Many years ago during the Korean Conflict the Coast Guard recruited ex USN Aviators. We got one that had a total of 272 hours, which was just out of flight school. He was let go from the Navy when WW2 ended and he went to divinity school. He stayed in the Navy Reserve and rose to the rank of Full Lieutenant. Officers that were junior to him were training him and some of them had in excess of 10,000 hours PPC (Patrol Plane Commander).
On one training mission he was being checked out on an UF1-G (SA-16). The plane was at 90-degrees to the runway and being run-up to take off power. The pilot being trained had his head down near his knees when the training pilot released the brakes and told him to take over. He did not respond quick enough to get the plane on the runway and we nearly impacted a stand of pine trees at the edge of the field. Reverse thrust saved our ass.
On another flight in a JRB (Beech D-18) I was flying in the right hand seat. We were going to Cleveland, Ohio to pick up some high-ranking officers and civilians. Just prior to take off he put on his glasses and he told me to remind him to put on his glasses when we were going to land. After takeoff he removed his glasses and the flight proceeded normally. That is until we were flying over Lake Erie. I asked him if he had a green card (Instrument ticket) and he said no. I told him that he had to be instrument rated to fly over water.
We headed for Toledo and in the process consumed a lot of fuel. I asked him if we could land at Toledo to pick up fuel to get to Cleveland with the necessary reserves. He said we had enough fuel to make it. Cleveland was socked in and the closer we got to Cleveland the ceiling was dropping at an alarming rate. Since he was not rated for instrument flying I asked him if we could return to Toledo and wait until the weather got better. Again he pressed on.
He asked for landing instructions and Cleveland put him under GCA control. They vectored him to his final and he could not get aligned with the runway. This was repeated several times and 1) we were running low on fuel and 2) GCA would shoot us down if we missed it again. All of this time I was busy looking for other traffic and in the process I forgot about reminding him to put on his glasses. When we finally made it to the end of the runway he had forgotten to lower the flaps. We hit so hard that I thought the landing gear would come through the engine nacelles. We bounced about fifty feet and then he lowered the flaps and we ballooned down the runway. We finally got down and taxied into the parking area he asked me why I didn’t remind him to put on his glasses. I told him I was busy looking for other traffic. I asked him why he needed his glasses on takeoff and landing. He replied that his depth perception was not what it should be.
The flight back was just as bad. We were flying at about 10,000 feet and when we entered into an ADIZ he forgot to file in. We were jumped by two Air Force F-89 Scorpions. As we got closer to the base he maintained his altitude and made a “Big hole approach” diving from 10,000 feet to get into position to land. My mastoids hurt so much the pain was unbearable and the same was happening to our passengers. I was grounded for over a week and the pilot was transferred eventually to Alaska where all of the flying was done off of water and mostly under instrument conditions.
Now that is incompetence.
