Primarily for general aviation discussion, but other aviation topics are also welcome.
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#1865827
Hi all,
Last night I heard the horrible news about a close friend of my family who was killed in the CAP10 crash in Somerset last Thursday (12th August). She was flying with a pilot friend - they regularly went flying together as his wife was afraid to fly as she viewed it as too dangerous.
I don't know any details about the accident yet as the investigation results haven't been released, but from reading a post on this forum I have learned that it appears to be the result of inadvertently flying into IMC.

I have been flying light aircraft for about 6 years now, and I regularly fly a C42 and a Eurostar EV97, both belonging to my flying club near where I live (near Gothenburg in Sweden). Whenever I hear about an accident, I always read the investigation report so that I can try to ensure that I don't make the same mistake. Sadly, the causes of the accident are nearly always the same things: inadvertently flying into IMC; running out of fuel; flying low and slow and stalling/spinning; flying in unfavourable weather conditions (I am sure I've missed one of two here but I can't think of them just now).
I am very careful about my preflight checks (particularly fuel), I avoid flying low and slow, and I am extremely careful and err on the side of over-cautious regarding the weather conditions I choose to fly in. Therefore I feel that my flying is relatively low-risk.

However, this accident, because it resulted in the death of a close friend, has caused me a lot of mental anguish, particularly with regards to a trip that I have planned for this coming weekend. It is our 19th wedding anniversary, and to celebrate I have booked the C42 for a weekend away with my wife. We have a friend here who will be looking after our two young daughters (aged 10 and 12), for the weekend.

So the question is this: do other people who have young children fly together with their spouses, or do you consider it too risky to have both of you up there in the plane? My feeling has been that if I consider it so risky that I shouldn't fly with my wife then I shouldn't be doing it myself as I don't certainly don't want to leave my children growing up without a father. If I continue to be so careful and conservative about checks, weather conditions etc. then I consider it to be about as safe as driving in the car (which we do without a second thought for risk), but am I being naive?

I'd be very interested to hear some other opinions on this, whatever they may be. I am struggling with this one...
#1865835
Our principle is that we don’t want to risk leaving either of our children without a parent. As such, my wife and I will only fly together if both kids (aged 14 and 11) are with us. Otherwise my wife is quite happy for either or both kids to fly with me but without her. We do, however, drive and fly commercially together without the kids.

It’s not that flying is risky enough to stop me engaging in it but there are clearly some risks involved with light aviation that are not present elsewhere. Our approach mitigates that risk to some extent while not depriving ourselves of the immense enjoyment that aviation brings.
Last edited by G-SLOT on Wed Aug 18, 2021 8:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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By Dodo
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1865836
The one and only time I planned to fly all our 3 children without Mrs Dodo on the aircraft, the youngest, then about 5, and in the back seat, threw a tantrum at the hold and we taxied back.

That was about 25 years ago. I've taken each of them flying occasionally since then but never all together.

I was actually quite relieved that none of the three were particularly interested in flying and none have gone on to get a licence even though I have owned an aircraft for much of that time and they could have done it relatively cheaply.

Mrs Dodo has done a safety pilot course and has a reasonable chance of getting down in one piece if I croak in flight.
#1865845
tomarnold wrote:So the question is this: do other people who have young children fly together with their spouses, or do you consider it too risky to have both of you up there in the plane? .


Its interesting that this comes up as I'm thinking of getting back into aviation from an enforced break, caused mainly from having a family.

I've decided that I will never fly with just my wife and I again. The risk to my 5 year old is not justifiable for what is, at the end of the day, a leisure activity.

I would take him flying if he was interested, but thats a different risk.

The whole risk/reward thing is something I still struggle with as I used to ride motorcycles and now have what most folk would term as a "quick car". I still have a passing interest in paramotoring, only curbed by a lack of available funds!

So, you're not the only person that thinks this. Ironically, being unable to share in the joy of flight makes operating an aircraft that much more of a difficult sell to ones partner.... :cry:

Andy
#1865848
Both our sons have been flying in the helicopter since three months old. I regularly fly with one or both sons (or the whole family). My wife is quite supportive of my mix of hobbies which also includes wingsuit flying. However, my wife and I decided to not fly the helicopter together without our sons until they are older and out of school.

The real driver for us wasn’t purely our risk perception of GA flying; it was more related to our lack of “backup” should the worst happen as both of us have very small families. She has only one sister and an 80+year old Dad; I have no living siblings or parents.
By johnm
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1865850
I can't really comment as my kids were grown up before I learnt to fly, but I have flown with myself, wife, daughter, son in law and young grandson in the aircraft IFR from Alderney to Rotterdam and back to Fairoaks.

My wife flies with me to go somewhere (think car with wings) and I gained instrument qualifications immediately after my PPL
JAFO liked this
#1865852
Mrs L and I will not fly together without the children - it is not the actual risk but the potential consequences vs reward really. Military regulations (in my area at least) prohibit those with dependent children below 18 flying together.
#1865861
I try to think about what I can do to mitigate risk of an accident in the first place. I follow accident reports and commentary closely to try to identify what mistakes I am vulnerable to making, debrief my own flights from a risk perspective, and am constantly looking to find out what I can learn to make myself safer.

A lot of the time I come to the conclusion (rightly or wrongly) that my approach would have mitigated an accident I see reported. I don't think I'm a superhuman pilot or anything, and I realise that this could be seen as complacency. But I often do identify something that objectively would reduce the risk of a specific accident happening to me. For example, take this case: I have an IMC rating, and I stay proficient by flying with a safety pilot as necessary. Despite having the rating, I have cancelled flights that might end up in IMC on the basis that I was not proficient at the time. In other cases I can point to specific flights I have cancelled for less than the conditions of an accident that has affected someone else. And so on.

So far, I have yet to fly with wife but not child. In practice that is because that then requires childcare arrangements, rather than a specific decision by us to avoid that situation. One time we nearly did, but I cancelled because of the weather forecast (it turned out to be fine but I do not regret that decision!).

My conclusion: I think it's OK. But I remain very sensitive to safety matters, and will readily cancel flights or change plans to mitigate risk.

If you're worried about inadvertent flight into IMC, I think the best thing to do is to get an IMC rating and stay proficient by using it. To mitigate LoC, fly more frequently with an instructor and push your envelope when you do. And so on. I think these types of mitigations provide more bang for the buck and as a bonus you don't need to die for the mitigation to have been useful.
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By Milty
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1865867
Interesting and thought provoking topic.

Firstly, my sympathies with you for the loss of a close family friend.

I’m very new to GA flying (3 hrs in on PPL training) so not we’ll experienced to comment too much. I tried to find some meaningful statistics on risk of different things but struggled to find something concrete. Definitely seemed to be indication that several things we do daily are more risky than GA flying and as the OP mentions, we do many of these without a second thought.

I’m not judging, but I also found some comments interesting that feel like they prioritise the risk of wife over the risk of others, e.g. won’t fly with wife due to risk of orphaning children but would you take up a friend who was a single parent? Each and every one of us fully entitled to our own opinions.

For me, I think I will fly with my wife when I get the chance. We have two children, 18 and 20 so different circumstances to some.

One thing that being new to the forum and reading the thread on the Somerset crash, my thoughts of risk mitigation are heightened and I hope it will make me a better, safer pilot when the time comes. I will definitely be taking additional IMC training after getting my PPL..
#1865886
I came to flying later than most, both children were adults and thought ‘job done’. I flew with my wife a few times, she’s not really interested , and my children once each. Following that were a series of target flights in terms of destination, and a night qual, then simple joy flights.

However, the arrival of grandchildren brought about a change. For selfish reasons, (being aware of my limited aviator skill set) and not wanting to miss seeing them grow up, I stopped flying.

I still read this forum, contribute what I hope are encouragements to the student area, and am extremely happy that I got a PPL, but I don’t think I’ll be airborne at the controls again.
Flyin'Dutch' liked this
#1865888
Life is full of risks. The main thing with flying is to check the weather. Don"t be afraid to say to mates, friends that the weather is not good enough for flying with someone with my level of ability.
My guess is that most of us have had some "nearly situations "in life--with swimming, driving cars , motorbikes etc--even walking along the pavement. You can end up doing nothing if you"re worried about everything.
Minimise risk by obvious actions with weather , maintenance etc and get on with it.
Rob P, Nick, jcal and 2 others liked this
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