Trust But Verify

The decision-making process for the layperson who is deciding whether to fly with a friend is a complicated one that reveals a lot about the individual.

Ben Younger

Monday, April 10, 2023 at 09:02 AM ET

Verified

The author navigates around Catalina Island, off the coast of Southern California. [Courtesy: Ben Younger]

Key Takeaways:

The article explores the varied ways people assess pilot trustworthiness and aviation risk, contrasting the data-driven evaluation of fellow pilots with the often emotional, appearance-based judgments of lay passengers.
Non-pilots frequently rely on perceived confidence and superficial cues when deciding to fly, described as "garbage in, garbage out" due to a lack of empirical aviation knowledge.
Personal relationships, shared history, and practical needs can heavily influence a passenger's decision-making, sometimes overriding objective data, past incidents, or even fear itself.

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Walking up to my airplane on a warm Saturday in October on Catalina Island off the California coast, and after devouring one of the airport’s famous buffalo burgers, I noticed a beat-up Cessna that I recognized as belonging to one of the flight schools in Santa Monica. The pilot was young, mid-20s, and he had three people with him—two of which looked like they might be his parents. He stopped his preflight and approached me.

“Are you a CFI?”