Originally Posted by
Dufo
Try this answer on an IFR proficiency check, Big Pistons Forever
I did and showed him the speed dial number on my phone. His response was "good enough for me" and we moved on to the next exercise.
I fly a lot in the airspace surrounding Vancouver. If you had a true lost comm and YVR was your destination the air traffic havoc you would cause by ATC having to protect all the arrival airspace would ripple all the way to Toronto. The fantasy make believe world of flight training IFR has almost no relation to how IFR is actually flown in the real world. Lost Comm is a perfect example as you say lost comm to the average fresh IFR graduate and they will immediately launch into a big diatribe on routes altitudes, hold until flight planned approach time blah blah blah.
Almost none of them actually seem to be taught practical actions like cancelling the squelch to see if the volume got turned downed inadvertently, looking for the transmit icon on the radio, trying the other radio and the handheld mic, or trying to transmit on one radio and receive on the other. There is also invariably no thought to the fact that the lost comm might be the first indication of a much bigger problem, namely a failing electrical system.
As an aside if your electrics are failing the first piece of avionics to die will be the transponder. If ATC says you have suddenly unexpectedly dropped off the scope, it is a really good idea to immediately check the health of the charging system.