions for 30 minutes start at $129, and WeFly\u2019s trainers will tailor it toward one\u2019s experience. I made sure, for instance, that crashing was turned off. But I forgot, however, to turn with the brakes when it came time to land. Yet the plane was intact, and, as Joyce reminded me, \u201cAt least you\u2019re on airport property.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I was warned in the waiting room of Pasadena\u2019s WeFly: \u201cThis is not an arcade,\u201d said flight trainer…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364212,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[147911,7499,2303,48,52,51,147912,47,50,49,63,6337,147908,24026,147909,826,360,4610,22319,147910],"class_list":["post-364211","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-analog-world","tag-dream","tag-l-a","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-laser-scanned-track","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-mind","tag-needohs","tag-plenty","tag-real-race-car","tag-store","tag-teen","tag-thing","tag-tween","tag-yore"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364211"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364211\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364211"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}