Aviation Safety

Driving the airplane to and from the runway is a piece of cake, right? Not for the dozens who prang something each year.

You can fly convective conditions without radar or Stormscope. Remain visual, use ground radar and cut your losses early.

Accident stats notwithstanding, gear-related mishaps account for more than half the unhappy endings to flights in retracts.

The accident chain, like most, was as obvious in retrospect as it was elusive at the time. Consider these links:

Link 1: The pilot and his four passengers absolutely, positively had to be at the destination, 300 miles away, by early the next morning. There was an event that could not be missed, even if it meant driving. A short weather delay would be OK, but a substantial one would not.

Link 2: The pilot had had a stressful week, with both professional and personal anxiety and bouts of poor sleep.

Link 3: He had gone out with friends the night before the anticipated flight, returning home well after midnight and facing an early wakeup call.

Link 4: Th…

The following briefs were selected from the 170 preliminary reports filed with the NTSB in May 2001. Statements in quotes were taken directly from the NTSB documents. The information is subject to change as the investigations are completed.

Click here to view “Accident Totals, May.”

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May 01, The Woodlands, Texas
Mitsubishi MU-2B
At approximately 12:41 central time, a Mitsubishi MU-2B-40 crashed after an uncontrolled descent near The Woodlands, killing the pilot and passenger. VMC prevailed but scattered thunderstorms were reported in the vicinity of the departure airport. Witnesses reported hearing an engine…

So there you are, sitting in your airplane, gazing dreamily at the new GPS, MFD, and autopilot on which youve just spent almost as much as you originally paid for the plane. Now youre faced with an IFR approach-certified GPS interconnected to a two-axis autopilot with ILS coupling and a moving map the size of a portable TV screen.

Maybe youre about to check out in a brand-new C-172 or Piper Archer with a whole pile of ultra-modern avionics, and all the FBOs other airplanes have a pair of Narco MK 12s or King KX-175s. You cant even find the on-off switch, much less tune the comm radio. How do you learn to use all that stuff?

If its your airplane, you might call your friendly loca…

A friend assures me that he has developed a sure-fire method to duck out of jury duty. When the defense poses the first voir dire question, merely reply: Well, the police wouldnt have arrested him if he wasnt guilty.

If the judge doesnt threaten contempt, the defense attorney will immediately conclude that no one could possibly be that dumb. On the other hand, on the off chance that someone could, using up a challenge is cheap insurance. Next juror, please.

The irony of this absurdity is that in such life-and-death matters as jury trials, were spring-loaded to doubt the governments pronouncements. Yet as pilots, most of us react in the opposite way when confronted with ATC clear…

Among the most avoidable mishaps are those caused by fuel exhaustion. Most of them seem inexcusable, yet virtually every pilot has flirted with this danger at one time or another.

You may pass up refueling at a major metropolitan airport because of the price. Or youre in a hurry and rationalize that you can make it with good leaning or tail winds – especially if youve made the same trip before. If the winds are not as forecast or your leaning is a bit off, you could be in for trouble. Ditto if you fail to recheck the weather en route and arrive to find it below minimums.

According to the AOPA Air Safety Foundations Nall Report there were 95 accidents due to fuel exhaustion in 1998…

Its every motorists nightmare, breaking down in an Audi in a rural town where the only mechanic knows only tractors, Fords and Chevys.

Surely, pilots reason, the same thing cant happen to airplanes. The technology is usually more familiar and the mechanics are more worldly. Besides, the FAA makes sure mechanics know how to fix airplanes, right?

If you believe that, youd better stick to a factory-standard 1978 Cessna 172.

The fact is that modifications done to airplanes through supplemental type certificates and even Form 337s can give mechanics headaches. Although the vast majority are straightforward installations that are intuitive to remove, service and replace, there are en…

At a recent international symposium on aviation human factors, one of the interesting sessions described an FAA study attempting to answer what traits might predict accident prone pilots.

A number of large aviation organizations – airframe manufacturers, airlines, pilot organizations and the NASA Ames human factors directorate – sent representatives to engage in what turned out to be a lively and interesting discussion. In the study, more than 4,000 pilots were asked to answer various questions about their background, training and attitudes. Among those who answered the survey, about half had experienced an official accident. The survey was structured to obtain a fairly representative s…