(March 2011) — PAYING HEED TO THE Scottish poet Robert Burns, who said: “The best laid schemes of mice and men go often askew,” I counsel those who come to me for flight training not to think in terms of “if,” but rather “when,” so that they are prepared for that moment when things go wrong. That preparation includes not only refining troubleshooting techniques and thinking through the actions one should take for a variety of potential problems should they occur, but also the possibility of having a forced landing in a remote area, and the skills and techniques one would need to survive in that situation.
Whether it is a diversion, a precautionary landing, or a worst-case scenario, a forced landing, we need to know what to do in order to achieve a safe and successful outcome.
