Safety equipment and outbriefs

[McTall]

After a 2 years being involved with GA whilst hour building and competing my ATPLs etc, I have seen many people walk out to aircraft in the most inappropriate clothing you could imagine, full of loose articles and without any consideration to the inherent risks if the career/hobby in which we all enjoy.

This brings about my question, what, if any, safety equipment do people wear/ carry when flying, and do you conduct any type of preflight outbrief (even to yourself)? Personally I now always fly with an belt cutter/screen breaker, rarely carry any "loose articles" and always do proper fuel/mass and balance/performance calcs before I go flying. I also always fly with long trousers/long sleeves and try not to wear clothes that would be worse in a fire.

One can never be prepared for anything, however it does appear that many people out there just either don't understand the risks or choose to ignore them.

Thoughts/ comments?
McTall

[ChampChump]

Summer: polo shirt, shorts, crocs...










:E

and, like a Cub, a Champ can only just barely kill you.


Sartorially, I don't care. Obviously.
I dress for comfort, natural fibres preferred. Footwear that doesn't slip, decent eyewear, otherwise unimportant.

And yes, I've had an engine failure and forced landing on a hot sunny day (we had one once). Barring the mid-air, wings falling off scenario, I'll accept the risks.

[Genghis the Engineer]

I try to avoid "flammable" clothes - fleeces and the like, and often use a nomex growbag, for all the usual good reasons.

For summer, I have a homemade thin Nomex flying jacket - all I did was cut the legs off an old RAF flying suit, replace the zip and hem it. Scruffy as heck, but comfortable and very well equipped with pockets. And, of-course, flame retardent.

Stout shoes, for all the obvious good reasons.

I find a headset bag useful - they zip up, and will take all of the "fod" items from my pockets: keys, wallets, pens, etc. A simple and painless pre-flight precaution.

Thin leather gloves I wear most aeroplanes, most of the time (unless it's open cockpit and I'm wearing much thicker gloves anyhow).

G

[flybymike]

Not sure what outbriefs are, but I don't think I wear them.

[Fly-by-Wife]

Not sure what outbriefs are

What Superman wears, silly.

FBW

[flybymike]

Of course!
:);)

[mad_jock]

Outbriefs are usually only found at schools that are involved with RAF cfs contracts.

They are fairly formal as you would expect. Also the fixation with clothing is also required.

Most schools do have a form of out brief its just not as formal as the RAF formal brief.

As for clothing yep its a good idea but not really something to get wound up about if you see others not following good practise.

In fact most commercial pilot uniforms are an out right fire hazard they would just melt into your skin.

[Whopity]

before I go flying. I also always fly with long trousers/long sleeves and try not to wear clothes that would be worse in a fireAh, Yellow nylon jackets, high inflammable, generate static electricity and if caught by a prop would not let go!

I recall flying Hercs in shorts, desert boots and short sleeved shirts because it was too hot to wear a flying suit!

[Grob Queen]

Yep, being at an RAF Flying Club, we always outbrief to ensure that we have checked everything (Notams, FOD hazards, ATIS, Ops, ATC, Royal Flights, Alternate landing, wx, Tech log, Auth sheets etc etc)

Bit formal yes, but its got me into good habits anyway. Must say though, i don't always see the Civvy trained members outbriefing! :hmm:

Dress.... grow bags, military boots and leather gloves...Personally I wouldn't fly without 'em.;)

[sharpend]

I am always totally amazed when I see pilots/passengers walking out to a light aircraft dressed in shorts and T-shirts. They would not be allowed on a car track day unless their legs and arms were covered.

If you want to learn more just read 'The Last Enemy' by Richard Hillary. Gloves are the most vital part of one's safety equipment. Nomex flying suits too are great.

So what do you wear? And do you carry a PLB? How much is your life worth?

All that said, when the OAT reaches 30 deg, as it did today, then I suppose you have to weigh up what is the greater risk: burning or dehydration.

At the end of the day, it is purely your choice.

[heights good]

My tuppence worth as military aircrew of 11 yrs experience and a survival instructor of 7 yrs experience...

Having deployed to Iraq in 50 degrees I always wore full thermal underwear and fire retardant clothing and gloves, no exceptions. Dehydration can be managed, being trapped in a burning aircraft can't without Nomex. I have 3 friends who have all had horrific burns and lost parts of their bodies as result. You will never regret wearing it.

I cannot fathom why anyone would want to risk it when it can be mitigated against so easily and cheaply. Civilian leisure flying carries the same risk of fire and I suppose a greater chance of crashing due (generally) to less hours and experience. Military crashes tend to be more catastrophic and to be honest a Nomex suit wont help when you fly into a hillside at 420 kts!

Do yourself a favour, wear 2 layers. The under layer made of cotton and the outer layer nomex. eBay is your friend, rather than spending money on flying hour, buy some Nomex clothing. :ugh:

I am not for a minute saying this is the only answer and others are wrong, it is merely my opinion. You are all adults capable of making your own decisions :ok:

[A and C]

It all depends on what type of flight is planned, Local flight may only require me to carry a mobile phone.

Any water crossing out of gliding distance requires life jackets with PLB (GPS equipped), distress flares, dye sea marker and a life raft during the summer, winter time also requires an emersion suit.

The life raft stays in the aircraft at all times in the winter to provide a shelter in the event of a forced landing.

Clothing is always enough to cover the body and non synthetic and gloves are always available, this is for all flights.

[riverrock83]

Jeans and T-shirt, jacket (hi-vis) with pockets.
They are comfortable and in a bubble canopy, heatstroke is more of a danger than fire and Jacket gets stowed once inside, with anything I need placed in an accessible place within the cockpit. With a 5 point harness, most pockets are pretty useless anyway.
In winter I use leather gloves.

In small GA civil cockpits, fire which gets to the point of burning the occupants is very very rare, and then if it happens and you aren't able to be rescued / are not on the ground, you are going to really struggle if cutting the fuel and electrics don't help. I suspect that the extra time that Nomex might bring isn't likely to make much of a difference.

The glass breaker things are designed for tempered glass (for which they are very effective). For the perspex screen in my plane they would just bounce off. Seat belt cutters are of use if the seatbelt is being held in tension, but there aren't pre-tensioners on aircraft belts. Also, my aircraft has a rotating clasp which will still release the belts when they are under tension so no need for the cutter.

A call on 121.1 or squawking 7700 is likely to be as effective as a PLB... I only bring one if I'm going to be over inaccessible terrain / water for a length of time.

I do always look at NOTAMs and weather (including local airport metar), do Auth Sheet and go through Tech log. I don't always do a weights and balance, because with me and the Bulldog it is impossible for me to go outside the limits (I will if I have a passenger or theoretically if I had a lot of luggage - hasn't happened yet). I only look at field length / performance if I'm not taking off / landing at an international airport which has many times the runway length that I need.

[dubbleyew eight]

there is obviously a great difference between the previous posters and their flying experience and me and mine.
all the prior posters seem to live in constant fear of a catastrophe. you guys must get a real downer going after a flight when you realise that nothing happened. you never had a moment where the crash axe got raised in anger.
what a letdown flying must be for you all.
I knew pilots like you once. they could last 3 hours in the air and the nervous tension did them in to the point where they could only fly every second day.
they dumped me as a friend when I told them that I could fly every day and for nearly 3 times as long each day.

boy scout safety is all nonsense methinks.

I had some advice once that seemed to be on the money.
"wear the clothes you want to walk home in."
if your aeroplane stuffs up and you have to leave it in a field well...
I also carry a swiss army tinker knife. it is used for peeling oranges.
whatever shoes I have on and often that means I fly in steel cap work boots.
jeans and comfortable flannelette shirts.

crash risk? good grief.
the odds are that my sons will inherit my aircraft and they will be classed as vintage aircraft by then.
ymmv.

[Johnm]

An aircraft is a car with wings so I wear what I wear when driving. Anything from a business suit with collar and tie to shorts and T shirt!

[A and C]

The two posts above are an interesting view to risk management in that they seem to view any precautions as an over reaction to that amount of risk that light aviation presents.

Some of what has been said is true, if all your flying is good weather day VFR over populated areas than as I said in my post above that only bit of safety equipment that you need is a mobile phone. To treat an aircraft in the same way as a car in terms of safety equipment is wholly wrong if you intend to go any distance when the weather might turn bad. Unlike a car that sticks to a well worn line of communication aircraft are most likely to be forced to land away from the beaten tracks of normal human communication and so some form of self help may be required.

It is not inconceivable that in the event of a forced landing in winter the emergency services could take three to four hours to find you if you have the misfortune to come down on the Welsh or Scottish mountains so some sort protection from hypothermia is required to stay alive.

As I said in the first post on the subject the equipment that you carry should be based on the risks of the flight and the conditions that are expected on the day, not on an emotional response that the likes of me and most of those who have posted above are doom and gloom types who see disaster around each corner, I except the risks of light aviation and choose to manage them rather than ignore them.

The chances are that all of my safety kit will never be used just as the chances are that the guys who wrote posts #14 & 15 will never be involved in an accident but should the worst happen the chances are I will survive and they will not.

[Torque Tonight]

I generally don't bother with these sort of threads as in the PPL flying world level of risk tolerance is basically a personal choice, and people are generally quite set in their ways and unreceptive to other opinions.

I am generally quite keen on the safety equipment, probably because in my flying background the potential consequences were drilled into us. Some have said this is risk averse, old fashioned, pretentious etc. I am happy to be averse to easily avoidable risks - it allows me to give full consideration to the unavoidable ones.

Many private pilots do not fully understand or consider the risks and perhaps make less safe choices as a result. A comment above mentioned using an immersion suit in the winter but not in the summer - the current 'summer' sea temperature off the UK will give you a survival time of about one hour. Having had a go at sea survival trainng I always wondered when bobbing about alone in the sea an indivdual would still be happy to have saved a few quid by not buying an imm suit, liferaft, etc.

For many the matter comes down to peer pressure and looking cool. Flying in flip flops, shorts and a nylon hawaiian shirt seems popular for some but makes me cringe. Burns definitely don't look cool. Leather gloves, perhaps the most contrversal item, may make the difference between being able to undo your harness to get out of a burning aircraft and staying in there. A minor injury during a walkaround on a Boeing last year made me wish I had been wearing RAF leather gloves at the time!

Dubbleyew Eights comments are the epitome of the opposite point of view, to put it politely! The suggestion that we want an emergency to occur and are let down if it doesn't is so silly that I need not comment on it further. His level of risk tolerance is his personal choice. However he may well get whacked one day by a situation that is perfectly surviveable for others with a more considered approach to risk. He is reliant on good luck - others ensure they can handle bad luck.

[Dave Gittins]

Most important is a pair of trousers that I don't mind getting dirty crawling about looking for the fuel drains.

[riverrock83]

I perhaps should have pre-fixed by comments with "when going for a local bimble" or some such thing.

If going over water for any length of time then additional equipment needs thought about, same as if going over mountainous / remote terrain in winter. Do I think about the risks for the flight I'm about to do - yes.
But a full Nomex suit for a local bimble (or a cross country flight over lower lying land) in a typical light aircraft seems overkill to me, which was my point (I think I agree with you A&C)

Shorts - I've flown in. Flip flops I've not (would effect my rudder peddle control). Hawaiian shirt I haven't - although that's mainly because my other half thought mine was so bad she threw it out...

[Johnm]

My response was slightly tongue in cheek but only slightly. I regularly fly IFR over water and under those circumstances I have been known to wear a life jacket complete with PLB over a business suit and have a raft on the P 2 seat.

[AberdeenAngus]

I'm a new pilot but an old hand at risk management.
One thing I will add to this thread is that there is no such thing as an acceptable level of protective equipment since 'acceptable' is entirely subjective.
We all have different perception of risk, usually coloured by our personal experiences.

[tmmorris]

I find the clothing thing very hard to decide.

I too fly from an RAF club, and many of the members, older and wiser than I, always fly in a Nomex suit. I did, for a while, particularly flying our Firefly which had nowhere to put anything. But it leaves me feeling a bit of a fraud, really. Recently I flew my IMCR renewal in a t shirt alongside an examiner in a flying suit and gloves. He didn't say a word! (nor indeed fail me)

On the whole, I am with A and C, and wear long sleeves and trousers in natural fabrics, usually cotton. I don't carry gloves but I have a pair and perhaps I'll start. But I must admit last week in 30° temperatures I flew in shorts and a t shirt, on the basis that the distraction of being boiled alive would probably be a worse risk.

Tim

[sharpend]

Dubbleyew Eight wrote

all the prior posters seem to live in constant fear of a catastrophe. you guys must get a real downer going after a flight when you realise that nothing happened. you never had a moment where the crash axe got raised in anger. what a letdown flying must be for you all. I knew pilots like you once. they could last 3 hours in the air and the nervous tension did them in to the point where they could only fly every second day. they dumped me as a friend when I told them that I could fly every day and for nearly 3 times as long each day.

Assuming he was being serious, I have to disagree with him. The very fact that I plan for everything means I relax totally in flight, knowing I'm in control. I don't live in constant fear; far from it. Moreover, flying is never a let down, always a joy. Even when a surface to air missile was fired at me, I was relaxed, for I knew what to do.

Whatever, as I previously mentioned, wear what you like. It will not affect me one jot. However, this forum is an interchange of ideas, advice is free and can be ignored. At the end of the day, most aspects of flying are all about risk assessment. If we did not want to take a risk we would leave the aeroplane in the hanger. In fact, we would not even get into our cars!

[Gertrude the Wombat]

To treat an aircraft in the same way as a car in terms of safety equipment is wholly wrong if you intend to go any distance when the weather might turn bad.
Erm, if I'm going off somewhere in a car when the weather might turn bad I do take survival equipment - no fun even being stuck in a jam on a motorway in subzero temperatures in your shirtsleeves, let alone a breakdown on a country road with no mobile coverage.

I do the same in an aircraft - take what's appropriate according to my risk assessment for the trip and possible weather.

(My father always carries a spade in his car in case he has to dig himself out of something - and I've seen him use it (albeit to help another motorist rather than himself). I have twice got stuck, once in mud and once in sand, and felt the lack of a spade ... they don't come as standard with hire cars!)

[thing]

I fly from a service club and people turn up in whatever they feel comfortable in. I've never seen anyone fly in a nomex unless they were just off duty and were wearing it for their day job.

Some people will drive at 60 mph in foggy conditions where I think 40 mph is appropriate but then my 40 mph may seem fast to someone doing 30.

There are other risk management issues that I take more seriously. I would never fly from an airfield/runway where there wasn't an 'out' if the fan stopped; I also like at least 3,000' between me and the ground if possible. Perhaps nomex wearers would be happy flying around at 500'. That's an unacceptable risk to me.

[Pilot DAR]

I always wear natural fibers, and carry a great Swiss Army knife. Beyond that, it depends what, and where I'm flying.

For summer land flying jeans and a cotton shirt or cotton hoodie, if cool. Winter land flying, add to that, a down vest or jacket, and suitable boots.

For summer water flying, add an inflatable two chamber life jacket, which has a clip off waterproof pouch for my phone, LED strobe lights, magnesium fire starter, folding pliers, knife, wire saw, and whistle. If it sinks, you get to keep what you exited with, so it better be clipped on already. I might wear shorts, as getting out the beached plane will take you into knee deep water. Crocs are handy for that, but otherwise leather running shoes.

For winter water flying, I'll wear either full "Mustang" or "Helly Hanson" floater suit, or a Mustang "ice commander" dry suit, with the life jacket over it. A bit bulky, but reassuring...

[BroomstickPilot]

Hi Guys,

If you do a search under the title 'What To Wear When Flying!!!!' you should find a 2007 thread that deals fully with this subject.

Regards,

BP.

[Camargue]

Each to his own I think

I did aero's yesterday in Jeans and T shirt. Negative G is hard enough without being overheated before you start.

On a jolly I'll take wallet and phone and some water and be dressed to cope with outside temp if I had to.

As for fire I work on the basis: if you are struggling to get out fumes will kill you 1st. If are taking pax and you are wearing nomex then everyone needs to.
In short I perceive the risk to be so low as not to be relevant (lets face it I am far more likely to be killed on my motorbike on the way to the airfield)

I wont fly over water in a fixed undercarriage sep (maybe wearing a 'chute along with a life jacket.) A Couple of trips in clients power boat over calm seas at 70kts quickly disabused me of any optimism I might have had of surviving a ditching.

[Pilot DAR]

Jeans and a cotton T shirt are a good choice for flying, flammability considered. That's what I often wear. Obviously, there is slightly less protection for your arms, but this choice does not pose the actual flammability hazard to the wearer that many common man made materials would.

Even thinking about it, is a good thing....

[Arclite01]

Usually Jeans, RAF Aircrew socks, cotton vest & pants, RAF Aircrew T-Shirt (long sleeves and Turtleneck), Old SAS windproof (cotton), desert boots or Timberland boots and RAF Issue cape leather gloves, and a cap plus sunglasses.

In the winter maybe one more cotton layer, and cotton long johns, plus silk inners for the gloves.

Comfortable and hopefully safe ('ish).

I also think that Richard Hillary comment in 'The Last Enemy' about gloves is very true - one of the aeroplanes I fly has a header tank just in front of me - not even a firewall between me and it............. (Cub J3) - I often think of Geoffrey Page when I see it. I'm also mindful of lessons learned around 'Anti-Flash' learned in the Falklands. I stay well away from Nylon as it has bad static properties and melts like.............a melty thing !!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Page

I never fly in shorts or short sleeves, or flip flops (which I have seen).

Arc