Just to get things into perspective, I recall getting airborne one filthy winter night from Copenhagen. I was training a new F/O who had come from the Dornier 228 and he was the pilot flying. He had not done many sectors on the BAe146 but he was a tidy pilot.
The flaps stuck at 18 degrees after take-off. I think he expected me to take over but I asked him what he was going to do next? And so it was that we went through the flap fault/flap inop checklist and, surprise, surprise, were now faced with an 18 degree flap let down and landing in very ****ty conditions.
I basically told him "You got us into this mess so you can get us out of it".
You will be astonished to learn that he did a great job (I knew he would).
Two things come out of this:
a: The BAe146 with abnormal flap situations is not a difficult aircraft to handle.
b: My student's confidence level in the aircraft and in his own ability went up hugely that night.
Finally, and I mean finally, I would say to my friend in Botswana that if he is looking to rid aviation of a 0.0000000001 risk factor then he is on a complete loser. What he is trying to say is that if a B737 were to lose a wing on take-off, then the situation would not be recoverable but should be.
Get a life, that's the way the cookie crumbles.
P.S. The last time I went to Francistown was from Matsapa. WANELA were flying DC-3s and DC-4s. Shortly afterwards, someone filled one of the DC-4s with AVTUR (JET A1) instead of AVTAG (AVGAS). I think they were all killed.
So maybe, instead of making aeroplanes 100% safe, you should concentrate on the 50/50 situations like putting the correct fuel into your aeroplane in the first place?
Last edited by JW411; 25th Nov 2010 at 15:28.