When Rabbit Won’t Run

The inoperative table doesn’t cover every possible system failure. Plus, you also need to consider facility outages and equipment failures at your alternate.

D Higdon

Friday, October 19, 2012 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

Instrument flight relies on trust in aviation systems, but these systems, whether airborne or ground-based, are prone to failure, a reality anticipated by aviation infrastructure and IFR regulations.
Pilots must proactively plan for potential equipment failures, as these often lead to higher approach minimums or render procedures unusable.
Thorough preflight review of available approaches, alternate minimums, and the impact of inoperative components is crucial for safe IFR operations.
Regular practice under degraded conditions, such as flying approaches with higher minimums due to system outages, builds essential pilot competency and confidence.

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Trust is an intrinsic part of instrument flight. We trust ATC to keep other aircraft from running into us, we trust other pilots to know what they’re doing and we trust the instruments themselves. In the bargain, we also expect our onboard equipment—trust is too strong a word—to work and have a similar, positive outlook on electronic navigation resources: GPS, ILS, VOR, etc. But these systems, whether air- or ground-borne, can and do fail. In fact, expecting failure of various components comprising the aviation infrastructure is baked into many of its procedures.