Teelar

The second biggest misconception I always get after telling people what I do for a living is, “Oh you must be good at math.” (The first, and even more wildly inaccurate, is “You must make a lot of money.” HA!) The truth is most of the math that takes place on a flight deck is fairly simple mental estimation. Distance = rate x time type stuff. The CRJ travels upwards of 8 miles per minute, meaning if you aren’t thinking 50+ miles ahead of the airplane then you’re already behind. A big part of learning any new airplane is learning the general rules of thumb regarding performance. In a jet, namely descent planning.

For example, in a CRJ200, a flight idle descent at 320 knots will give you a 3200 foot per minute descent rate. 250 knots will give you 2000 fpm. 210 knots will give you 1500 fpm. To slow from 320 to 250 you need 2000 feet descending at 1200 fpm OR level flight and 7 miles (10 knots per mile). There’s no calculation involved in any of this, you just have to know them and be able to hack out the simple math involved in applying them to your flight path. Very little of what you do in a jet is guesswork. There are almost always procedures and hard numbers to accompany everything. Almost. 

Me: “So what’s the gouge with the flight spoilers? Like percentage deployed vs. airspeed or altitude loss? Anything like that?
Instructor: “Teelar. Just watch the trend vector.”
Me: “Ah, okay.” (pause) “Uhhh, I’m sorry, teelar is…?”
Instructor: Teelar! T-L-A-R. You know, That Looks About Right.

See also: PFM.