Mandatory Radios

On 2/8/2010 4:28 AM, Bruce wrote:
Until you use something like FLARM - you may preludedly think you have
good situational awareness. Personal experience and that of many other,
much more experienced than I. Initially I thought it was just evidence
of my poor scan - but national and world champions alike have made the
same comment - your mind filters things out to keep complexity down to
something it can handle. Problem is some of those things move and can
very quickly be somewhere other than where you fondly imagined them to be.

From a safety perspective I cannot see how anyone can justify flying
without at least a decent radio. A decent panel mount radio is 800-1300USD.

Monitoring the local general flying channel , it is remarkable how much
traffic you hear, but never see. 5km/3NM too far away to see but is only
maybe a minute for a fast turboprop.

I know multiple anecdotes do not make data but:
Having had the experience of being low, and a little marginal getting
into an airfield I did not know on an early XC. I made a reasonable
circuit and a nice safe landing. It was a completely unremarkable
"landout". Of course, I called joining overhead on the TIBA frequency (I
was disorganised enough to have failed to note the frequency for the
field before I took off.)The B200 I had not seen in the haze on its huge
downwind acknowledged, did an orbit and landed 2 minutes behind me. If I
had not made the call I would have been turning final in front of him,
in the ground clutter, with the sun behind him. That could have been
seriously interesting. Until I called, the 2 crew Comm pilots had not
seen me, despite me crossing in front of them within 200 feet of their
height.

My 2c - nothing substitutes for pilot attention - scan and situational
awareness cannot be replaced by technology.
that said you should do whatever you can to help the old brain.

The minimum technology in our current skies has to include a radio.
Adding FLARM to the gliding aircraft - tugs included is well worth it.
Adding PCAS / Mode-C would be perfect - but would exceed the value of my
glider - but maybe not the value of my life. (That depends on when you
ask the wife ;-) )

Cheers
Bruce

Eric Greenwell wrote:
jcarlyle wrote:
A PCAS might help. And of course there's no replacement for a good
visual scan - the radio and the PCAS are crutches, nothing more.
The implication of the word "crutch" is a pilot with a good visual
scan can get along just fine without a radio. I think that is
misleading, because very few pilots can scan at such a high level they
always see all the traffic. Even the best scanners can miss a fast
airplane coming up behind them, not see one below them in the ground
clutter, or get tunnel vision when distracted by a situation.

And, I believe both the towplane and the glider should have a radio,
even if they are the only two aircraft within 20 miles of the field.
They are cheap to buy (cheaper now than ever before) and install, last
a long time, and are easy to use. It's hard to believe we're still
having this conversation.


--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: ---
FLARM is NOT the answer in the US. What we need is low cost ADS-B
transceivers in the same price range as FLARM. That way we can see and
be seen by other aircraft in the US airspace system.

Low cost ADS-B technology exists TODAY and prototypes are flying. The
only thing missing is the political will in the FAA to prioritize the
establishment of certification standards so this equipment can be
commercialized for VFR applications.

Mike Schumann

--
Mike Schumann