Originally Posted by
Ollie Onion
Of course you should enjoy it in conjunction with the other pilot. I fly in both seats and had a Captain say to me the other day, 'I will request a visual approach for you', I said 'no thanks' and he proceeded to tell me for the next 10 minutes that we are 'pilots' and should manually fly whenever we get the chance. I reminded him I was only there as he was getting checked back to line after an incident and he should perhaps be more picky about what he does and when. If an FO wants to do a visual then that is not a problem and I encourage it, I will however say no if I don't feel like being PM on a visual (not a common occurance) and that is alright too. I just hate the attitude displayed by some that it should be a requirement to fly manually all the time or you are not a real pilot.
Valid points. There is a large middle ground that exists between "not a real pilot" and "risk taker sky god" where most of us comfortably reside by being able to competently fly manual visual approaches a couple of times a week without any issues. Incredible it has caused such a debate!