Originally Posted by
Romeo_Fox
It seems like declaring an emergency could have saved the day. I'm looking into exactly this topic for quite a while now and it seems there is very little knowledge about why pilots seem so reluctant to declare.
Although in this case there are quite a few "obvious" reasons why the owner/pilot did not declare, does anyone know of some proper research / reports why (also GA) pilots do not declare, when they clearly need a maximum of help.
Controllers find it hard to say the words "avoiding action" because we don't say it very often and it is tantamount to admitting it's all gone wrong. This is especially the case if it is your own mistake and not say a level bust. Sometimes controllers think they have said those words, and are surprised when hearing the replay that they haven't and have said immediately instead. I presume the same would apply to pilots who don't want to admit it's all gone wrong or think that saying you are low on fuel is the same as a pan or mayday.
In the uk we do practice for emergencies in the simulator and the people running them try to engineer situations which require controllers to say "avoiding action" so it isn't a strange thing to have to say.