Moving Targets

Twice in a lifetime is two times too many; two times when the operator of a moving machine stared a hole right through me and rendered me invisible. In both cases perfect conditions prevailed—nothing obstructed the view, yet our machines converged at a good clip. My first experience came at the hands of the driver of a 1977 Cadillac. My solution was to lay down a vintage motorcycle. It wasn’t my preferred choice, but obstacle and traffic conflicts made lateral maneuvering unwise. The second time came courtesy of two pilots in a Skyhawk during a VFR arrival to a non-towered airport in Florida’s panhandle.

Key Takeaways:

• Despite good visibility, human pilots frequently fail to visually acquire other aircraft, leading to near-misses and collisions, especially at non-towered airports in visual meteorological conditions (VMC).
• This failure stems from inherent limitations of human vision, including reduced acuity at distance, poor contrast detection, and psychological phenomena like motion-induced blindness from fixating on a single point.
• Effective collision avoidance requires pilots to adopt structured scanning techniques (dividing the field of view into blocks and pausing to examine each), utilize ATC services like VFR flight following, and consider factors such as lighting, glare, and supplemental oxygen.

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