Like so many things in life, from cooking a turkey to getting an education, a typical flight progresses in phases. The way the human mind seems to work, we like to put things into “beginning,” “middle” and “end” categories. While helpful with most things, this structure doesn’t do justice to the way a flight really works. It’s simply more complicated. The beginning of a flight, for instance, has several key components, from pre-flight to climb, with many, many steps in between.
If you think those steps are easy to understand and incorporate into your flying routine, congratulations. You’re an experienced pilot. But many new pilots, and many not-so-new pilots, have a hard time coming to terms with all the chores the cockpit requires of them, and this uncertainty can cause anxiety, distraction and mistakes, all of which can lead to bigger, potentially hazardous problems.
