I had accrued six hours of instrument training and was with my 20,000 hour instructor on a CAVU (now CAVOK) short final approach in a Cessna 172 to 22 at KSSI, a controlled airport, in 1977. We had had no radio traffic on the approach frequency. Just as I selected flaps 40 at approximately 1/4 mile before the runway's threshold and trimmed accordingly at 70 knots, a small twin appeared, unexpectedly and largely, in my window at our altitude - 300 feet. He was no more than twenty feet distant but 40+ knots faster!
He plunged directly in front of us, waggled his wings in a pronounced fashion to bleed airspeed, landed perfectly, then turned off on the first taxiway. As I landed, my instructor, a gentleman in the true sense of the word, said in an uncharacteristic venomous tone "I am reporting that S.O.B. to the tower and the FAA as soon as we shut down!"
The trouble was this: I knew the pilot of the twin. Not only that, I worked for him! He had three (count 'em THREE) Naval Distinguished Flying Crosses! He also claimed the FIRST NIGHT KILL in Viet Nam, as an F-4 Phantom pilot off of the U.S.S. Constellation. He flew with the surety and confidence which most humans have in walking and breathing.
He had just purchased race car driver A. J. Foyt's Cessna 320 Skyknight and had sold me a 1/3 interest the day before this near miss! He was handsome and wealthy and intelligent and my friend.
Only through the deepest and most persistent persuasion did I talk my instructor, also by that time a dear friend, out of making a scathing report to the Federal Aviation Administration. In retrospect, I regret my youthful decision. (I was 29.) Friend, foe, or anything in between, if a pilot's showboating puts lives at risk, it's time to file a report!
Still looking at the grass from the green side forty years later...
- Ed
