Originally Posted by
Jetblu
Between 17 - 20ish hours over 30+ years simply because I personally do not like aerobatics. Flying is dangerous enough without opening the envelope further IMHO. Each to there own.
But I'm still curious BPF, how my aerobatic experience alters or assists your dilemma of not being able to assist the British Judicial system with your expert knowledge, which by all accounts we should have been eternally grateful for.
I have repeatedly indicated that I did not believe a criminal prosecution was appropriate in this case. I find the tone of your post rather uncivil which is good because it means I can just go ahead and provide a few blunt truths.
Your characterization of the accident pilots earlier flight is as follows
Originally Posted by
Jetblu
He had previously looped earlier in the day because he had done it before, had competent previous instruction and he knew how to do a loop. The regs here are different to yours.
Jetblu: I think you are wholly unqualified to state an opinion on whether or not the previous instruction this pilot received can be characterized as "competent" and then go on to state as fact, that he "knew how to do a loop"
That is not only my opinion, but also that of several experienced aerobatic pilots I reached out to in order to ask their opinion of the suitability of the "training" the accident pilot received prior to carrying out low level aerobatics with a passenger.
I raise this specifically because I think it would be very unfortunate if any reader took away your uninformed and incorrect assessment of the minimal training he received as constituting sufficient training to conduct
any aerobatic maneuver on his own, let alone fly the flight profile he performed on that first flight.
Aerobatics is great fun and an enormous confidence builder for all pilots, especially relatively low time ones. However solo aerobatics should only be undertaken after a proper course of instruction by a qualified aerobatic instructor. That instruction will not only teach you how to perform aerobatic maneuvers correctly, but will also prepare you to deal with maneuvers gone bad and how to deal with aircraft malfunctions while performing aerobatics.
Aerobatics with a passenger brings additional responsibilities including a careful cockpit briefing with special care to ensure that nothing the passenger does could cause a flight safety issue.