Now this is what I call an interesting thread.
The original thread asks if a simmer or whatever they are called could land a big jet ?
I fly a 30 ton turboprop. When sitting in front of my computer I have serious problems landing that fu..ing simulator, and to be honest, I believe that comparison will be true if reversed also.
Now I'm not saying it's impossible for a simmer to land a big jet. I for one would of course have given it a try if the situation required me to do so. But would never take it on as a challenge to find out. Now you may have alot of hours in GA and perhaps an hour or two where you've flown a big simulator. But having spent more than a 150 hours in a simulator I can tell you that a simulator behaves rather similar to the airplane in ideal weather conditions. As soon as you try to simulate things out of the ordinary it sucks in comparison with a real one. The calm enviroment of a simulator and the comfort of knowing that if you **** up, you just press the reset button, is in itself a stress relieving factor which you definately would not have if the situation in question arises.
Again, I'm not saying you would fail, but I would not put my money on your performance if it should happend. Another thing I would point out. You guys talk of the autopilot as a solution to this problem ?? I would say the opposite. If you were to take a one hour crash course (considering fuel and endurance) via the radio without the oportunity of hands on training and failing, I would say the autoland, FMC, and FMP, and autothrottle would be more of a confusion than a helpful tool. It is helpful if you fully understand the operation of these systems, but would just be a total mess under stress without any experience of it. I sometimes get rather confused myself of all those systems and sometimes the systems themself get so confused they just reboot. Now what the he.. do you do ?
Personally I disconect all autoflight systems and continue manually. But without a single hour in the aircraft in question I would not go for that either unless absolutely neccessary, and even then I would not put any money on my performance either.
The inclination some of you may have when saying "real pilots try to elevate themselves above others" is a total misunderstanding of the point here. By saying "i think you would fail" and afterwards explaining why is not equal to "elevating above" someone else. But then again what do you mean by elevating. I would elevate myself above the average simmers with regard to my ability to fly an aircraft. Of course, I do this for a living, and have been for some years. If you were to say that is elevating above you then I would say you're trying to elevate yourself up to a level of flying ability you do not posess. Sorry but there is a reason for why I do what I do, as I'm sure there is one for you doing what you do. And I for one would not even consider trying to elevate my self to your ability level in what you do.
Conclution ?: I think you would fail, but hell, if the situation arose then I would rather have a simmer behind the wheel than secretary
. Let's just hope that in the interest of safety for those on board, this will never happend.
