Safety, yet again...

Does anyone know how to extract the "stupid pilot trick" fatalities
(I.E.: Running out of gas; Flying into terrain; Buzzing your
girlfriend's house; etc.) from this statistic?

Why would you want to?

Because I'm interesting in *my* probability of dying in a plane crash,
not anyone elses.

Since I:

a) Usually fly with two pilots on board
b) Have a well-oiled cockpit resource management scheme in place
c) Always top off the tanks after each flight
d) Never fly IFR
e) Never fly at night
f) Never "buzz" anyone's house
g) Never skip a pre-flight inspection
h) Personally supervise the maintenance of my plane
i) Don't let anyone else fly my plane
j) Rarely fly in mountains
k) Fly twice per week, on average
l) Maintain excellent health
m) Don't "skate" on maintenance
n) Keep the plane in a locked hangar

....I conclude that I may eliminate many of the "stupid pilot tricks"
from my personal risk assessment.

Trouble is, I don't know how to do that...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 22 Apr 2006 22:04:51 -0700, "Jay Honeck"
wrote:

Because I'm interesting in *my* probability of dying in a plane crash,
not anyone elses.

We've been here before. Probability has to do with populations, not
with you as an individual. You do something, you wind up either dead
or alive. No fractions. The coin comes down either heads or tails.
It doesn't matter what side it came down on the last ten flips.

This is your life. Be careful. Enjoy. Select your risks.

Don

Because I'm interesting in *my* probability of dying in a plane crash,
not anyone elses.

We've been here before. Probability has to do with populations, not
with you as an individual. You do something, you wind up either dead
or alive. No fractions. The coin comes down either heads or tails.
It doesn't matter what side it came down on the last ten flips.

This is your life. Be careful. Enjoy. Select your risks.

Point taken, but surely there is knowledge to be gained by subtracting
the "stupid pilot tricks" from the total number of fatal accidents?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote

Point taken, but surely there is knowledge to be gained by subtracting
the "stupid pilot tricks" from the total number of fatal accidents?

I agree.

I know, let's put you in charge of this important project. Carefully go
through all of the accidents, read all of the NTSB rulings, total them all
up, then give us the results.

You don't have anything else better to do, sitting at that hotel desk all of
the time. Just get off your arse, and do it! g
--
Jim (ducking, really low) in NC

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
Point taken, but surely there is knowledge to be gained by subtracting
the "stupid pilot tricks" from the total number of fatal accidents?

There is knowledge, agreed. I just don't think you can use that knowledge
to change in any meaningful way a rational calculation of your own exposure
to the risks.

You can do lots of other useful things with the knowledge. Just not that.

Pete

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
Because I'm interesting in *my* probability of dying in a plane crash,
not anyone elses.

We've been here before. Probability has to do with populations, not
with you as an individual. You do something, you wind up either dead
or alive. No fractions. The coin comes down either heads or tails.
It doesn't matter what side it came down on the last ten flips.

This is your life. Be careful. Enjoy. Select your risks.

Point taken, but surely there is knowledge to be gained by subtracting
the "stupid pilot tricks" from the total number of fatal accidents?

How often do you drive drunk?

How often do you drive 70MPH or wet or icy roads?

How often do you drive recklessly? Carelessly?...

How often do you drive drunk?

How often do you drive 70MPH or wet or icy roads?

How often do you drive recklessly? Carelessly?...

Uh, never.

What's your point?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
How often do you drive drunk?

How often do you drive 70MPH or wet or icy roads?

How often do you drive recklessly? Carelessly?...

Uh, never.

What's your point?

I believe his point is that the auto statistics include those behaviors as
well. If you're going to adjust the aviation statistics to exclude stuff
you don't do, you have to adjust the auto statistics to exclude stuff you
don't do. Otherwise, the two numbers aren't comparable.

Pete

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
How often do you drive drunk?

How often do you drive 70MPH or wet or icy roads?

How often do you drive recklessly? Carelessly?...

Uh, never.

What's your point?

The point is if you're trying to ascertain _your_ risk factor, you must
compare apples and oranges...both on the ground and in the air.

Your risk factor is higher (VFR only, recreastion/personal flying) and your
automobile risk factors are lower. Using general statistics won't help YOU
because you're outside the generalities that the accident stats are
picturing.

"Don Tuite" wrote in message
...
Because I'm interesting in *my* probability of dying in a plane crash,
not anyone elses.

We've been here before. Probability has to do with populations, not
with you as an individual.

It has to do with both. No one would complain (from a mathematical
standpoint) about someone decreasing their risk relative to aviation by
simply not getting in an airplane. So obviously personal choices have an
effect on safety.

To me, the real problem with trying to eliminate the "stupid pilot tricks"
component is that I think it likely that many of the pilots who are killed
doing something someone might consider a "stupid pilot trick" probably if
asked beforehand if they'd ever do something so stupid, would have said
"no". And all it takes is making the mistake once.

Heck, for that matter, some of the mistakes are deadly enough that in all
likelihood, most of the pilots killed by such mistakes did them only once.

Which means you can spend your whole flying career avoiding such mistakes,
without doing a single thing to affect your risk of being killed by one.
Why is that? Because the measured risk isn't of pilots who go around making
those mistakes, but rather is of ALL pilots where eventually some make one
of those mistakes.

In other words, it's a fallacy to remove any stupid pilot tricks from one's
"personal risk assessment". I do very much agree with you that it's a
mistake for someone to believe that their personal risk exposure is less
simply because they strive to avoid those stupid pilot tricks.

Now, all that said, looking at the differences between accidents caused by
stupid pilot tricks and accidents caused by something else should (one
hopes) give each pilot a strong appreciation for the importance of avoiding
those stupid pilot tricks. But that doesn't guarantee they won't make one
of those mistakes. It just means they are more strongly motivated to avoid
them.

Pete