What's the most stupid thing you've done as a pilot?
 

After reading this amusing post:

Don't talk or touch!

It got me wondering about what daft things we have all done as P1/P2

Any howlers out there?

PS - Forgive me if there is already a past thread out there about this, all I could find was this:

http://www.pprune.org/rotorheads/231...-has-done.html

Mmmm ....

Probably getting married is up near the top of my list!



:}

That was exactly the same thing that I was going to say :\

Not telling, but it felt good!

KW:}

Join CHC:}:uhoh::mad:

Qualify. ie fly solo, and continue in this profession!

Uttered the fatal words "watch this....."

mmm
plenty I would rather not think about.
after cyclone tracy a workmates inhereted a heap of homeless,
but very fit greyhounds.

the wife was exercising them along the local airstrip,
with her motor-car and holding all four dogs at a fairly fast clip,
in the motor-car was her two kids, and infant now sound asleep;
a panorama before me as I skated over the last ridgeline before base.

well, apparantly the kids all had nightmares for months,
the dogs half of which were never seen again, nearly,
but very nearly tore her arm orf, she had stress disorder forever,
stupid, damm stupid, maybe as bad as a mate of mine.

he was skating along the highway, at zot minus;
up a slope round a bend and over the crest he flew,
holy mother what the, a white car careering bush,
oh dear, the travelling nursing sisters on the rounds,
now with a flat tyre and very stern countenance; he had bolted.

every one down the road, at the next visitation site was waiting:{
for smoko and an ogling or something more. in they stormed;
violence upon the pilot was their mission,
lo and behold about fifteen minutes later in he sauntered;

silence, absolute silence, afore the penny dropped with a clang
and away he went without scones or tea or a buttering up
that he had expected in his exalted position.
silly very silly, one, a silly beat up,
two, girls, especially happy ones were always in short supply.

Got airborne with the biggest hangover of my life. Schweizer 269, 97 hours on my personal clock and couldn't make out why my flying was so rough. Landed in the middle of the field to think things through. It took me five minutes of looking around the very basic cockpit to realise I had left the frictions on.

Never, ever flown in that state since (12 500 hours now) Never touched tequila since either.

Got married twice.

Got divorced twice too, I do learn it just takes a while.

Converting from a Gazelle to an R22A and wondering if I could or should be flying

Started my second tour in Vietnam on 1 April 70.....should have known better!

I should have known better than to kick off something as serious at that on that particular day of the Year!:ugh:

The stupidest thing I've done as a pilot? Become a pilot.

Summer 2002, night T/O for a 160Nm trip from an airport on a little island in the deep south mediterranean sea (for those middle aged remember Loran C station in Lampedusa?) towards Palermo hospital.
I was junior F/O with less than 1000 hours and my captain was a newly hired retired navy istructor pilot who had quit flying ten years before and recently resumed his licence to get some living.
He cranked the good 412SP, we checklisted everything, he pulled pitch and got into the runway ready for departure while I stood head down on the cockpit setting nav and gps.
Suddenly I felt a strange vibrations under my backpants and shortly resumed my vision towards the gauges--------what the f..k!
We where pitch down attitude, 40kts, 50ft on the rwy, zero climb or dive, the helicopter rock shaking without any intention to get airborne.
Than I turned at him: he had crossed arms on chest, feet-off-the-pedals staring at the cockpit doing anything and waiting for something never coming up to him.
Autopilot was engaged with Vertical speed and Heading modes coupled at 40kts some feet off the concrete, flying towards the accident.

"What are you doing?"
"Waiting for the autopilot to bring the ship off the ground!"
"Pull pitch!!"
"I say pull pitch!!"
"PULL PITCH NOW!"
No answer or movement coming from him.

As I grabbed the lever and pulled the heavily loaded 412 crawled up in the night.

For allmost all the flight he didn't say a word and I performed all till we got to Palermo Hospital and unloaded pax and refuelled.
I asked him about the argument just before strapping in for the flight back.
"Sorry for that, boy; I don't know how this autopilot works, nobody told me ever about this!" his gloomy words.
He was a good man, maybe once in the navy was a good pilot but now he was experiencing how difficult it was his return to flying operations in the unknown civil hems world after ten years behind a desk in the military.
Douring his +30 years pilot career in the Italian navy he had used 4-axis autohover autopilots on B212 gaining good skills in antisubmarine operations, being also istructor in all that stuff.
Now we where using a 3-axis on our hems 412 and minimum speed for his operations was 60kts and 500feet after crosscheck calls between pilot flying and pilot not flying.
He told me anything wasn't in the right place for him and he left the company some months later.

My stupid thing?
Trust an unknown colleague without going through any assesment about his flight ability or human behavior relying only on his huge military background experience just because he has huge military experience.
My second stupid thing?
Feel too confident about night operations as to leave my head behind the ship.

Cheers

Maeroda

Actually I think it would be answering that question so the world can see it here. So I wont.

Volunteered for combat duty in Vietman?

One of the stupidest things I did, strapping on a FH 1100 for about 500 hours over two summers, chasing forest fires in central Canada!
Young, dumb, and full of ***

Eating a Ginsters pie 15 minutes before getting airborne. Not sure what the MCC procedure ought to be to get your copilot to land immediately or suffer incoming projectiles from the left hand seat!

Lift-Off
 

I can't believe I'm telling this.

Enstrom 28a. 1973. My TT around 75 hours. Location heli apron at Shoreham Airport in the UK. Trusty old Lycoming fired up and burbling away at idle.

Take-off checks complete and I call ATC for lift-off clearance.

Sardonic reply. "Suggest you engage rotors first!" Sadly true.

DennisK

Cleared to take off in a fixed wing trainer, I accelerated onto the runway from the holding point - in a 'punchy student' kind of way - and reached up to close my helmet visor.

Sadly, I had left the velvet cover over it (RAF MK3 Helmet), and as the visor had locked down it wasn't that easy to retract it with one hand. There were a decidedly unhappy few moments as I tried to regain vision by removing the cover :\