31 July - Night flying

starts with learning how to use NVG's. Above is a picture of the same aircraft from yesterday's picture but through the use of our NVG's (Night Vision Goggles). As you can see the FOV, Field Of View, is much smaller than the 210 degrees of view you normally have with both of your eyes. The best way to simulate the 20 degree FOV that we experience while using NVG's is to close one eye and take an empty toilet paper roll and look through it with your other eye. The FOV you see out of the tube is about a 20 degrees FOV. Although our NVG's look like binoculars the total FOV is 20 degrees for both eyes. With that said you can imagine how much twisting, turning, and nodding of your head one must do to see the same amount of information you would normally see with an unobstructed 210 degree FOV. Now throw on top of that - we see everything in shades of green. So not only are we busy moving our heads but mentally we need to quickly and clearly interpret and distinguish one green object from another so as to make an accurate picture of our surrounding. This becomes especially challenging during landings and even more difficult in a dusty area.
So next time when you are sitting on the toilet and you realize the last person did not set you up with a new roll of toilet paper - in stead of getting upset conduct a little experiment. Try to restock the toilet paper while looking through the empty toilet paper roll. This might take some of coordination as you try to hold the the toilet paper roll to your eye as you balance it between your eyebrow and cheek. As you fumble with the new roll be careful as you try to insert the new toilet paper into the holder without having the "toilet paper holder 'pin'" spring apart before you can properly reseat the roll. Good Luck!
I hope this bit of info was worth the read. See ya.