Originally Posted by
SafetyPee
Many posts focus on stick and rudder skills (fly) overlooking the preceding need to understand the situation – 90% of human thought involves understanding; when and where are the skills of understanding taught.
Some recent views of awareness suggest that we should be teaching the identification of situations where SOPs should not be followed (how to identify them), opposed to always follow SOPs.
TY safetypee for one of the best posts I have read in a long time. This identifies the root issue. All of these pilots knew how to fly, however they failed to understand their situation, their awareness was behind what their a/c was doing. This caused them to apply the wrong/opposite solution to their situation. Being aware of what the other pilots inputs to flight controls is a part situational awareness!
For this reason I suggest a modification of the flying maxim:
Situate, Aviate, Navigate, Communicate
(where situate means situational awareness).
In my first flying lesson around 12 yrs old I vividly recall trying to move the stick and finding it stuck, then looking at my instructor and seeing he had limited the sticks travel. Ever since then I always communicate who has control without exception. This is not a side stick vs shared control column issue. It is about knowing your plane and having strict discipline. Current flying practice has been honed in blood over the decades, are we to learn from the lessons of others or blaze our own trail?