You’re not in a dangerous situation until

By Dave English

Scott Crossfield — fighter pilot, aeronautical engineer, first person to fly twice the speed of sound and X-15 chief engineering test pilot — quoted in the classic book X-15 Diary released this week.

scott

He is also quoted as saying:

In all of this business there’s a requirement of intense concentration—if you can train yourself to be self-disciplined. If you close the car door on your finger, your impulse is to put it in your mouth and curse. But you train yourself too wait. It’s part of the profession—to avoid an emotion or a reflex reaction.

Clearly a safety warrior at work.

Fighting complacency

By Dave English

Fighting complacency is not as exciting as fighting fires, but it’s a battle we will join many more times.

testing

We train for engine failures, electrical loss, and lots more. And we should practice multiple worst case failures. But we must also learn to handle ourselves on all those flights when nothing is going on.

(Quote is from Coelho’s 2008 novel The Winner Stands Alone.)

Being a good stick is not enough

By Dave English

Being a “good stick” is not enough. Good pilots are thinking their way through the air as well as simply moving controls. What comes next in flight is absolutely as important as what is happening right now.

Jack J. Pelton
EAA CEO, Sport Aviation magazine, Nov 2016

stick and rudder

“Being ahead of the plane” they call it. And if you can always answer the question, “what are the next two things,” then you are really mentally ahead—pilot not passenger.

Aerobatic training?

By Dave English

“The real need is for a fully aerobatic training aeroplane to be provided so that airline pilots can practise real flying manoeuveres and recovery from unusual attitudes. … There are too many senior transport pilots flying who have just about forgotten how to fly an aeroplane.”

The Chief Test Pilot of the UK Airworthiness Authority wrote this in the last paragraph of his classic book. Fifty years ago. Long before AA587, AF447, and so many more. But we still don’t do this. Most airline pilots have never gone past 60 degrees of bank, and our simulators aren’t realistic for high AoA or high/low g events.

forgot

Until employers provide this training, we are on our own.