Originally Posted by
Pull what
Pilots tend to be obsessed about handling skills, the majority of jet transport accidents arnt caused directly by lack of handling skills, they are caused by error chain human factors
Neil Williams was an excellent handling pilot and an aerobatic champion but he killed himself and his wife by flying below safety altitude. A PPL with 5 hours solo could have prevented the accident.
At Kegworth some of the passengers with no flying skills where more aware of what was happening that the two pilots.
At Staines none of the four pilots realised the aircraft was stalled.
Improving the handling skills of any of the above accidents wouldn't have prevented these accidents
This is in many ways the classic argument for CRM and variations thereon - and in principle I don't disagree.
However, in my opinion, the concentration on CRM / teamwork / comms - call it what you has missed an important point. Historically things would have been far worse if there weren't people up the front with good handling skills: from wherever they'd come before - instructing, military flying, bush flying, whatever.
There seems to have been a perception that because all the big historic prangs were essentially about CRM failings, that was all that mattered. In reality, it wasn't, because handling related accidents were being avoided because those pilots were very good at handling.
So, in my opinion, handling is as important as it ever was - and we must guard against pilots losing that skill because of the concentration upon CRM.
G