Originally Posted by
JimBall
Plainly you have an agenda. What's the difference between a piston single at night and a turbine single ? Oh yes - there are fewer engine failures in pistons than turbines........
Funnily enough, if you evaluate all the risks for Day vs Night in a single you would probably find that the Day risks are more.
Like the Manchester Low Level corridor on a sunny, calm day when all the microlights take to the air over Cheshire and don't show up on radar - so the FIS is useless.
Night flying is a wonderful experience and makes you a better pilot. For that reason alone, we should all have a go at a night course.
No, what's plain, actually, is that you didn't read the first sentence of my Post #9.
If you believe you can consistently and safely manage an engine failure in a single of any kind over terrain, at night, regardless of how spectacular your lighting may be, and avoid wires and trees, and uneven terrain, and walk away... well, you're a better pilot than I am and undoubtedly more of a hothead.
YOU might evaluate the risks as greater during the day, and it is indeed true that certain risks ARE greater during the day, but taken as a whole, risks are greater at night. I expect you would find yourself in the minority with your assessment otherwise among the professional pilot fraternity. Tell me, if risks were not greater at night, why does one require specific recurrent training before going out at night?
Since I have a couple thousand hours of night time to include instruction, NVG, shipboard operations and SAR, and enough of it is in singles to have some sense of what that's like, I think I know that of which I speak. I'm not saying flying at night is a bad thing, and nowhere did I say that. If you would read a little slower and more completely, you might have realized that and your bare bum wouldn't even now be waving in the breeze for all to see. I have also flown to enough night crash and ditching sites at 3 in the morning hunting for survivors (sometimes on foot because the crashed machine scattered itself broadcast) to also know that of which I speak (funny, they were all pistons, must just be a coincidence). What I am saying is that flying at night in a single, any single, is a calculated risk. If that means I have an agenda, sure, whatever, dude. Why don't you tell me what that agenda is, since you seem to know so much about me.
MamaPut, indeed, the only engine failure I've had was in a twin (which, when you consider that about 5 of every 6 engine hours I've burned fuel for were in a twin, only seems fair), and by great good luck we managed to bring it safely to earth as planned and other than the seat cushion extraction afterward, it was more or less uneventful as we were close enough to home that recovery there was the best choice. And it was at night. I wouldn't wish to duplicate that scenario with but one engine (there be dragons down there a'nicht). If I may, I think what you may be saying is that an engine failure in a twin gives more opportunities for error because there are more choices to be made. If that's what you're saying, I certainly wouldn't argue with you. I've heard of plenty of occasions when the good engine was shut down during a OEI situation or fuel was transferred the wrong way, or the fire bottle was shot into the good engine and things got mighty quiet. In a single however, an engine failure concentrates the mind wonderfully on the task at hand. Even so, I'd still rather have the second motor and takes my chances. Had I your set of experiences and observations, I might think differently, as you might if you had mine.
