On Feb 22, 1:10*am, Bertie the Bunyip wrote:
Well, the former pilot will always be better at the end of the day no
matter what type of flying is being done. The discomfort that comes from
flying insturments for the seat of the pants pilot is a good thing if
it's kept in it's place.

I don't agree with either of those statements.

When it comes to stick-and-rudder intensive flying, like aerobatics,
dropping jumpers, towing gliders (or flying them for that matter) -
then yes. When it comes to flying point to point in lousy weather and
complex equipment - then no. The pilot who makes use of somatic cues
naturally is always going to have to divert part of his attention to
fighting the wrong cues (that's the discomfort) and will never perform
at his best mentally - and weather flying is mostly a mental game. If
there's one thing I learned while teaching both flying and skydiving,
it is this - discomfort never improves performance. Flying a light
plane in IMC, you should be paying attention to potential weather
deterioration and potential developing systems failures - not fighting
your discomfort in controlling the plane by instruments.

I remember one time, I let a kid who had spent a lot of time playing
flight simulator games fly my airplane. VFR, he did about as well as
a low time student generally does with it - not well enough to have me
talk him through the landing (it was, at the time, an unmodified
PA-30, and they have some rough edges on landing - I've since
installed the wing fillets). But then, on a lark, I put him under the
hood. He was instantly better than most instrument pilots I know -
and he was easily able to carry on a conversation while doing it. I
was going to talk him through an ILS, but it turned out to be
unnecessary - he just needed some help setting up my radios and some
advice on power settings, and then he flew it to ATP standards on the
first attempt. If he ever learns to fly, he will make a spectacular
instrument pilot, consistently able to launch and arrive safely in
weather most people wouldn't handle, even if he has significant
multiple system failures in that weather. He will make an acceptable
and safe visual pilot if he gets the right training - but you will
never see him win an aerobatic competition or precision landing
contest. With good training, practice, and experience he might place
or show.

That's our future. You may not like it, but that's the pilot of
tomorrow. There is already a flight school out there (Part 141) where
lesson 3 is an ILS approach. Brave new world - by the time I first
flew an ILS approach, I had already flown from the Gulf to the Great
Lakes, and from the Statue of Liberty to the Golden Gate, in an
airplane that couldn't even do an ILS (or get an IFR certification
without major repairs). But I think those days are pretty much gone.

It is for that reason that we must be ever more vigilant about
watering down the stick-and-rudder component of training (remember the
discussion of spins?). While people on this group talk about how most
accidents are the result of stupidity like blundering into weather or
running out of fuel, the reality is very different. Most accidents
are the result of mishandling approach and landing, takeoff and
initial climb, and go-arounds. They're stick-and-rudder airplane
handling issues. We're turning out pilots who have no real concept of
how the airplane handles (or should be handled) at high anges of
attack, stay away from that region as much as possible (remember the
pilots who won't stall solo, never mind spin?), and thus get into
trouble. I would hate to see that kid handle a vacuum failure in IMC
like it was no big deal, and then wreck the plane because he was
trying to land on a short strip with gusty crosswinds.

I would be very comfortable dropping the time requirement (3 hours
now) for simulated instrument flight, though of course not the
performance standards. Most young pilots these days don't need
anything like 3 hours to learn the emergency instrument skills to the
level they are tested on the checkride (or needed by a VFR pilot). A
lot of them don't need 3 minutes. That would maybe have been a good
requirement back in the old days. Now we're better off using that
time in slow flight, stalls, spins, or short field crosswind landings
- because that's where the skill deterioration is happening.

Michael