what are the chances?

[cessnasey]

hi all :)

im training for my ppl with 3 hours logged.. my problem is i feel very nervous. hopefully this will pass, but i cant help thinking that this engine is all im relying on up here! is it normal at this point in ppl training to feel this way? anyone else had this nervous feeling?

also how common is engine failure and what is the survival rate of this situation on a single engine aircraft? i would be very intrested to hear how long you guys have been flying and whats been youre worst experience till now?

forgive me if this post seems silly to you old timers, but as an inexperianced wanna be pilot i cant help but be curious of answers to these questions. maybe im a little to safety conscious, i just wanna have peace of mind and enjoy my flying wich i really do love.

thanks

[Chilli Monster]

Fact of life - engines fail, albeit rarely.

Other fact - aircraft don't fall out of the sky because of engine failure. They land quite easily providing the rest of it is intact. You will learn all about this during your training and realise that, providing you fly the aircraft it's perfectly manageable.

There are more probably more accidents / incidents with serviceable engines than there are without ;)

[DubTrub]

cessnasey, have a trip in a glider at your nearest gliding club. They regularly land without an engine :) and it might help your confidence! And it's great fun too!

Most gliding clubs do a basic trial lesson for a nominal sum.

But above all, don't worry too much about it, a large part of your training plans for such an eventuality.

[Saab Dastard]

It is perfectly natural to feel nervous. We all feel nervous about something, sometime - particularly something new and unfamiliar.

I'm not at all nervous about the aeroplane or the engine - I have complete confidence in the theory and practice of flight. No, the thing that worries me is my c0cking something up!

As for the survival rate of engine failure - well, a wise pilot aims never to get into a situation where an engine failure would be non-survivable. Like not flying over built-up areas / mountains etc. in a single-engined aircraft.

SD

[A and C]

I now have about 3000 hours on piston engine aircraft and have yet to have an engine failure. I did once have to shut down an engine on a light twin as a precaution but it would have got me to an airfield if it had been the only engine fitted.

Most engine failures seem to result from dry fuel tanks.

If you want to stack the odds in ypour favour take a good look at the maintenance that the flying club has done and the price that you are paying, if it is rock bottom then it is likely that the maintenance is being skimped on, if you are paying the very top rate for the aircraft I would think about changing clubs but if the rate you are paying is about mid-market then you are dealing with a reputable club that probably look after its aircraft its aircraft well.

I see from your profile that you are from London so a few club recomendations for you are:- At Booker BAFC or WAC at White Waltham WLAC at Stapleford SFC.

[dwshimoda]

As has been said, your training will cover everything you need to know should the donk stop. Again, as has been said, it's up to you to make sure you are always in a survivable situation, most aircraft you will learn in can be landed in a very short distance if needed - ie a field. It may not come back out easily, but you will be in one piece, which when all's said and done, is what counts.

DW.

[Whirlygig]

We all have/had confidence crises from time to time but your training will help you to overcome that. I'm not sure you want to hear about everyone's worst experiences - that might be counter-productive.

However, the only engine failure I've had was in a Ford Escort at 18:30 on a Friday afternoon on the outside lane of the M25. That was pretty hairy! Thankfully cars can coast along as well.

Cheers

Whirls

[Whirlybird]

I started flying in 1997. I now have around 740 hours, both fixed wing and rotary. I've had no engine failures, and only a couple of electrical-related failures, neither of them serious. My one scare was my fault, due to a mistake I made, but I landed safely anyway.

In the same period, I've had about four car accidents. One was fairly nasty, and could have been worse - a head-on collision on a very narrow road with a van which was going much too fast. The others were all minor...but that's called luck. None of them were my fault, but in each case I couldn't take avoiding action quickly enough. And they were scary!!!

Life is a dangerous business. :( :uhoh:

[S-Works]

coming up on 2000hrs, 2 engine failures in microlights, one was a crankshaft and the other was actually a frozen throttle. No failures yet in GA aircraft.........

The quality of the maintanance and the regularity of use of the aircraft are good starting points as a rule well used aircraft have less problems.

[slim_slag]

cessnasey

also how common is engine failure

There aren't really good figures but the best I have seen was from a NASA study in the States - where most figures come from as they do a lot more flying there and there is more research. The probability that your engine will still be working at the end of a 700 mile flight was put at just under 99.99%. The majority of people survive an engine failure, and if you don't it's more than likely because you did something wrong, so part of your training is practicing what you do until you can do it in your sleep.

I don't know many people who have had an engine failure. Those that have are real old timers who flew a lot of hours on things like cropdusters which are put under a lot of stress, and they seem to have had them in the distant past. The manufacturers claim that engines are more reliable now, some don't agree with that, but most aircraft engines are still a simple design from decades back. The only engine failure I had recently was on a modern BMW because some sensor broke and shut a perfectly sound engine down. You won't get that sort of nonsense on a light aircraft engine, they are simple things and don't have much to go wrong. I know flying schools which have been in business for 20 years and they have 20 planes on the ramp and they still haven't lost an engine.

It's common to be nervous, for some people it never goes away, which is probably a good thing. Complacency will kill you far more often than mechanical engine failure will.

[Julian]

Agree with what was said previous , if your engine does fail you will not plummet out of the sky into the ground ...... you are now flying an extremely expensive glider!!! :}

[Yorks.ppl]

Complacency will kill you far more often than mechanical engine failure will.



Once for either is of the above is significantly more than enough:eek:

[IO540]

The most important thing is making sure there is enough juice in the tank.

A lot of schools play very close to the line on this. The common practice of assuming that a certain plane will go for say 3 hours if full, and writing down the times in a flight log, and subtracting the presumed fuel usage on each flight from the presumed fuel left on board, is very dodgy and there have been a number of accidents due to this.

We've all read much about a high profile court case in recent years involving a Seneca, and that was a very good example of a number of factors, dodgy industry practices included.

The important thing is to not accept the school's word for the fuel on board (FOB), and always do a physical check, and fill right up if unsure (even if you get a bollocking afterwards for having come back with too much fuel to carry the next load of obese instructors/passengers).

I've had two cases where I would have definitely come down had I relied on the FOB figure, which others routinely relied on. In one case the tanks were so empty it was amazing how the previous person made it back at all. That one would have been an engine failure shortly after takeoff, for me.

[dwshimoda]

and always do a physical check, and fill right up if unsure

Yep, I was atught that you ALWAYS look in the tanks - even if the fuel bowser has just been and filled her up - get up there (Cessna's - obviously!) and have a check. It also helps to be the one responsible for screwing the cap on tight as well!

Now we have a dip stick, I record the fuel before every flight, and then after, and have worked out an average consumption - it's scary how different it was compared to what I was always told! This lead to ma landing with only 45 mins of fuel on one occassion - I know that is acceptable, but if Luton hadn't have cleared me through their zone, I would have had a longer detour...

[big.al]

I had an engine failure on one of my last solo sorties before the test whilst training in Florida. Well, to be more precise, I lost about 80% of the engine power, accompanied by massive vibration. At full throttle I was descending 300ft per min.

Fortunately I was close to an airfield I'd just departed from (around 7 miles away) so I limped back and landed on the first available runway (not the R/W in use) as I had not time to join the (thankfully empty) circuit.

Turned out to be that a cylinder had detached from the engine block. The engine died completely just before I crossed the holding point on the taxyway after landing.

A scary experience but one that I would say is very rare. At 43 hrs in the log book, I certainly wasn't expecting to have an engine failure so soon! But my PFL training had been very recent, so my practice was very current (can't say that nowadays....:ugh: ).

As has been said, the training will give you the skills to handle the situation. Practice will ensure you know how to use those skills when called upon. A typical light a/c will glide quite a distance without an engine, so provided you follow the training your chances of walking away from an engine failure are very high, I would say. Since the chance of having a failure in the first place is very low indeed, it's not something to worry unduly about.

[cessnasey]

thank you for youre replys. its good to hear opinions on this subject. i hope i have not brought any negative thoughts to anyone, just needed to hear youre views.

and thanks for the suggested flight schools. i have logged three hours at cabair (biggin hill) because they have newer aircraft than any other school in biggin, and though more expensive, they do seem very proffesional. however i have nothing to compare them to as this is the only school iv flown with. but i will check out schools as suggested in stapleford as i havnt heard great things about cabair recently.

again thanks.

[18greens]

i have logged three hours at cabair (biggin hill) because they have newer aircraft than any other school in biggin, and though more expensive, they do seem very proffesional. .

If you are comparing prices remember Cabair charge based on air time not tacho. A tacho charge will always look cheaper but is it? Also consider the avaibability of a large fleet and full time instructors. It can be annoying if the only plane you fly breaks (and it will )

RE the nervous bit, get the instructor to demo a practice forced landing to you. You will see how well the PA28 flies with no powered assistance. The nervousness will pass and you will enjoy your flying.

The only injury I ever had was when I fell off the wing.

[Fuji Abound]

When I learnt to fly it was one of my greatest concerns.

Firstly stack the odds in your favour.

Way ahead of all others there are two reasons engines stop - running out of fuel and carb icing. Running out of fuel is obviously completely avoidable. Carb icing is largely avoidable but unless carb heating is used correctly (and very often it is not) it is a significant hazard. Flying injected aircraft does however eliminate this risk.

There remains mechanical failure which is either caused by poor maintenance or those very rare instances where not withstanding, something simply breaks. Engine failure due to poor maintenance is very rare (in spite of some pretty awful maintenance shops). Again even this risk can be significantly reduced by using reputable maintenance shops, having regular oil analysis and not continuing to run an engine when there are early indications of problems which may not fall foul of the airworthiness criteria but could be indicative of a more serious problem.

In summary if you are certain you will never run out of fuel, always use carb heat correctly or run an injected engine, use a good maintenance shop, have the oil analysed and never carry a potential engine problem the chance of an engine failure is almost non existent.

Having taken all the precautions engine failures divide into two types - sudden and with little warning and failures with some warning. I don’t know the statistics but I would guess sudden failures may be in the majority because one of the biggest reasons for failure is carb ice.

Failures with warning should be far easier to manage so long as you follow the golden rule of making a precautionary landing. So long as the engine is producing some power you would have to be incredibly unlucky to carry out a precautionary landing and suffer any significant damage. The problem is that pilots risk carry the problem in the hope they will get home. This is particularly true of running out of fuel. If you know you cant make a suitable airport you are far better landing in a field before you run out that have the engine quit just before you make it home.

So in a perfect world we are left with failures that haven’t arisen through running out of fuel, are not caused by carb ice, are not caused by poor maintenance, and happen suddenly. The chances of this happening are incredibly small. They are however the most difficult to manage and there is an element of luck in play.

As others have said even then you can modify your flying to minimise the risk. Here is how:

Flying high (few do) gives you so many more options - the chances are you will be able to find a suitable field and you have time on your side,

Always be aware what is around you and where you would go in the event of a failure,

Avoid flying over heavily built up areas or heavily forested areas, often skirting around adds very little to the journey,

Be incredibly aware on takeoff where you would go if the engine quit,
Always keep in your mind the direction of the wind so you can instantly set yourself up into wind,

Know the drills of by heart,

Practise engine failures regularly.

Look at fields when you drive by in your car and look at those same fields when you fly - you will form a good idea of those you would want to land in and those you would prefer not.

Finally if it all goes horribly wrong and the engine fails at 1,000 feet over a forest unexpectedly, remember that surprisingly as long as you do not panic and so ensure the aircraft does not stall, land straight ahead and have the door or canopy open you will hardly ever suffer serious injury.

Ah well, that’s what the book says, but may your God also always be with you!