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Safety

Are you a pilot who cancels too many flights?

John Zimmerman has written an interesting post for Air Facts Journal in response to comments from their “Go or no go” series to ask the question: Do you cancel too many flights? To first put things in perspective: John says that the comments the series has received are revealing because a number of pilots appear to be uncomfortable flying in anything less than clear skies and unlimited visibility. In fact, he might even go so far as to say that the aviation community has beaten everyone over the head with the risk management stick so much that some pilots are afraid to fly in IFR. 

John then outlined what he thinks are the three major reasons for canceling flights:

  • We put too much stock in forecasts. John wrote that to delegate flight decision-making authority to an hours-old text forecast is “lazy, naive or both.” On the other hand, he also added that many pilots think that as long as the weather forecast is good, there won’t be any danger when flying. 
  • We’re afraid to “go take a look.” While John acknowledges that get-home-itis is a major cause of accidents for VFR pilots, he also adds that it can be safe for an IFR pilot – when it’s done properly. Pilots just need to have “ironclad rules” for when to quit and must always have an out. Specifically, John noted a late afternoon flight he did where the tightly packed thunderstorms on the ground-based radar actually turned out to be scattered enough in the air to allow for wide gaps between the cells and for an uneventful flight.
  • Instrument training doesn’t expose us to weather. John wrote that many pilots spend the majority of their instrument training practicing procedures and paperwork and never actually get much real in the air IFR flying to see real weather systems from the cockpit.

Of course, John did write that pilots should make decisions based on personal minimums as a legal trip may not be a safe trip but he also pointed out that pilots by their very nature are risk takers:

It’s simply what IFR flying is all about: accepting some level of calculated risk in exchange for great utility. If you’re not doing that, you’re not using the rating you worked so hard for. In fact, if you’re not doing that, you might not be getting out of bed in the morning.

In other words, you could easily find a reason to cancel every flight but then there would be no point to having spent so much money, time and effort to obtain a pilot license in the first place.

Top 10 weather rules to fly by

Richard Collins has written a great article for Air Facts Journal listing his top 10 weather rules for flying which were the following:

  1. Distrust any weather forecast calling for an improvement at a location covered in fog because you don’t want to be stuck in the air above a foggy airport without enough fuel. Moreover and if its overcast ABOVE the fog, you are going to run into even more problems.
  2. When the wind aloft forecast is substantially wrong, don’t trust any other forecast.
  3. Scattered clouds can end up causing the same effect as overcast approaches in IMC. Moreover, they could form into broken clouds or cause overcast conditions.
  4. Turbulence can tell you plenty about what is going on in the clouds – which can either be wind shear turbulence that can make flying a chore or convective turbulence that make it difficult to maintain altitude and air speed.
  5. There is no such thing as getting trapped by the weather as there are always signs that a system or something is forming.
  6. Cloud tops are always 1,000 feet greater than the ceiling for the aircraft you are flying in according to former Senator (and General) Barry Goldwater who was also a pilot – a point worth remembering.
  7. A windsock is the most reliable indicator of a gusty crosswind during a takeoff or landing.
  8. Early birds be warned: Substantial weather changes can happen shortly after sunrise – including the appearance of fog or frost on the aircraft.
  9. The onset of rain while flying VFR is bad news as it will cut visibility and lower clouds will tend to form after the rain starts. Rain can also make visibility from the aircraft much worst than the visibility being reported on the ground.
  10. If the wind shifts from northwest to north to northeast after the passage of a cold front, it means the front has stalled and has turned into a stationary front – meaning VFR flying may be off the table for awhile.

Richard went into considerable detail about each of these rules and he concluded by saying that a VFR pilot has the easiest time figuring out weather conditions as its always in plain view outside the windshield.

However, are there any weather rules for flying that Richard may have left out – especially any specific rules specific to UK or European weather conditions?

Complacent pilot misses the runway in winter

General Aviation News will often reprint accident reports from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in the USA, including one dated April 2010 that involved a Cessna 210 in Truckee (CA) that resulted in substantial aircraft damage but luckily no injuries.

According to the accident report, the pilot had obtained an airport condition report while on the approach to the airport. Apparently, airport personnel had indicated there was ice along with a layer of snow covering the surface of the runway. On approach, the pilot aligned with the airport runway and then flared over what he believed to be the normal touchdown point.

However, the aircraft hit a snow berm at the edge of a cross runway which resulted in a collapsed nose gear along with a damaged firewall. Moreover, the pilot figured out that he was 50 feet north of and parallel to the actual runway.

Hence, the probable cause of the accident was the pilot’s failure to correctly identify the location of the snow covered runway. He had also noted that complacency along with deviation from standard aeronautical decision making practices had caused him to miss the runway.

80 year old woman lands plane after her pilot husband goes unconscious

Its being widely reported that an 80 year old woman landed a twin-engine plane on Monday after her pilot-husband lost consciousness. The incident happened in northeastern Wisconsin near Sturgeon Bay around 5 pm on Monday.

Apparently, the woman had taken the controls of the aircraft but she did not know how to fly. To make matters worst, one of the engines ran out of fuel.

Another aircraft was sent up to determine the Cessna’s airspeed as well as to transmit instructions to the woman about how to safely land the aircraft. She did make a hard landing but unfortunately, her husband was pronounced dead at the hospital while she herself suffered minor injuries.

However, the Fox 11 News account of the incident noted that the pilot had a medical condition which caused him to loose consciousness.  Hence and if you are a pilot with a potential medical condition that could impair your ability to fly, it would be wise to reconsider flying – even if your medical certificate is valid. Likewise, the incident also shows the need for pilots who regularly fly with family members to perhaps teach these family members a few basic flying skills or at least what to do in case of an emergency or should you become completely incapacitated.

Plane makes hard landing in Door County: fox11online.com

Study finds that glass cockpits are not increasing general aviation safety

General Aviation News recently had an article about new research from the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association Foundation’s Air Safety Institute (ASI) that revealed that the increase in glass panel cockpits in general aviation aircraft has not had a dramatic impact on safety (Be sure to check out this blog post from 2010:  NTSB study: Glass cockpits do not make planes safer). Specifically, the ASI report found:

  • The accident rate in lower-powered aircraft, with or without glass panels, is still higher but there was an exception as these accidents are less likely to be fatal. However, the fatal accident rate in newer aircraft models was more than 60% higher – seemingly due to the fact that these aircraft are more likely to be flown at night and/or in IMC and not necessarily because they had glass cockpits.
  • Overall, glass cockpits had a “negligible” effect on accident patterns among similar aircraft. However, the research data suggested that there was consistently more accidents during takeoffs, landings and go-arounds in glass panel airplanes with the difference being smallest among the low-power models. A possible explanation for could be that analog gauges are more easily interpreted during rapid changes in airspeed and altitude while pilots in aircraft equipped with glass panels might be spending too much time staring at their displays instead of looking outside.
  • Nevertheless, aircraft equipped with glass panels may have advantages when it comes to terrain avoidance and avoiding VFR flight into IMC but the data is unclear in this regard.

It was also noted by General Aviation News that there is a lack of standardization and model-specific training with glass cockpits plus there are many variations with glass panel displays. For those reasons, ASI recommends that general aviation pilots take the time to master all of the systems in their aircraft and preferably they should do this on the ground rather than in the air.

A full copy of the ASI report is available here and would be worth a quick browse by steam gauge and glass cockpit pilots alike.

Do you know when your fuel selector valve is turned off?

General Aviation News will often reprint accident report excerpts from the US’s National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), including a February 2010 accident report about an incident involving a Beech Musketeer in Winter Haven (Florida) that led to two fatalities.

Specifically, a private pilot had more than 468 hours but no flight time between November 22, 2003 and October 4, 2008 and then 5.7 hours in the Musketeer between December 6, 2009 and December 16, 2009.

On the day of the fatal incident, the pilot took off but the aircraft engine lost power on the initial climb, stalled and then crashed. An examination of the wreckage revealed no mechanical malfunctions but the fuel selector was observed to be in the off range.

Further testing of the fuel selector revealed no other mechanical problems and the evidence from the crash suggested it was in the off position after takeoff.

However, the mechanic who performed the aircraft’s last 100-hour inspection six months before the fatal accident apparently missed the fact that the fuel selector valve guard and stop lacked the required markings that clearly depict its off range. According to Airworthiness Directive (AD) 85-05-02, there should have been a clear label or decal to indicate when the fuel selector was on or off.

Hence, the probable cause of the accident was the pilot having left the fuel selector valve off during takeoff along with his failure to maintain adequate airspeed after a loss of engine power. A contributory factor was the mechanic’s failure to spot the lack of markings on the fuel selector stop and fuel selector valve.