(June 2011) In last month's "Stuck for a Week," I wrote about how an extended delay can eventually lead someone to diminish or ignore what should be obvious risks. Another common cause of faulty risk awareness involves failing to “do the math.” Risk factors seldom operate in isolation. Multiple risk factors will typically interact with each other, causing at least an additive effect, and often go far beyond that to multiply the total risk many times over.
For a simple example, let’s say you know the tires on your car are worn to the point where there is very little tread left. Because money is tight, you decide to defer purchasing new tires for a few more months. At that point every trip you take in the car carries with it the increased risk that you will skid if you have to stop quickly. A few weeks later it is raining hard as you hop in the car to do an important errand. Even with new tires, the wet roads increase the risk that you will skid, especially if you have to stop suddenly. However, with bald tires that risk is increased to the point that, if someone pulls out in front of you, you will not be able to stop in time and will find yourself staring at your crumpled wreck of a car, kicking yourself for not getting the new tires. The combined risk of the bald tires and the wet roads was much greater than the sum of the two separate risk factors.
Let’s consider how we as pilots often find ourselves sliding down that same slippery slope of increasing risk. Imagine you are a low-time private pilot who recently received your instrument rating. You have been very busy at work, so you have had only one local flight over the last five months since you passed the instrument flight test. You have also noticed that the attitude indicator seems to be getting a little sluggish and have made a mental note to get it checked during the next annual inspection. None of this worries you much because you don’t plan on taking any serious trips in the near future.
Then a friend suggests that you fly together on a weekend mountain fishing trip. Like your flying, your fishing has fallen prey to a busy schedule, so the chance to get away for the weekend while doing the two things you love is very enticing. You are, of course, aware of your low time and lack of recent experience, but a quick check of the weather forecast shows a fairly good weekend followed by rain and storms the following week. Since the weekend weather looks good, you enthusiastically agree and start planning the trip.
As you check the weather for your departure, you find that early effects of the coming storm are causing overcast clouds nearer your destination. You figure that’s not a problem, since you are still legal to fly IFR and will be flying only in instrument conditions en route. You launch with your friend on a beautiful clear morning but soon encounter the thickening clouds and have to concentrate on flying the airplane despite your rusty scan. You are glad the weather at the destination is supposed to be VFR so that an instrument approach won’t be necessary.
As you approach the destination, you are surprised to find that the weather in the mountains is much worse than forecast, and it looks like you will have to fly an instrument approach. At least the weather is still well above minimums, so that should not be a problem. You get out the approach plate and carefully study the approach, trying to remember everything you were taught during your instrument training while keeping the airplane on track and following the instructions of the controller. It is getting harder and harder to keep up with everything, let alone stay ahead of the airplane.
