If I spent my aviation career wearing a helmet, I might not have tinnitus now.

Perhaps a headset would have helped more than a helmet bob.....

I've been reading the few publicly available articles I can find on Google Scholar. Alas, most of them are behind paywalls so I’m often limited to summaries.

One drawback is that many of the papers, such as Analysis of injuries among pilots involved in fatal general aviation airplane accidents
(Wiegmann and Tanaja), seem to focus on fatal accidents, where 50-60% of pilots suffered head/brain/facial injuries. However 36% had also fractured their pelvises and 50% had liver injuries and 30% splenic injuries etc... It’s no use surviving your head injury if you’re going to die of half a dozen other things simultaneously.

Li and Baker (https://www.researchgate.net/profile...fc.pdf)suggest that polytrauma causes 42% of deaths, and head injuries 22%. About 6% of fatal injuries are isolated head injuries. Burns – 4% and drowning, 3%.

However the more interesting accidents from our perspective are those where the participants either survived with a significant injury, or where the participants suffered an isolated fatal injury that might potentially have been prevented.

This FAA report (Crashworthiness Studies: Cabin, Seat, Restraint, and Injury Findings in Selected General Aviation Accidents,), unfortunately rather old from 1982, looks at 47 ‘survivable’ accidents. They found that 25% of their pilots/co-pilots had suffered facial/head injuries. They also found that hardly anybody was bothering to wear an upper torso restraint (shoulder or harness) - arguably if they had been, these injuries might have been less common. It’s not quite clear to me how they defined ‘survivable’accidents. I suspect it’s in the small and illegible print at the end.

Baker, Brady, Shanahan and Li (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2810202/)
alarmingly state that there are about twice as many fatalities as hospitalisations for serious injury! About 14% of hospital admissions were for head injuries, and 4% for burns. A more general figure seems to be that 20-25% of accidents result in a fatality.

Of interest to me was Wiegmann and Tanaja's observation that brain injuries are more correlated with facial injuries than skull fractures. I’d been thinking of getting a lightweight helmet with no visor, but on this basis I’m reconsidering that.

Wiegmann and Tanaja stated that 7.3% of occupants had suffered ante-mortem burns. Obviously that’s not the same as stating that 7.3% of occupants could have been saved had they been wearing Nomex. However it implies there’s some value in the stuff.

All the papers that mention it are unanimous that upper torso restraint makes a big difference to survivability and that if it's there, it should be worn.

~~~~~~~
So for my own safety equipment budget:

Nomex clothing and leather gloves – weight neutral; cost £150 (the new Nomex underwear was more expensive than the grow-bag)
Helmet - £300 for a budget/Ebay version – about 600g heavier than a headset alone.
Shock absorbing foam seat – about 500g heavier than the previous version. £60 + labour
Life-Jacket - £80; 800g
PLB - £180; 150g

Total cost of safety gear: 2kg additional weight. Price: £770

Looking daft: priceless

Obviously it’s not going to make anybody invulnerable (and one of the drawbacks of safety gear is that sometimes it makes people think they’re invulnerable) but I think you can argue it will make a significant dent in the risk of dying from a head injury, burn or drowning and should also reduce the injuries suffered in already survivable accidents.

Most head injuries can be prevented by the proper use of upper body restraints such as 4 point belts. Another major factor is unrestrained items in the rear, especially children. Many drivers (and by implication pilots) are killed by children and by assorted goods carried on rear seats and parcel shelves.

It's worth mentioning what to combine with nomex - this is important :ok:

My received wisdom is to wear fabrics that don't melt. All the nomex in the world is no use if your polyester tee underneath fuses with your skin. Ouch!

I use cotton, denim or wool. Wool is flame resistant but scratchy :} Cotton is neither, but burns quickly, and won't melt; denim is cotton but thick so a little better. I like wool for base layers, I use it on the mountainside too.

Finally - leather jackets are nice but cost the earth!

My passengers don't:

• Juggle (often filthy) aircraft to drag their steed out of the hangar
• Drag the aircraft out of the hangar
• Crawl around on the grass preflighting the aircraft
• Poke around under the cowl, and top up the oil
• Refuel the aircraft at the self-serve pumps
• Manhandle the aircraft back into the hangar after flying
• Have a Mrs who is fed up with oil and grass stains on the 'normal' clothes

My passengers also don't (have to) wear stupid dayglo tabbards if they are accompanied by me, nor do they have to wash the aircraft, do the paperwork or other things associated with owning and/or operating one.

Most of them also don't much like going upside down, or all the bits in between, but those that do can, if they wish, wear a gro-bag to stop them loosing their lose change or iPhone into the airframe.

The way things are going, it probably won't be long before EASA mandates fire resistant clothing for all GA flights in the same way you need to carry a PLB to fly a few circuits. What will the 'lounge suit' flyers do then :ugh:

Leather jackets appear to always have nylon or other synthetic lining, which should melt onto skin.
T-shirt cotton is not that flammable - thin cotton dresses may be, due to air surface contact.
I suspect, if no-one is in the RHS, any sideways impact to the right will jerk me out of the diagonal part of my restraint.
I once used a 4-point harness with a lot of sideways force, and my head smashed the glider canopy, (with no adverse affects on the head.)

Those were the days:

http://thetartanterror.co.uk/2006/02/roland-roly-john-falk-obe-afcbar-1915.html
(There's something funny going on with this link.You may have to type it in yourself)

The picture I was looking for was of the A V Roe test pilot when testing the approx half scale version of the Vulcan. Maybe someone can turn it up.

Avro Test Pilot Wing Commander Roland 'Roly' John Falk, dressed in his distinct pin-striped suit, finally took the gloss white Type 698 prototype (VX770) into the air on 30th August 1952, albeit single crewed for safety reasons.


http://www.avweb.com/blogs/insider/G...-223739-1.html

Depends who makes them. I have two made by a well-known British purveyor of leather jackets to military pilots. Leather with cotton lining.

While a brain-bucket is probably a bit OTT for your Warrior or Cirrus, it makes sense elsewhere. I have recent fairly intimate knowledge of the damage a severe head injury can do (not flying related in that case) and I wouldn't wish to be on the receiving end. I've also spoken to someone who suffered from permanent after effects after the aeroplane he was in (US spamcan) burned some years ago. His injuries aren't pretty.

I fly a couple of ex-military types (sitting between fuel tanks - one of which has split in flight in the past :ooh:) so I wear the lot. Dome (Alpha), nomex suit and gloves, proper flying boots with decent ankle support, a leather jacket and no man made fibres.

As someone pointed out earlier I think...

No point wearing a dome unless you're wearing nomex (burns will incapacitate quickly - the extra few seconds may make a difference).

No point wearing a chute unless you wear a dome (head hits tail, game over - Rob Davies hit the tail going out of the Doll and survived).

May as well wear boots to stop you breaking your ankles as you land (mine is an emergency chute - not some fancy skydiving rig - bend ze knees!).

No point freezing to death on the ground (most likely in shock) while you wait for your lift after you've survived the above so wear a decent jacket. :E

Personally, I don't give a fying fluck if anyone thinks I look like a prat. ;)

Do you wear the same in your car? If not, why not?

No, for the same reason that no-one else seems to wear a parachute in their car. If it starts to burn I can stop and get out.

I take it you'd just sit there.... :E

In nearly 10,000hrs none of my aircraft have caught fire. Mind you, neither has my car.

I don't have a car, though if I had a car of the same vintage of my aircraft I probably would. I have a friend with an open-top Lancia from the 1920s and when he gave me a lift, helmets were provided.

It's interesting to look at how cars have become heavier as safety standards have improved. The weight of an original mini was 590kg; the new version is 1150. Much but obviously not all of the increase in weight will be down to improved passive safety features. Even the new 2-place smart car weighs more than the original mini.

I would consider not wearing a helmet if I had an aircraft with a properly designed cabin and airbags, such as a newer SR22. But realistically aircraft will never have the same level of passive safety as cars - they would just be too heavy.

Where is the logic in comparing cars to aircraft?
I have yet to hear of any military ground based vehicle fitted with ejector seats, why not I wonder?!! Some of those are full of fuel and bullets, and get shot at.
As for the "new Mini" it bears no resemblance to the original, it's bigger than my Outback!

My Cessna does not have an ejector seat either..... nor does a chipmunk....

... and I hope you never find yourself sitting there in either with the very strong smell of petrol around you. It isn't pleasant.

I once did exactly that during training, 152, solo circuits and a helicopter apparently determined to baulk every one of my approaches. Strong smell of fuel, eventually landed with fuel streaks and drips from leaking carb. Not funny.

You have clearly never owned an Auster..... ;)

Very true, sir. :eek:

It's more of a worry when they don't normally smell of the stuff....