Motorway Flying ...
 

Would the pilot of the (locally based) Cessna F150J who was flying South following the M6 motorway in Lancashire yesterday lunchtime please explain what pre-flight planning s/he carried out, and what particular attention was paid to threat and error management, that resulted in the aircraft having to navigate alongside the motorway and remain visual with the surface at an estimated height above the ground of between 150 to 250 feet in heavy rain?!

You were lucky my friend.

I hope you will take that as a salutary lesson, because if you consider that exhibition of flying acceptable you may not be around too much longer!

:=

Overbearing posts on here do nothing to help either. Advice and assistance is better than posting holier than thou comments.
I bet he isn't your friend either.

Really? No holier than though comments? I thought that was the point of forums :p:p:p

Ok, I'll get my coat......

ak7274

Neither are you.

'Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect'.

There's a piece of good advice!

Another is to read and understand TAFs and METARs - and act on them.

Yet one more - don't succumb to 'press-on-itis' - the weather was reasonable from where this pilot had come from and it seems s/he continued into an ever lowering cloud base rather than turn around and/or divert. Heaven knows what would have happened to this non-instrument pilot if the cloud base had lowered even further or s/he had lost sight of the motorway?

Another CFIT statistic no doubt.

Aviation is no place for fools and a soft approach giving 'advice and assistance' is not likely to press this point home - although I imagine the pilot of the C150 is unlikely to want to repeat this particular experience?!

And you are??

How do you know where the pilot had come from? How do you know that he hadn't already turned round?

Where were you when you saw this aircraft? Hopefully not at the wheel of a moving motor, on the MW.

If what you say is true, then he or she would have given themselves such a fright they will learn a very good lesson and wont get sucked in again.

This is how we learn. Some need more lessons than others.

We all make mistakes and will continue to do so.

Motorway Flying ...
 

How do you know he/she was a "non instrument pilot"

I can't do smilies on this thing but I'm sick of the waggy finger thing.If you know the (locally based) aircraft then go to the local base, find out who was flying the aircraft at that time & have the guts to speak to the pilot rather than try to score points on here as a "concerned person".

My eyesight is so bad I could hardly tell a Cessna F150J from an I or a K when preflighting on the ground.
In a car, in heavy rain, at motorway speeds, and the resulting spray, even as a passenger, I'd have difficulty seeing the reg at that distance.

Well spanner, full marks for being so, so, much smarter than someone who you do not know - or really much care about. We are truly impressed by the 'outraged of Surbiton' posting.

Spanner by name and nature.

Or being instructed in operation at minimum level and finding conditions worsening.
And what if he has more qualification and experience than you Spanner? Is he then still an idiot?

It's politically not correct to call him a spanner anymore

I'm not correct. Politically or otherwise......:cool:

Can he be called a socket?

so, you saw a plane flying along in the rain, alongside a major road.

I've been flying along the road in rain and still been in VMC having INFLIGHT visibility better than 3 miles.

IF you were sure the plane was in some violation of safety regulations, I suggest you contact the CAA (isn't that the equivilent of the FAA in England)along with their registration number and time/location.

Then the proper authorities can take proper action after a proper investigation. AFter all you only estimated the height (we might say altitude).

I once reported someone for getting an instrument clearance without an instrument rating...the FAA investigated and took them to lunch, telling them not to do that again.

Just think, someone could get a free lunch if you call in!

Every so often i see an aircraft flying in the local area near my works in dreadfull weather conditions. Sometimes at below 1000 feet. A couple of years ago one crashed into the nearby "hill". It made the front page of the local paper which is great news for the shut airfields down brigade.
The poster did not mention the aircraft reg just made an observation.Jump on his case and feel good about yourselves as a bunch and feel you have gained brownie points but maybe think about his post.
I stopped reading Pprune a few years ago cos of crap postings then revisited the site but it seems its not changed!

Possible scenarios:-

(1) Highly experienced captain with good situational awareness permanently about to climb into IMC if it got too bad but it never quite did.

(2) Crap weather but line feature to destination, competent pilot flying field to field using the road as reference prepared to make a field landing if it got too bad, but it never quite did.

(3) Idiot out of his depth who somehow got away with it.

(4) Visibility along the flight route rather better than it appeared from the ground.


I think I've been in all four of those at some point in my flying career. Certainly I'd not be worried about landing a C150 in a field - it's an excellent short field aeroplane. It also flies slowly well - and in such conditions visibility is much more important measured in time rather than distance.

Regardless, if it was me on the ground seeing it, I don't think that I'd post on a forum about it in quite this manner. I *might* phone the CFI / club chairman where the aircraft came from, if I knew them, for a private chat to suggest that he should have a chat to make sure that any necessary learning points had been made.

However, you can see why one might want to blow a bit of steam off after seeing something that seems a bit daft. So I'd not judge Spanner that harshly.


But a comment about mindsets. A year or so ago I was flying (as it happens with another forum member who may recognise the scenario if they read this) a microlight home from a long all day navex. The weather was forecast to deteriorate significantly, but it did so around 4-6 hours earlier than forecast and I got trapped in a valley VFR - in a VFR only aeroplane, with no way out. Oh well, I landed on a golf course, without incident, and was eventually able to fly out again solo a few days later - I didn't even get charged green fees.

The interesting thing about it afterwards however was the response of various types of pilot I told the story to:-

Light aircraft pilots: "YOU DID WHAT? ARE YOU MAD?"

Microlight pilots: (brief pause for thought) "Yes, good call, well done.

Glider pilots: "So what? that's not even a good story".

Which is just to make the point that different pilots, with different perspectives, may see these things very differently. We should all bear that in mind before criticising other people's flying.

G

Flarepilot

You sound like a real nice guy.

Can you explain this to me please:

"I once reported someone for getting an instrument clearance without an instrument rating...the FAA investigated and took them to lunch, telling them not to do that again."

You're trying to tell me, fact a pilot receives a clearance and reads it back, he is in trouble if the clearance is not legal? Don't you read back a clearance, check if you can carry out the clearance, legally? If not call it in and say it can't be done.

I have heard of this sort of strange behavior before. Heard an FAA guy pitched up in Aspen, Col years age and violated at least 3 pilots for taking clearances, then upon review, the departure couldn't be carried out legally for that aircraft on that day.. Or is it in the US you have to know every departure in your head, for every airport you visit?

I think he was referring to the fact that a non IR rated pilot requested and got an IFR clearance, which he then reported to the FAA - and if that's so, with friends like that, who needs enemies :}