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princepilot
16th May 2009, 19:57
Just why does it happen??

I see and hear quite old people who have been flying for more than 30yrs and have obviously not killed themselves or had a fatal crash to still be here, yet i see and hear of young or younger people that have fatal crashes?

Puzzles me why some people seem to never kill themselves yet some other people do.

Do you think it takes certain type of person to be safe throughout their flying time?

Matt :hmm:

Whirlygig
16th May 2009, 19:59
It's the well-known adage, "There are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots".

Cheers

Whirls

princepilot
16th May 2009, 20:01
So you think those who take unnecccesary risks, or scrimp on maintenance are the ones that suffer?

Matt

TheGorrilla
16th May 2009, 20:06
I think it's 50-70% luck. The rest can be influenced by good decision making, good handling and good equipment.

Rugbyears
16th May 2009, 20:23
Doesn't one make ones own luck....

Whirlygig
16th May 2009, 20:27
If a pilot takes an unnecessary risk and survives, is that luck or judgment? Those who don't take unnecessary risks are much more likely to survive.

Older pilots will usually have more experience and less of a risk-taking mentality than younger pilots.

Motor insurance companies also recognise that with drivers; young male drivers having the highest premiums with pensionable women having the lowest.

Not sure why the concept puzzles you?

Cheers

Whirls

Molesworth 1
16th May 2009, 21:31
In "The Killing Zone" Paul Craig explains that pilots due to inexperience and attitude. Low hour PPLs (like myself) are particularly vulnerable. These are pilots who have between 50 and 300 hours. (Students are amongst the least likely to kill themselves because they follow all the rules). A cavalier or complacent attitude is also a common factor in fatal accidents. Just read the AAIB reports.

Typical scenarios include flying VFR into IFR conditions, not looking out for traffic, poor fuel management and alcohol and drugs. I suggest pilots who think that luck plays a major role attend their local CAA safety evening more than just occasionally.

Getting IMC/IFR training is also a good idea.

Age is not a factor. Experience and being safety concious is what makes pilots survive.

Gertrude the Wombat
16th May 2009, 21:49
Same as motorcyclists.

Fuji Abound
16th May 2009, 21:52
It is X% judgement and Y% luck.

The more you practice, the lower Y becomes, but it never gets to 0.

In other words with experience and training you are able to avoid situations you required luck to intervene in to keep you safe, and are able to recover from situations you didnt manage to avoid.

However with all the experience and training there are some situations it is almost impossible to avoid and recover from. Thats is when you still need to hope it is your lucky day.


Age is not a factor.


You are wrong - if you fly with "older" people you will find out why.

Pilot DAR
17th May 2009, 03:52
I've thought a lot about this. 20 years ago, I crossed the 1000 hour mark, and thought I knew it all. I didn't wreck anything, but I sure came close, and scared myself into safety. Since then, I've watched and considered. I have flown with a lot of pilots, sometimes receiving their mentoring, though more often demonstrating and checkng them out on new aircraft or operations. Some have died in aircraft I have flown with them.

I observe the following (as total generalizations):

Pilots who learned young, seem more natural to fly, and better "hands and feet" than older new pilots. They take more risks, and are trying to impress and show off more than older pilots. They don't ding aircraft, they don't damage them at all, or they totally wreck them.

Pilots who learn later in life, do well understanding rules and limitations, and are much less likely to challenge them, but are less natural at flying, and will miss details. They think that because they have suceeded in life, and can affort the fancy plane, they feel self assured out of proportion, and might have a nasty surprise just ahead of them. They ding planes, though seem less likely to destroy them.

Because the older ""new pilots" are less likely to show off, and just want easy going flying fun under conservatively safe conditions, they are less likely to find themselves in challenging conditions, though if they blunder in, they will be more challenged getting themselves out safely.

The younger "new pilots" are out sewing wild oats. they have a keen understanding of what they have been taught, and the reflexes to handle most anything, but not the motivation, or life experience to avoid it.

The older old pilots, have seen it all and done it all, and have geneally given up showing off (save for the occasional need to put some young whipper snapper back in palce). They fly natually, and with instinctive skills, but are getting complacent, and that is a very real threat to safety. The "been there, done that" attitude will cause them to be casual, and miss the odd hazard, and sometimes it will bite them. A few near miss wakeup calls will set them straight for a while again, and might even drive them to more instruction.

I've been lucky, I've had the opportunity to do lots of test flying in differnet aircraft types, and I think it helps to keep me fresh. To ward off complacency, I trained for my helicopter license a few years back. I don't know if it has worked, but so far, so good.

Some applicable sayings:

Luck favours the prepared.

You begin flying with a full bag of luck, and an empty bag of experience. The objective is to fill the bag of experience befoe you empty the bag of luck.

Read, listen, practice, respect the laws (both legal and gravity), and never think you are invincable, and you'll do fine for a long time to come!

Pilot DAR

411A
17th May 2009, 04:28
Older pilots will usually have more experience and less of a risk-taking mentality than younger pilots.



Yup.
Here in Arizona a few months ago there was quite a nasty accident with a single engine trainer with two brand new young pilots aboard.
No one knows exactly what happened as there was not a part big enough of the airplane to put in a shoe box...however, one of these new pilots was a known risk-taker, and had been re-examined by the FAA.

Not good.:sad:

Molesworth 1
17th May 2009, 12:48
Pilot DAR

Thank you for your excellent and thoughtful post!

Being an old "newer" pilot I found during spinning training what a different beast a normally benign PA-38 can be! I see no reason to be complacent. I debrief myself after every flight - how could I have done this or that better? Occasionally things go wrong unexpectedly - just when you think your landings are automatic you get a bounce or you find yourself veering off the runway.

Lister Noble
17th May 2009, 15:04
I've think I've posted this before but may worth putting it on here again.
We used to have a lot of crop spraying and fertiliser applied by air,by Piper Pawnee.
When I asked the pilot how dangerous it was and the accident rate,the pilot ,who was I reckon around mid fifties,said.
"There are very young pilots and old pilots,the ones in the middle are dead!"

He went through some cables later that year,but survived.
Lister:)
Old newish pilot,just about to amend my age.

A Very Civil Pilot
17th May 2009, 15:40
It's a function of the Gompertz Curve. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gompertz_curve)


http://www.apsnet.org/education/AdvancedPlantPath/Topics/RModules/doc1/images/Thumbs/D1_gompertz.png
Gompertz Curve


The death rate of low-hour pilots is small (because they're cautious, and the low-hour population is large).

Death rates start to rise exponentially with hours (as caution decreases, and the population pool decreases).

Then starts to drop off again (as experience builds, and population of really high hour pilots is very small).

princepilot
17th May 2009, 16:40
Oilot DAR,

Thanks for the reply. Well im 31 so looks like i fall in the middle (dead) pilots. SO id better be careful.

Matt

biscuit74
17th May 2009, 17:10
The services used to reckon there were several high risk points in a pilot's career, as his/her experience increased. They had - and probably still have a system which take a more careful look at pilots as they approached those zones.
I don't recall the hours involved, I think one was around 250-300 hrs then around 1200 or so. There is a third higher hour point I think. The first being a 'know-it-all' point, the second being complacency where we start thinking it's all too easy. A good fright helps - that is where the luck comes in. You have to survive it, or just be a prompt to others.

Still as a famous golfer once said - I think it was Sam Snead after sinking a particularly difficult very long putt - "It's amazing. The more I practice, the luckier I get."

Ask some of our military colleagues. I expect they will know where the high threat intervals are.

I think the Gompertz curve is slightly too simplistic for this purpose. If you plot risk of accident against experience (hours) I suspect there are a series of waves. Logically each wave will show features somewhat like the Gompertz curve, since feedback helps the surviving pilots learn from the mistakes of others, thus reducing fatalities until the lesson gets overridden with time.

Hmm, after 40 + years kicking around in aviation I guess I'm one of the older ones now, though there are some very much older wiser birds on here !

Pilot DAR
17th May 2009, 17:44
When I started taking helicopter training a few years ago, I was an odd mix of experienced and very novice. If it had to do with being off the ground at more that 50 knots, I had it fairly well worked out, if it had to do with all the unusual characteristics of flying at less than 40 kts, I was very new to it. There I was, with all of the students, among them as one for the first time in 30 years. My second first solo was 30.5 years after my first. It was a good lesson in humility for me! I had three instructers with whom I alternated. They kept saying to me "You already know this", but I saw the opportunity to be refreshed.

I past times, I'd be a check out pilot for a newer pilot on a relatively exotic GA type. I quickly learned to not assume that they knew how to fly well just becasue they could afford to. There were certainly times where I waited too long, and my very sudden "I've got it!!!" surprised them.

We are of all different skills and experience as pilots. It's amazing how we can help each other learn new things. Having flown Lycoming IO 360's for 30 years, in March, a very wise mechanic, who is also a new pilot, taught me something very simple and basic about checking the dipsticks on the DA42L.

To assume that we pilots are safe or dangerous, requires a lot of generalizing. I've met many very new pilots to whom I would lend my plane, and some very experienced pilots to whom I would not. The experience and skill are only a part of the equasion, its the attitude which really matters. Pilots of the right attitude never assume they know it all, and will always be willing to learn and share. Pilots with the wrong attitude don't listen well, and tend to show off. Whenever I'm around planes and pilots, and I hear "watch this", I watch out!

Keep reading here, and chatting with other pilots, and you'll find you're saying to yourself "yep, I can imagine how [that] could happen, I've come so close myself. I have to do better next time".

Safe flying, Pilot DAR

foxmoth
17th May 2009, 21:11
Another way of putting this is the old adage that "A superior pilot is one who uses his superior experience to avoid getting into a situation that might require his superior skill to get out of that situation"

The inexperienced pilot though gets into these situations and does NOT have the experience and skill to get out of that situation without luck on his side (after which, if he gets away with it, he has a bit more experience under his belt to enable him to progress towards being a superior pilot!)

Crash one
18th May 2009, 13:47
I don't think inexperience is the problem, it is inexperience coupled with over confidence. Which seems to be a common trait among todays yoof. I have recently read "The Killing Zone" & it struck me that most of the examples were the result of utter gross stupidity through over confidence.
No old bold pilots & all that are just the end result.
What about "He who knows not, may be a wise man, He who knows not that he knows not, is a fool." ?
I also don't see what the puzzle is. "The Killing Zone" explains it pretty good.

Rod1
18th May 2009, 15:00
Pilot DAR

I really like;

“I didn't wreck anything, but I sure came close, and scared myself into safety”

I have (only) 25 years of amateur aviation, but in the early days I pushed the limits quite hard. Some of my IFR flights in singles and some of my over water flights were, by my current standards, shear madness! This area is one where pilot mentoring can be very useful, as one can give a less experienced pilot a different perspective on what he is about to do.

I tend to say, there are bold pilots and old pilots and I am well into the transition!

Rod1

maxred
18th May 2009, 15:44
Good question Princepilot, I have been reading through the posts, and all make sense. I fall in the 800 hr category, think I fly as I like to live life, covering ALL the numbers/options. Sometimes though, whilst you are doing that, life has an awful habit of dealing a leftfield curve ball. Experience+judgement+luck (if you are facing a situation), probably either gets you out of the hole, or deeper into it. I view flying with an A plus B plus C building block mentality. Keep in your routine as much as possible, do not attempt anything that is evidently outwith your experience and ability zone. I always do the walk round methodically, shout clear prop:D try and be courteous in the circuit and with R/T, and treat every flight as an hours and experience builder. I watch others with amazement, as they cut me up in the circuit, blast off into IMC, do no walkround nor checks, fly off with no check on weather etc etc. We all see it day in and day out. TIP get as many ratings as you can, and revalidate constantly with the instructor.:ok:

Exaviator
19th May 2009, 05:46
As one who started flying at 18 and still going at 69, with 23,000 hours in the log book I would have to say that longevity in the business of aviation is based on:

(1) Aptitude (2) Good basic training (3) Sound application of those learned skills, and (3) A healthy dose of good luck. Flying is a risk business and being a pilot is all about risk management. If I had to name one particular trait above all that makes a good aviator it would have to be "Situation awareness" Stay Aware - Stay Alive.

One last thing - in this business you never stop learning.:ok:

stiknruda
19th May 2009, 12:36
I very much agree with exaviator 4 points above! I believe that 2 of the most common factors in flying accidents are:


Bad Luck
Exuberance


A catastrophic failure is sheer bad luck.

A low level aeros maneouver that goes wrong is probably exuberance.


I saw the former at an Air Show in RSA - when the Silver Falcons jet lost a wing - then a few weeks later, a C210 performed an impromptu roll whilst departing from an Airshow at Nampula in Mozambique and struck a mud hut, killing the occupants of both the Cessna and the hut.

vabsie
19th May 2009, 13:44
Only joking really ..

BUT

It does make you wonder:

Even although you have a love for flying .. is it worth the risk - Reading threads like these always make those words from my beloved fiancee bang loudly in my ears: "Your flight training does concern me sometimes, it's dangerous"

As for bad luck - If you are well prepared, what are common bad luck situations that can't be prevented? - in normal flying not aerobatics

One that springs to mind (if you are well prepared and that can't be avoided) is if some nutter with a faster airplane flies into you from behind.

Vabsie

Rod1
19th May 2009, 13:50
“As for bad luck - If you are well prepared, what are common bad luck situations that can't be prevented?”

Engine failure, especially on takoff at low level.

In flight fire/Co2 in cockpit

Unexpected medical problem

Structural faliure

ETC

Rod1

bjornhall
19th May 2009, 14:44
Even although you have a love for flying .. is it worth the risk - Reading threads like these always make those words from my beloved fiancee bang loudly in my ears: "Your flight training does concern me sometimes, it's dangerous"

Threads like these demonstrate a safety conscious culture, bordering on obsession. They do not demonstrate a high risk, or that flight training is dangerous. :ok:

vabsie
19th May 2009, 15:09
bjornhall - good reply, feel much better :ok:

stiknruda
19th May 2009, 19:14
At the Display Pilots' Symposium three or four years ago, there was a talk about mid-airs, in short the circuit is the most dangerous place for these. The extensive (global) survey showed that the majority occured with faster aircraft running down a slower aeroplane in front.

To mitigate this, I fly a fast aeroplane with my fingers crossed! :E:E


Stik

Gertrude the Wombat
19th May 2009, 20:07
Threads like these demonstrate a safety conscious culture, bordering on obsession. They do not demonstrate a high risk, or that flight training is dangerous. http://static.pprune.org/images/smilies/thumbs.gif
Yep. If road accidents were investigated and reported, and all drivers read the accident reports as obsessively as we read the aviation accident reports, the roads might be a safer place, almost as safe as the skies!

Molesworth 1
19th May 2009, 20:18
Told at a CAA safety meeting that the rate of fatalities in SEP light a/c is 1 in 85000 hours. No room for complacency but that figure hardly justifies the view that flying is dangerous. Microlights have double the fatality rate. Gyroplanes are REALLY dangerous.

Pilot DAR
20th May 2009, 01:22
Gyroplanes are REALLY dangerous

Honest question:

Are they, or is it a matter of a realtively safe aircraft type not being operated with due respect to the laws of physics, or maintained so as to assure porlonged safe condition? By the same measure, are helicopters "dangerous"? I can think of many helicopter pilots I know who have flown accident and damage free for decades!

I think it goes back to pilot attitude and preparedness (which is part of attitude anyway)

Pilot DAR

Chuck Ellsworth
20th May 2009, 03:33
Gyroplanes are REALLY dangerous.

A properly designed gyroplane is arguably one of the safest aircraft one can fly.

Several reasons the gyroplane group have such a high accident rate are.

Improperly designed machines such as the RAF 2000.

Lack of proper training.

Lack of discipline within the gyro flying group as evident by the aggressive low flying maneuvers they are so fond of.

As to the secret of flying for many years and still around I like to think it was learning when to say no that was the most important thing in my career..

Gertrude the Wombat
20th May 2009, 19:44
By the same measure, are helicopters "dangerous"?
The folklore that I have chosen to believe is that helicopters have lots more "Jesus bolts" than fixed wing aircraft, where a "Jesus bolt" is a single point of failure such that if it breaks you've no options but to call upon Jesus.

I expect the helicopter pilots to join in and say that this is a load of ******* and that wings spontaneously fall off fixed wing aircraft just as often as little widgets break inside helicopter gearboxes.

bjornhall
20th May 2009, 20:18
I thought helos had only one Jesus bolt .... Except Chinooks etc...

2hotwot
22nd May 2009, 20:24
Lets get a definition right. A danger is a controlled risk. Electricity is dangerous but because of risk controls like insulation, it is safe to use in your house by your children.
All aeroplanes are dangerous, it is the risk-controls that we put in place that make them safe. Omit those controls and they become killers.
My view is one of the greatest risks in aviation is not flying with a sufficient margin for error/failure. That happens for example in low level aerobatics where an error by the pilot or failure of the machine will probably result in a high energy impact. That is not just bad luck.
After you have done everything possible to control risk you have to decide whether you will accept the remaining risk and for instance continue into bad weather, fly low aeros or fly atall. Understanding is the key.

What really worries me is the number of people on this thread relying on luck to keep them alive!!!!
Anyone for a lucky amulet?

Miles Magister
22nd May 2009, 21:50
Ladies and Gentlemen,

There are many good points above, however I believe there is a fundemental missing on this thread.

When I was lucky enough to be taught by HM's finest we flew the lesson with an experienced well trained QFI, we then consolidated the lesson on another sortie, then flew it solo and then consolidated it again with our QFI. All this meant that we had seen quite alot before we were let loose.

Later on when flying the big jets we flew as co-pilots for many years and did not think it was unusual, which meant we had seen most things before having to make the decisions from the LHS.

Much of this is missing when people strive to go solo early, finish their training in minimum time and jump to the LHS after only minimal time.

If more people were patient and content to watch, listen and learn before trying to show that they can do it on their own then there would be many more old pilots.

MM
A slow and careful tutor from the old school