INSTRUMENT RATING

Fly In The Clouds

An Instrument Rating lets you fly in clouds and low visibility using only your instruments. It makes you a sharper, safer pilot, and every flying career requires it.

Book a $199 discovery flight

What an instrument rating unlocks

Weather cancels a lot of VFR trips. With an instrument rating, a cloud layer doesn't have to.

FLY IN THE CLOUDS
Go IFR.
File IFR and fly through cloud layers that would ground a VFR pilot.
KEEP YOUR PLANS
Arrive.
Fewer weather cancellations, so trips happen when you planned them.
FLY SAFER
Precision.
Sharper aircraft control and a plan for when the weather turns.
BUILD A CAREER
Required.
Nearly every professional flying job, including the airlines, needs it.

FAA flight time requirements

The minimums for an Instrument Rating, airplane, under 14 CFR 61.65.

CROSS-COUNTRY
50 hrs
As pilot in command, with at least 10 of them in airplanes.
INSTRUMENT TIME
40 hrs
In real clouds or simulated, flying under a view-limiting hood.
WITH YOUR CFII
15 hrs
Training from an instrument instructor, counted within the 40.
PREREQUISITE
Private
A Private Pilot certificate, or earn it at the same time.
A close-up view of an aircraft cockpit display screen showing flight information, altitude, speed, and navigation data with surrounding control buttons.

Down to minimums.

The ATIS is calling it ceiling 300 overcast, visibility one and a half in mist. You brief the ILS: localizer tuned and identified, inbound course set, decision altitude 200 feet above the runway, missed approach loaded. Before-landing check complete.

“Cessna 5 Papa Alpha, turn left heading 330, maintain 2,000 until established on the localizer, cleared ILS runway 36 approach.” You read it back. Localizer alive. The needle swings to center. Glideslope alive. One dot above, then centered. Power back, 90 knots, and the nose settles into a steady descent into solid gray.

No horizon now. Just your scan: attitude, localizer, glideslope, airspeed. Tower clears you to land. “One thousand to minimums.” Tiny corrections, a degree or two at a time. “One hundred above.” Still nothing but white.

“Minimums.” Then the approach lights punch through the mist, a rabbit of strobes pointing straight at the runway. “Runway in sight. Landing.” Mains on the centerline. You just flew through a cloud and found a runway you never saw until the last 200 feet. That's instrument flying, and we'll get you there.

Why train one-on-one?

Large academies are built for volume and speed. Many students do better with one instructor who knows exactly where they are.

An airplane flying through a cloudy sky.
ONE INSTRUCTOR
Same CFI.
You fly with the same instructor every lesson. No re-briefing someone new, no lost progress.
YOUR SCHEDULE
Your pace.
Lessons built around your job and family, not a fixed academy calendar or a full-time commitment.
PAY AS YOU FLY
No lock-in.
Pay after each lesson instead of financing an entire program up front.

READY WHEN YOU ARE

Take the controls.

Instrument training typically runs $15,000 to $19,000. Estimates are not quotes; your total depends mostly on how often you fly.

Book a $199 discovery flight