I have never claimed that I am Chuck Yeager or Neil Armstrong, or even the ace of the base and certainly not Superman - far from it. I am just an average pilot (and am not claiming that I have a perfect flying record either !).
But I am confused that in recent years we have had:
A crash at SFO because nobody did anything about the speed dying away.
A crew with mode confusion who stayed on the runway well past Vrotate and then flew very very low, barely missing buildings, instead of climbing away.
A pilot who held full backstick at FL390, fatally stalling the aircraft.
A crew who forgot to select TOGA when trying to fly a baulked landing.
A crew who continued when they were so hot and high, they forgot to lower the gear, scraped the engines along the runway, got airborne again and fatally crashed.
A crew who landed so fast and deep that they went off the end of the runway.
A crew who after landing tried to use the yoke as a steering wheel to stay on the centre-line instead of the rudder, during a crosswind landing, and went off the side of the runway.
All of the above were basic piloting errors and none of the above were owing to engine fires or control problems and were not difficult or complicated problems. But if I and my colleagues had done any of these things in our initial airline Sim test, we would not have been employed by the airline - it would have been "thanks, but PFO".
The last real piloting events I can think of were the B777 into EGLL with double engine failure at very short finals owing to blocked fuel filters - saved by the quick thinking of the crew who raised the flaps one stage and just managed to get over the fence. Another was the QANTAS A380 with an exploded engine and dozens of ECAM warnings. And of course the Cactus double engine failure, landing on the Hudson river. All fantastic piloting and surely what we expect from pilots, (and would hope to achieve ourselves), are they not?
So I am honestly not bashing pilots as such; but just wondering what is happening to aviation? We now hear about this startle effect, which now seems to be used as an excuse when pilots make basic flying mistakes. Are we not selected as pilots exactly because we can deal with problems in a calm and controlled manner? How are some pilots now getting so badly out of shape with standard flying and standard manoeuvres? Is it the training or the selection or something else?