FLYING LESSONS for October 25, 2018

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1 FLYING LESSONS for October 25, 2018 by Thomas P. Turner, Mastery Flight Training, Inc. National Flight Instructor Hall of Fame inductee FLYING LESSONS uses recent mishap reports to consider what might have contributed to accidents, so you can make better decisions if you face similar circumstances. In almost all cases design characteristics of a specific airplane have little direct bearing on the possible causes of aircraft accidents but knowing how your airplane s systems respond can make the difference as a scenario unfolds. So apply these FLYING LESSONS to the specific airplane you fly. Verify all technical information before applying it to your aircraft or operation, with manufacturers data and recommendations taking precedence. You are pilot in command and are ultimately responsible for the decisions you make. FLYING LESSONS is an independent product of MASTERY FLIGHT TRAINING, INC. This week s LESSONS: Pursue Mastery of Flight Freeway motorists captured video of the last seconds of a Piper s landing on a highway, when the trainer s engine quit during an instructional flight near San Diego. The instructor, who reportedly took over the controls when it was obvious [the airplane] was not going to make it to Gillespie Field airport, did a great job of avoiding vehicles, overhead power lines and other obstacles. Motorists were helpful in getting out of the way as well. See As such cases often do, this event caused widespread internet discussion of whether or not to land on a road in the event of single-engine engine failure, or if other options are safer. I submit that, unlike in rural areas with open fields, in the case of major metropolitan areas highways may indeed be the best option. We talk about the added risk of flight over mountains, over water, and sometimes even over large forests. That discussion almost never includes the quite similar additional hazard of flight over densely populated areas. Take a look at the photo. The terrain is fairly flat, but it is 100% covered by dense forest. If your engine quit over this terrain where would you go? Do you include the lack of emergency landing sites in your risk management decision? Now look at an image of the area near where the Piper went down. Are there more emergency landing areas near KSEE than there are in the forest photo above? The answer is yes, but only if you consider the highways far from optimal, but in this case the only real options. Do you think about the lack of landing sites when planning a flight over densely populated areas? How different is the risk flying over San Diego, or Los Angeles, Chicago or New York, or even over Kansas City or Wichita, than it is flying over the great forests of the Northeast or the upper Midwest? 2018 Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 1

2 Just as flight over mountains, open water, or dense forests should prompt consideration of the few emergency landing sites, and perhaps re-routing if possible to remain within gliding range of those few sites available, so too should you think about the lack of options when flying over densely populated areas, and select an altitude and route that keeps you within gliding range of emergency landing options whenever possible. *** A Facebook post last weekend included a short video of a single-engine airplane taxiing in dense fog, with visibility seemingly in that lowest 1/8 th mile range, sky obscured. The poster implied the airplane was departing on a family trip and that the flight departed in this near zerozero condition. Several responses touched on the risks of such a takeoff, most concerned about getting back to the runway if the engine quit shortly after takeoff (Hint: you can almost never do so successfully even in perfect visibility; the risk is in being able to identify an off-airport landing spot nearly straight ahead in such conditions). Several responders correctly noted that, unlike when paying passengers are aboard a commercial flight, there is no minimum visibility requirement for departures under Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) for private operators. VFR departures, of course, must have at least one mile visibility and remain clear of clouds in Class G airspace, more in other types of airspace. But an IFR departure under zero-zero conditions is permissible in Class G airspace (where ATC does not control the airspace and therefore a pilot cannot obtain an IFR clearance if she/he wanted), or in Class E, D, C or B when on an active IFR clearance. A simulated zero-zero departure using a view limiting device ( under the hood ), in fact, is a staple of instrument flight instruction. I m almost certain it was a required part of my Instrument Airplane Practical Test when I took it way back in 1988, but if the zero-zero takeoff was once a required Task for earning an instrument rating it is no longer on the Airman Certification Standards list of required Skills. The FAA s Instrument Procedures Handbook includes this advice: Aircraft operating under 14 CFR Part 91 are not required to comply with established takeoff minimums. Legally, a zero/ zero departure may be made, but it is never advisable. If commercial pilots who fly passengers on a daily basis must comply with takeoff minimums, then good judgment and common sense would tell all instrument pilots to follow the established minimums as well. The IPH, however, does not overtly state why the FAA thinks zero-zero takeoffs are never advisable. I added this response to the Facebook discussion. I often hear pilots opine on the hazard of engine failure in a near-blind departure, as well as those who state that as long as the pilot maintains heading on the runway and until transitioning to climb a zero-zero takeoff is legal, and is therefore an option. I don t recall reading or hearing other voice this consideration, however: Taking off is the most hazardous phase of flight not only because the threats are greatest when slow and close to the ground, but also because both the airplane and the pilot are as yet untested for their operational condition at the beginning of the first flight of the day. Engine, instruments, fuel delivery, electrical system, and the pilot s immediate ability to handle them how up to speed the pilot is at that moment on orientation and situationally aware, before a chance to get settle into a flight are all being tested at that moment. It is indeed within the pilot-in-command s authority to make a departure under these conditions under Part 91. Unless the fog was low in height and extremely localized to the immediate runway area, leaving nearby departure alternates and visual off-airport options immediately off the end of the runway, I would personally not choose to put my family and myself at such heightened risk by making such a takeoff. As it turns out, the Facebook poster later stated the flight took off after the fog began to lift, and included an inflight photo showing a distinct edge of the fog with part of the runway in view, with clear skies all around Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 2

3 My point? There is rarely one correct response to an incomplete set of facts. Most of the time I d say landing on a busy road is not the best option. But seeing the lack of alternatives in an aerial photo as the instructor and student would have seen them, I laud them for skillfully carrying out what was probably the only option available to them when the engine quit (whether or not they could have detected engine issues sooner or prevented it altogether will have to wait for the NTSB investigation). Most of the time I d jump on the bandwagon of criticizing the image of an airplane appearing to depart in zero/zero conditions, albeit for reasons other than those most commonly cited. But maybe the poster was right, and conditions improved prior to takeoff. This reinforces how important it is for you to get as much information as possible, and continually evaluate your options before you need to implement your decisions. VFR or IFR, long cross-country or trip around the pattern, take the hazards into account before you decide what s right for you on that particular flight. Then, practice similar scenarios. If you ever see a situation where you might have to land on a road, remain current on making short-field obstacle approaches and landings (do so even if you don t think you ll ever have to land on a road). If you ever contemplate a low-visibility takeoff, assuming that the conditions are extremely localized to give you options in case the climbout doesn t go as planned, practice simulated zero-zero takeoffs with an instructor regularly. Don t make a real low-visibility takeoff be the first time you ve practiced it, and practiced it recently because if the zero-zero takeoff was ever part of the FAA s required training and evaluation of instrument pilots, it s not any more. Hazard management and risk tolerance are very personal things. Whatever you choose to accept, do so because you have the skills and knowledge to do so safely and within the bounds of regulation. Don t choose to do something very risky out of impatience, or because you failed to evaluate the big picture or just because someone else online said it was a good idea. Questions? Ideas? Opinions? Send them to mastery.flight.training@cox.net See Readers, please help cover the costs of providing FLYING LESSONS through the secure PayPal donations button at Or send a check to Mastery Flight Training, Inc. 247 Tiffany Street, Rose Hill, Kansas USA Thank you, generous supporters. Debrief: Readers write about recent FLYING LESSONS: Reader Mark Sletten writes about willful noncompliance, the topic of our last two reports. Sent to me before last week s update, which included this example, he makes some great points about the impact our actions have on others. Here's another example that's a bit closer to home. {and] here's a report recorded the day after the crash which includes an interview of someone who knew the pilot. You can read the report for yourself, but there are two details about this particular accident that infuriate me. First, the aircraft was coming to Missouri so the pilot's (now dead) son could use it to learn to fly, and this incredible example of poor judgement and complete disregard for the rules from a supposed PROFESSIONAL would have been one of his very first lessons Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 3

4 Second, the general public hears from the pilot's friend in the news report that because of the pilot's experience level that operator error wasn't a factor. That's the LAST THING the general public will hear about this accident; the local news will not revisit the story with the information in the NTSB preliminary [or final] report. I don't know if the person interviewed was a pilot or worked for the FBO, but he did the GA industry no favors by trying to protect his friend's professional reputation. All the public knows is an experienced, professional airline pilot crashed through no fault of his own. If an experienced, professional pilot can crash and die in a small airplane then small airplanes must be way too dangerous. See: Frequent Debriefer Tony Johnstone revisits our mnemonics discussion, especially the use of GUMPS: Let me play a little devil s advocate regarding the GUMPS check. I do teach it in my Decathlon, which has fixed gear (Down and Welded!) for exactly the reasons brought up re gear-up landings. If a pilot develops the habit of verifying gear down, whether it is retractable or not, it will imprint into habit no matter what he or she is flying. I absolutely agree that switching tanks on downwind is a recipe for disaster and I teach people not to do that, just as dumb as switching tanks right before takeoff because the checklist says fullest tank. But at least looking at fuel selector and fuel level (and BTW the Decathlon has just a fuel shutoff with no option to select right or left) will at least get him to pay some attention. You will recall a couple of years ago a young low time pilot in a Mooney ran a tank dry on downwind at Jabara airport and put it down on a golf course. He was fortunate to walk away but the airplane was totaled. A GUMPS check might have produced a different result, I think. Switching from a tank that has some gas in it to one that has more is not a good plan, but switching from an empty one is probably better! I teach my complex and multiengine students to switch tanks as part of the Descent checklist, as I am sure you do. That is indeed what I do, Tony. I teach verification of landing gear position (several times) in the pattern. I personally do not teach anything that might suggest switching fuel tanks that close to the ground. If you and I are successful in our efforts to teach fuel selection at the top of descent then we won t have to risk getting too low on fuel close to the ground like that Mooney pilot (and I do remember it). It s a matter of teaching technique, but the end goal is to impress that, as you say, switching tanks on downwind is a recipe for disaster. Thanks as always, Tony. Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Let us know, at mastery.flight.training@cox.net Caution, Wake Turbulence This popped up on Facebook this week. I tracked it down to a YouTube video from It s a great visual demonstration of wingtip vortices. Use it in your pilot meetings and, if you re an instructor, with your students, to kick off a discussion of how wingtip vortices form, how they move, what hazards they present, and how to avoid them. Check it out: See Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 4

5 Weird and Dangerous Pilots Society of Aviation and Flight Educators (SAFE) leader David St. George wrote an outstanding blog this week titled Our Subtle Safety Enemy. David addresses some of the same issues we ve touched on over the past few weeks here the normalization of deviance or, as he puts it more succinctly, drift. David writes: Especially in the vacuum of personal flying, with no additional training or any outside objective comparisons, a personal standard can develop into some very unique procedures quite contrary to safety. This is why the simple addition of [flight] hours does not create safer pilots; it may instead create a very weird and dangerous pilot. Without a supporting professional organization and regular critique, drift and normalizing are almost inevitable in piloting. Lack of peer review, isolation from a cooperative learning environment once the checkride is passed, and lack of focus and meaning in recurrent flight instruction (see AOPA ASI s Focused Flight Review initiative) make it, as David says, almost inevitable that non-career pilots will drift away from safe behaviors. I won t steal any more of David s thunder; go read his blog and learn how he suggests we address this challenge. See: Single-Pilot Safety Stand-Down An annual event, the day-before the NBAA Convention Single-Pilot Safety Stand-Down (SPSS) presented by the Single-Pilot Working Group of the NBAA Safety Committee, seeks to address this same safety drift. This year s SPSS focused this year on the human factors behind aviation accidents. NBAA notes: In a video presentation to attendees, [business aviation crew concepts guru Dr. Tony] Kern spoke of "normalization of excellence," a term increasingly used by safety-conscious aviation professionals with the best of intentions but that may actually be misleading. "There's absolutely nothing normal about excellence; it means going above the standard," [Kern] explained. "This idea that we're already excellent is the greatest roadblock to achieve it; if you believe you've reached excellence, why would you strive to improve? What needs to be normalized is striving towards a natural state of excelling." The new chairman of the NBAA echoes a common FLYING LESSONS theme that safety is not a strategy, it is an outcome the result of mastery and command of the aircraft. From NBAA: NBAA Chairman Gen. Lloyd "Fig" Newton, who flew 269 combat missions in Vietnam and later with the U.S. Air Force "Thunderbirds" aerial demonstration team, began the event by recounting an early conversation with a higher-ranking pilot about the most important thing about flying. Newton had confidently responded "safety," but the other pilot corrected him. "He said 'professionalism,' and of course that's true," Newton continued. "If you have professionalism, then you have safety. Summing up the single-pilot safety record, Single-pilot operations comprise the largest number of accidents in the business aviation industry, according to a new study by the NBAA Safety Committee s single operators subcommittee. It found that approximately 2,013 of the 7,457 accidents reviewed were attributable to aircraft with a flight crew of one.single-pilot accidents and incidents fall into three main categories: runway excursions, undershoot/overshoot landings, and loss of control in flight. Reluctantly I had to miss the Single-Pilot Safety Stand-Down this year. If you missed it too, you can learn more about what was presented here. See Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 5

6 Pithy Words for Pilots Airspeed, altitude, and awareness. Gotta have at least two out of three. Slow & low's a no-no. (Re: approaches/final glide) When all else fails, feet pick up the wings. (Re: stalls/spins) Altitude = options. Only birds land butt-first. What goes up must come down. Where and how is flexible... unless you procrastinate. Believe the problem first. Ask why later. If it's bothering you, fix it before flying it. No one regrets keeping up to snuff. --sent (some time ago) by reader Chris Larson Share safer skies. Forward FLYING LESSONS to a friend Pursue Mastery of Flight. Thomas P. Turner, M.S. Aviation Safety Flight Instructor Hall of Fame 2015 Inductee 2010 National FAA Safety Team Representative of the Year 2008 FAA Central Region CFI of the Year Three-time Master CFI FLYING LESSONS is 2018 Mastery Flight Training, Inc. For more information see or contact mastery.flight.training@cox.net Mastery Flight Training, Inc. All rights reserved. 6