The scariest part of flying

[mary meagher]

question, for Tom775257

Tom, did you actually have all those episodes for real? or were they thrown at you during the check ride in the sim?

[Lister Noble]

Mary your comment re sim,I often wonder that on this site,no not you!

[G_STRING]

Bloody hell - remind me never to go to Perth !!

[gasax]

Perth is fine! To all those who state that an overhead join is 'dangerous', try spotting all three aircraft who are calling 'finals' on three different runways and the non-radio traffic, adding in the rotary approachs onto the various thresolds - then add in the locals who announce a 'low approach and go around'!

There are times when when a wee trip along the Tay, for "traffic spacing" makes a lot of sense!!!

[Final 3 Greens]

My scariest was landing at an airfield on the edge of LA, in a light single, only to discover that an oil seal had failed and most of the engine oil had drained out of the bottom of the engine compartment.

At the rate it was leaking, seizure was only minutes away.

And I had no idea there was a problem.

I got away with that one.

[mary meagher]

Lister Noble, not me! All my frights have been real ones!

The two most serious were my fault, due to impatience and showing off.

Number 1. Impatient, waiting for the 2 pilots in the K13 to pull their finger out, and for the wingtip holder and retrieve vehicles to get on with it, took off with a jerk, and then wondered why the rate of climb was much worse than usual.....glanced at the instruments,no problem there, engine sounded fine. Looked in the rear view mirror of the Tug and realised that the K13 had the airbrakes full open on tow!...and my airplane only a Supercub 150! Only just managed to scrape over the hill with speed down to 45 knots, didn't dare to signal to the glider with the recommended rudder wag, for obvious reasons. Climbed, barely, to 300' and then, because I was so scared, I dumped the glider. Landed back. The glider did NOT land back....they ended up in the valley, complete with towrope and brakes still unnoticed and open! No damage, nobody hurt.

Number 2. Impatient again, this time with a gallery of spectators, took up slack when the wingtip holder, who was an Instructor, signaled to proceed.
So I trusted him and didn't look at the Winch Launchpoint. As it was a light glider on tow, I climbed straight out, instead of the usual right turn toward an open track. And then saw the parachute on the descending winch cable not 20 feet away from my right wingtip. I didn't want to return. I just wanted to leave altogether and never come back. But towed the Libelle to 2,000' and came back to face the music. The CFI nearly had a heart attack watching the close call. As did everybody else who knew enough to realise what was nearly happening...

We've made some changes; radio is used. Though it might not be reached in time. And Tug Pilots are warned sternly never never never takeoff without a Good Look at the Winch Launchpoint. Trust NOBODY. LOOKOUT, LOOKOUT, LOOKOUT!

[PotentialPilot]

First flight in a glider.. Hearing the almighty BANG from the cable release.. Which I was not breifed about. Soon got used to in the end.

and

Leaning out the left side of a puma that turns left without warning.

From my experiences anyway.

I'd like to experience an auto-rotate.

[FlyingKiwi_73]

The scariest thing flying where I am is the indians from another flight school, If they make a position report the safest place to be is where they said they are, and at their altitude!!

One of them managed to travel 20Nm in 4 minutes in.... a 152! Another wasn't allowed to take off because he couldn't find the runway, although we can laugh at the pilots, I think the joke is on the instructors who let them go solo.

edit, just add a disclaimer: Yes I have stuffed up too in the past, nobody is perfect (but this group stands out as the 'have-no-idea' personality)

I HAVE to laugh at this I was in the same situation late last year (I wonder if its the same flying school) I was in the air and listening out when two 'foreign' students in two separate A/C both reported their positions as over XYZ VRP and at 1500ft, They then both started vigorously confirming their positions back and fourth! I looked over at said VRP and could not see either A/C.

Now bear in mind this is a coastal VRP and very prominent, it found it a little odd, after proceeding on track I sited one of the A/C at least 10NM from the VRP I did a 180 and promptly went and played in another valley.

Now I'm not saying anything about the ability of foreign students but I gotta say they have some issues with RT and VFR Nav ... and sometimes runway orientation (orientate the plate to north, RWY 12 is actually RWY30 !!!)

[Dan Winterland]

Single engine at night. I didn't do it - except with a parachute.

I was once told of the best forced landing technique to be used off-airfied at night. You just glide straight ahead until the altimeter reads 200'. Then you put the landing light on. If you don't like what you see, turn it off again!

[FlyingKiwi_73]

I was doing some night flying a few months ago, and i was wondering were i would go if the whirring thing stopped, i saw a flood lit sports feild about 5NM north of the airfeild and thought that would be best, the issue is i know tress ring the field so you have to land ACROSS the field and not down it. Driving past same feild during the day i saw the LARGE WHITE junction boxes in between each of the lighting stands, exactly where i would have postiong the A/C had i needed to,... made me a little queasy.

[ShyTorque]

took off with a jerk, and then wondered why the rate of climb was much worse than usual

I've flown with jerks like this, too.

[tom775257]

Mary:

All for real. Seneca engine fire (after landing) we followed the drills it went out. A321 tailpipe fire again once APU fired up we followed the drill it soon went out.

[AfricanEagle]

My biggest fear is losing a wing or the tail feathers during a normal flight because someone before me badly mishandled the aeroplane and not being able to have control.

Not scared of the bank account anymore: the bank manager has got used to it

[Floppy Link]

Originally Posted by maxred

I reckon Perth is one of the most dangerous airfields - anywhere, to enter the circuit. Everyone who has experienced it agrees

Not exactly true. I don't. Have to agree with gasax, Perth is fine. Was based there for a while in the aforementioned single seater P47 replica, did my R22 type rating there a few years back and nowadays occasionally stop in for fuel with the yellow EC135.

Perth is great. Although it was near there that the F15 incident happened, also I had a deer run across 21 from the central triangle towards the woods as I was landing...the tail was down so I all I could do was sit and wait for the crunch, which never happened.

[Pugilistic Animus]

In flight fire would be the worst thing.

that's possibly every aviator's worst fear, of all time

[Redbird72]

I agree with the added fear factor of mixing with microlights; my biggest scare to date was arriving at a small airfield's circuit on my first post qual flight to find that 20-odd french microlights had also chosen it as their destination

I allowed myself to put too much of my attention into looking out (they all seemed to be aiming for the runway at various heights and from half a dozen different directions) and let my speed get horribly low. Had to leave the circuit for 10 mins to regain my composure, and by the time I returned, most of them were on the ground and sanity was restored.

[Helicopterdriverguy]

Not necessarily scary but i have to mention when i was coming in 29 one time at Breighton, This autogyro decides to be a **** and lines up and starts spinning his rotors up from 0. Not recognizing the shape i'm beginning to get worried going under 400ft and a go around was made. Bottom line is, Be a gent and make sure no traffic is approaching if you're going to spin up on the active .

[sevenstrokeroll]

scariest part of flying...PAYING FOR IT.

[oxo]

On a winch site check ride in the north of england, glider ASK-13.

Very windy on the ground and a substantial wind gradient to climb through. Instructor in the back says to not worry about the launch speed being high, but when it goes through 65 knots at a rate of increase about 3 knot/sec, I pull the cable release, about 300 ft. Note that max winch speed on a 13 is 58 knots

Idiot instructor then grabs control and turns back to land instead of putting it down straight ahead. I thought we'd had it then.

[Shaggy Sheep Driver]

I spoke with a guy today who hit a rotor off the lee side of a mountain last week in his wood wing Bellanca... Once he was upside down he reversed the aileron controls and went through the full roll. I don't know about you but that would scare me...

I had that a few years ago going to Caernarfon, flying in the lee of the Snowdonia hills. I didn'y actually get inverted, but I was quite unable to control the aeeroplane; we were tossed around in all 3 axis and the controls were pretty much ineffective in trying to keep the Chippy straight and level. So severe was the disturbed air that wisps of cloud were forming and dissipating around us in the rapidly changing air pressure of the rotor.

Eventually it spat us out. We landed at Caernarfon shortly afterwards and the surface wind was a few knots; the windsock was hanging down the pole. That's why I hadn't expected rotor - no wind!

There must have been some odd metreological conditition funneling air over the hills in a venturi because there sure was wind causing that rotor!