Virgin Atlantic – Future Flyers

On Saturday 9^th February, my Mum & I attended the Virgin Atlantic – Future Flyers & Expert Engineers Event at their office called ‘The Base’ in Crawley. I wanted to go because I am interested in the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths), and I wanted to learn what it takes to be a engineer. When we arrived, we went to a talk called ‘Expert Engineers’ and we listened to some Apprentices and Development Engineers who work for Virgin.  I learned that some of the skills that I use today, such as playing with Lego and making paper aeroplanes, could help me to become an engineer in the future. The Apprentices said that to help me I need to focus on being creative, be able to listen and follow instructions, be a team player, enjoy learning and be good at problem solving. We also looked around some of the stalls that were there, and I had a go on a simulator and almost landed a plane, unfortunately I crashed it outside someone’s house!  I also looked at planes using a VR headset and I had a go at building a very small jet engine. The most fun thing that we did though was to go on a Rig Tour where we took part in a pretend emergency crash landing where we had to evacuate the plane sensibly.  We then went on the emergency raft and some parents even went down the emergency slide.