Mon Jul 19, 2010 10:03 pm
#879431
Height of absurdity
Richard Boswell shows how even an experienced professional pilot can make basic errors if relying too much on instinct. Pilot X is out of practice, and forgets checks that every PPL should know inside out
As X settled into the pilot’s seat he felt at home once again. His hands easily located the harness buckles and he instinctively strapped himself in while chatting to the examiner. Once comfortable, he started to run his eyes and hands around the cockpit as he completed the pre-start checks. Only the occasional hesitation hinted that he had been driving a desk for the last year. This was his first time back in the helicopter as he revalidated his professional licence.
X had known the examiner sitting beside him for many years. They had worked for the same company in the past and had completed their training to become instructors and then examiners around the same time. As a result, they had often carried out proficiency checks on one another; with over 12,000 flying hours between them, they trusted and valued each other’s professional opinion. X had chosen a career move which took him away from flying professionally while his colleague had continued to fly as a senior training captain. They had not seen each for some time, so there had been plenty to catch up on before the pre-flight brief.
X took his time over the checks. Not only was he revalidating his licence, he was also renewing his Instrument Rating and the plan was to spend the first part of the flight ‘under the hood’ as they completed an ILS followed by an NDB approach. With the checklist on his knee, he carefully ran through the full IFR checklist for the EC135 helicopter. With the glass cockpit and modern autopilot, there was a lot to run through, so he elected not to even attempt the checks from memory. He also took the time to identify as many of the navigational aids as possible. Experience had taught him that getting this out of the way early, in the calmness of the cockpit, with the helicopter still on the ground, was a sensible thing to do. It took almost 30 minutes to start the helicopter and complete the checks but having completed it all in slow time he now felt ready for the flight.
Lifting into the hover he managed to avoid the overcontrolling that was common to new pilots and he felt comfortable, despite the lay-off and the fact that only 100 hours of his 6,500 were on this particular type.
It felt good to be flying again. Many times during the last year he had regretted climbing the career ladder and leaving the joy of full-time flying behind him. As he hover taxied to the departure point he yawed the nose left then right, checking the instruments. He surprised himself by how quickly he was settling back into the routine.
Cleared for take-off, X lowered the nose and gently applied power. The helicopter accelerated slowly as he gently handled the controls. As the electronic ASI on his primary flight display flickered into life and passed through 30kt, he called, “Take-off decision point,” to the examiner. Safely climbing away at 70kt, the examiner took control and asked X to fit his foggles for the instrument flying. It hardly seemed necessary as they were quickly in cloud, but the examiner needed to ensure that he witnessed X instrument flying the approach down to the published minima.
Perishable skills
Concentrating on the instruments, X now found that he was working much harder than before. They had briefed that the autopilot would not be used for any of the flight – and X knew that instrument flying was one of the most perishable of all piloting skills. Instructed to level at FL35, he found himself ballooning above the cleared level; as he attempted to correct this, his heading wandered off by 30°. Correcting this, he descended 100ft below the level. It quickly became apparent that he no longer had any spare capacity to continue the conversation with his examiner.
He had requested a radar vector to an ILS for the first approach, as he had known it would take a while to settle back into the swing of things – he hoped the slightly less demanding ILS procedure would help sharpen his flying skills before he attempted the more demanding NDB approach. He also knew that at some point the instructor would simulate an engine failure and that too would increase the work rate significantly.
Like all international airports in the middle of summer, the airspace was busy and the radio calls came in thick and fast. X was given a new heading and cleared to descend to 2,500ft on the QNH, which he was given. He was cleared for the approach and asked to call when established on the localiser. A year ago, processing this information would have come instinctively but now he had to apply conscious thought and as he did so he lost accuracy in his flying.
X was very grateful he had all of his experience to fall back on. He was quickly established on the ILS and for most part the needles remained in the centre of the dial as he descended towards the runway.
The decision altitude was 320ft. As he passed through 1,000ft the ILS needles were already very sensitive. As he passed through 500ft things just didn’t feel right. “I have control,” came through the intercom.
X glanced at the rad alt for the first time and noticed that it was passing below 100ft. His heart sank. He could not believe that as such an experienced aviator he had made such a schoolboy error.
1. What did X fail to do which resulted in him inadvertently descending well below the published decision altitude?
2. How should have X set up the rad alt to have helped prevent this?
3. What is the procedure for confirming that your altimeter is serviceable?
Richard Boswell shows how even an experienced professional pilot can make basic errors if relying too much on instinct. Pilot X is out of practice, and forgets checks that every PPL should know inside out
As X settled into the pilot’s seat he felt at home once again. His hands easily located the harness buckles and he instinctively strapped himself in while chatting to the examiner. Once comfortable, he started to run his eyes and hands around the cockpit as he completed the pre-start checks. Only the occasional hesitation hinted that he had been driving a desk for the last year. This was his first time back in the helicopter as he revalidated his professional licence.
X had known the examiner sitting beside him for many years. They had worked for the same company in the past and had completed their training to become instructors and then examiners around the same time. As a result, they had often carried out proficiency checks on one another; with over 12,000 flying hours between them, they trusted and valued each other’s professional opinion. X had chosen a career move which took him away from flying professionally while his colleague had continued to fly as a senior training captain. They had not seen each for some time, so there had been plenty to catch up on before the pre-flight brief.
X took his time over the checks. Not only was he revalidating his licence, he was also renewing his Instrument Rating and the plan was to spend the first part of the flight ‘under the hood’ as they completed an ILS followed by an NDB approach. With the checklist on his knee, he carefully ran through the full IFR checklist for the EC135 helicopter. With the glass cockpit and modern autopilot, there was a lot to run through, so he elected not to even attempt the checks from memory. He also took the time to identify as many of the navigational aids as possible. Experience had taught him that getting this out of the way early, in the calmness of the cockpit, with the helicopter still on the ground, was a sensible thing to do. It took almost 30 minutes to start the helicopter and complete the checks but having completed it all in slow time he now felt ready for the flight.
Lifting into the hover he managed to avoid the overcontrolling that was common to new pilots and he felt comfortable, despite the lay-off and the fact that only 100 hours of his 6,500 were on this particular type.
It felt good to be flying again. Many times during the last year he had regretted climbing the career ladder and leaving the joy of full-time flying behind him. As he hover taxied to the departure point he yawed the nose left then right, checking the instruments. He surprised himself by how quickly he was settling back into the routine.
Cleared for take-off, X lowered the nose and gently applied power. The helicopter accelerated slowly as he gently handled the controls. As the electronic ASI on his primary flight display flickered into life and passed through 30kt, he called, “Take-off decision point,” to the examiner. Safely climbing away at 70kt, the examiner took control and asked X to fit his foggles for the instrument flying. It hardly seemed necessary as they were quickly in cloud, but the examiner needed to ensure that he witnessed X instrument flying the approach down to the published minima.
Perishable skills
Concentrating on the instruments, X now found that he was working much harder than before. They had briefed that the autopilot would not be used for any of the flight – and X knew that instrument flying was one of the most perishable of all piloting skills. Instructed to level at FL35, he found himself ballooning above the cleared level; as he attempted to correct this, his heading wandered off by 30°. Correcting this, he descended 100ft below the level. It quickly became apparent that he no longer had any spare capacity to continue the conversation with his examiner.
He had requested a radar vector to an ILS for the first approach, as he had known it would take a while to settle back into the swing of things – he hoped the slightly less demanding ILS procedure would help sharpen his flying skills before he attempted the more demanding NDB approach. He also knew that at some point the instructor would simulate an engine failure and that too would increase the work rate significantly.
Like all international airports in the middle of summer, the airspace was busy and the radio calls came in thick and fast. X was given a new heading and cleared to descend to 2,500ft on the QNH, which he was given. He was cleared for the approach and asked to call when established on the localiser. A year ago, processing this information would have come instinctively but now he had to apply conscious thought and as he did so he lost accuracy in his flying.
X was very grateful he had all of his experience to fall back on. He was quickly established on the ILS and for most part the needles remained in the centre of the dial as he descended towards the runway.
The decision altitude was 320ft. As he passed through 1,000ft the ILS needles were already very sensitive. As he passed through 500ft things just didn’t feel right. “I have control,” came through the intercom.
X glanced at the rad alt for the first time and noticed that it was passing below 100ft. His heart sank. He could not believe that as such an experienced aviator he had made such a schoolboy error.
1. What did X fail to do which resulted in him inadvertently descending well below the published decision altitude?
2. How should have X set up the rad alt to have helped prevent this?
3. What is the procedure for confirming that your altimeter is serviceable?
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