Originally Posted by
vanHorck
Frontlefthamster
It is that as the pilot in command designate (irrespective of pressures put on you from others) you ARE pilot in command and the buck stops with you. I ve seen postings of people on this thread which seem to doubt this and it is a receipe for disaster.
I think that has missed the real lesson. Getting in the plane on that mission was a bad idea - PIC and PAX equally crash into the ground. Any pilot should have been able to judge that risk and many non-pilots could as well. Just because someone else can do something (The ATPL guys in an ILS equipped twin) doesn't mean what you are going to do (either as leader or follower) is sensible.
There are important issues on the understanding of who is PIC and what is PIC accountable for. However, equally, reducing the issues to solely PIC decision making doesn't address the very real issues alleged. Specifically, that the two 'CFIs' who trained Mr Walker encouraged the flight, arranged for a further 'pilot/instructor' to accompany Mr Walker on his return flight, and one of the 'CFIs' accompanied Mr Walker outbound - in a context implying that the accompanying 'pilots' addressed the known lack of currency for Mr Walker. (summarised from boy entrant's post and comments in the AAIB report)