Real Pilots

Nice to hear
I caught up with my dreams last year when i found out that 3d vision is NOT
required I might be running 10 years late but i'm a pilot a fractional owner
and working towards more.

Its a unique addiction. Last saturday i spen 4 hours outside in -25c
windchill up to -35 c (it finally warmed up to a balmy -18C/0F) deicing the
plane from three weeks of snow and ice while it was in for annual. Only to
cancel due to low visibility. in the practice area.

The positive thing is i at least am canadian enough to dress even for that
lovely warm weather.

"george" wrote in message
...
On Jan 28, 3:15 pm, "Brent" wrote:

I'm a new pilot but I've been to and from Usenet for 15 years I come
prepared with a private reader and good kill filters. There are some
wonderful people and content and some intelligent filtering cleans it
right
up. the group does seem quiet, i only see two threads running right now
but
when i first logged on i saw one screamer in need of filtering now it
seems
calm here.

Welcome to the group Brent.
It livens up every so often and some of us are and were pilots.

You have touched on many good point, the most important (IMHO) being
risk aversion. This is everywhere in society nowadays. People are
completely accepting of the fact that the government should protect
us, from cradle to grave, so much so that the notion of flying a
personal airplane behind a piston engine and a PROPELLER sounds
nonsensical to many (most?) Americans. Flying might be dangerous --
and personal risk and danger are verboten in a society that mandates
bans on "second hand smoke" and requires seat belts in golf carts.

I call it the "pussification" of America. It's very, very sad, but
it's what happens when you have an ever-expanding, all-knowing, all-
caring, omnipotent central government.
--
Jay Honeck
Port Aransas, TX
Pathfinder N56993
www.HarborInnPortA.com


On Jan 27, 12:40*pm, VOR-DME wrote:
In article
,
says...



You make several good points. *I agree 100%, although the whole pie --
not just some parts of it -- is shrinking.

That's sad. * I see so many multi-million dollar boats down here in
Texas, I know it's not a shortage of rich people. *It's...something
else. *I wish I could identify it, and fix it.
--

To be sure, flying one s own airplane to get somewhere does not appear to
be a very up-to-date passion. Though not a wholly sufficient answer, the
morass of the commercial flying experience today has certainly done its
share in taking the shine off of air travel. When I was 15, my first flight
was in a DC-8, and my second, later the same year, was in a Grumman Tiger..
I was one of the only ones in my high school class to have done either.
Though aviation was of course far from new, the experience of flight was
new and exciting to almost any individual. Today most people in developed
countries have flown by the time they are 15 - months! And they cried and
yelled the whole way. The way we are treated today adults too are crying
and yelling the whole way! Have we managed to regulate out of existence
man s age-old dream of flying?

But wait a minute! If we are treated so badly on airline flights, shouldn t
that spark an even greater desire for people to fly their own planes? To
some degree it has, and the bizjet market, while hardly booming, is opening
up to a broader demographic. You no longer need to be a billionaire to get
an occasional ride in a Falcon or Challenger. But the passion is no longer
there. Not for most anyway. And even in this context you are still just a
passenger.

A few contemporary social concerns come into play. Flying an airplane is
not a very "green" activity. This may mean little to many contributors
here, but we should not underestimate the effect the "green revolution" is
having on every aspect of our lives, and ultimately on our thinking.
Secondly, I cannot prove it, but I believe the post-911 security craze has
heightened the general public s feeling that airplanes and flying are
dangerous. We take safety concerns more seriously every day, and the
intense scrutiny on safety of air travel has probably played its part.
Another issue is the cost. Flying has always been expensive, but many
people have less spare cash today for a passion like aviation, particularly
in light of the two preceding considerations. And those who do have the
cash are wary of spending it on anything that could be construed as an
ostentatious display of wealth. There s a lot of "rich-bashing" going
around these days, and flying your own plane is a great way to feel
yourself in the crosshairs.

Then there s a self-sufficiency issue, which may be the most important.
People of my generation take pride in doing something for themselves. If
you are not satisfied by the services you are being offered, do it
yourself. I laugh to myself flying over congested roads, thinking of people
sleeping for days on their suitcases in airport waiting areas while their
airline tries to come to grips with the bureaucratic mess of resuming
service after it snowed four inches - somewhere in another state! My
15-year-old nephew by contrast, far from flying in a Grumman Tiger, spends
his days and nights on X-Box, on line with his friends, playing tough war
games, shooting each others helicopters down. In real life, however, he
would not have a clue where to look if the car didn t start, would not be
able to find a circuit breaker in his own house (and doesn t know what this
item is) and refuses to fly even commercial flights because he feels it is
dangerous.

I m sure I ve only touched on the issue, and I may be mistaken on parts of
it, but I believe our society today is not at all conducive to the
interest, passion and overall satisfaction in an activity like flying. *Do
children today still have dreams they are flying? Can society really wear
us down to where this age-old yearning no longer has meaning, and ceases to
exist?

I wish driving standards wre 1/4 as tight as flying standards.

As it was mentioned boating is easy and drunk boating standards are not
enforced. I was a successful boater at the age of 8 wth my most critical
skill being learning how to not be swamped by the drunk yahoos in their much
more expensive boats.

Piloting requires a committment and they are up front with the high cost and
committment and it keeps people form dscovering the addiction of flight.

In all honesty though i dont want to share the sky with someon who feels its
too hard to go beyond the cooler with the six pack and making their way
around slowly on the lake.


"John Clear" wrote in message
...
In article
,
Jay Honeck wrote:

That's sad. I see so many multi-million dollar boats down here in
Texas, I know it's not a shortage of rich people. It's...something
else. I wish I could identify it, and fix it.

Any yahoo that can open a beer can drive a boat, and can take all
their friends on their boat. Entry level boats can be purchased
for around the price of a new car. Planes priced in the same range
are 40 years old and not nearly as pretty as a boat and can only
take 1-2 friends. LSA was supposed to save GA, but the planes are
all over $100k. To really sell in volume, they need to be in the
$40k range.

I think it is a combination of the level of training required to
fly, and the value for the money. What looks better, a 40yo burnt
orange and lime green plane, or a brand new ski boat? Even new
planes look pretty shabby after the first few annual inspections
with loose screws and loose side panels/etc.

To stick with aviation, you really need to have the flying bug.

John
--
John Clear - http://www.clear-prop.org/

On Jan 27, 12:37*pm, (John Clear) wrote:

I think it is a combination of the level of training required to
fly, and the value for the money.
To stick with aviation, you really need to have the flying bug.

And money.

Practically, I think you have to train and remain proficient in IFR.
At least that's what's holding me back.

Right now we're in "saving for the uncertain future/retirement" mode.

Big plans, if the economy doesn't do the full flush I've been
predicting for 10 years.
-----

- gpsman

In article ,
says...

Flying might be dangerous --
and personal risk and danger are verboten in a society that mandates
bans on "second hand smoke" and requires seat belts in golf carts.



At the time I took that first ride in the small plane, it was to take some
pictures for a school project. The idea that I might be putting myself in any
sort of danger never crossed my mind, nor my parents’, at least not that they
mentioned to me, and no one at the school expressed any concern over my
action. My only worry was that I might feel sick, which of course didn’t
happen. Even the cost was peanuts. Maybe the pilot was doing a high school kid
a favor, hoping he would get hooked on aviation (which did happen) but with my
allowance and a little contribution from mom it was a non-issue. Today, if
any high school were to allow a student to do that the principal and
superintendant would be hauled on the carpet for reckless endangerment, the
student would be disciplined, the pilot and airport manager prosecuted and the
student’s classmates given psychological support to help them through the
trauma, while the FBI would be running background checks and the plane dusted
for explosives and anthrax! (Of course I’m exaggerating - at the rate we’re
going now it will be another five years or so before this scenario is no
longer an exaggeration).

Today that local airport, along with all of the others in the region, has
ceased all instruction, rental and for hire activities, completely squeezed
out about 15 years ago by exorbitant insurance rates. Perhaps it’s just as
well that my nephew and all of his friends hold nothing but disdain for
airplanes and aviation. If any of them were to want to take instruction they
would have a two-hour drive ahead of them to get to an airport that still
offers this insanely high-risk activity. There are four airports within 30
minutes’ driving time, and several others within an hour. All of these boasted
club and instructional activity 20 years ago.

In article ,
gpsman wrote:

Practically, I think you have to train and remain proficient in IFR.
At least that's what's holding me back.

Depends what the local weather is like. I'm VFR only, as is Jay, who
flies a lot more then I do. And he has Midwest weather to deal with.

John
--
John Clear - http://www.clear-prop.org/

Funny, I've flown many Young Eagle flights and haven't been prosecuted
yet. I guess this must have happened only on the other 1,499,980 flights
that I wasn't part of...


VOR-DME wrote:
In article ,
says...

Flying might be dangerous --
and personal risk and danger are verboten in a society that mandates
bans on "second hand smoke" and requires seat belts in golf carts.



At the time I took that first ride in the small plane, it was to take some
pictures for a school project. The idea that I might be putting myself in any
sort of danger never crossed my mind, nor my parents?, at least not that they
mentioned to me, and no one at the school expressed any concern over my
action. My only worry was that I might feel sick, which of course didn?t
happen. Even the cost was peanuts. Maybe the pilot was doing a high school kid
a favor, hoping he would get hooked on aviation (which did happen) but with my
allowance and a little contribution from mom it was a non-issue. Today, if
any high school were to allow a student to do that the principal and
superintendant would be hauled on the carpet for reckless endangerment, the
student would be disciplined, the pilot and airport manager prosecuted and the
student?s classmates given psychological support to help them through the
trauma, while the FBI would be running background checks and the plane dusted
for explosives and anthrax! (Of course I?m exaggerating - at the rate we?re
going now it will be another five years or so before this scenario is no
longer an exaggeration).

Today that local airport, along with all of the others in the region, has
ceased all instruction, rental and for hire activities, completely squeezed
out about 15 years ago by exorbitant insurance rates. Perhaps it?s just as
well that my nephew and all of his friends hold nothing but disdain for
airplanes and aviation. If any of them were to want to take instruction they
would have a two-hour drive ahead of them to get to an airport that still
offers this insanely high-risk activity. There are four airports within 30
minutes? driving time, and several others within an hour. All of these boasted
club and instructional activity 20 years ago.


--
Don Poitras

In article , says...


Funny, I've flown many Young Eagle flights and haven't been prosecuted
yet. I guess this must have happened only on the other 1,499,980 flights
that I wasn't part of...



I trust I’ve been sufficiently clear not to leave much wiggle room for
misunderstanding. You have to work at that. What you (and the 1.49M others) do
is praiseworthy and necessary, and is certainly not going to draw anything but
adulation from me. However it also puts you in a good position to corroborate
that there is a growing culture of suspicion and a waning culture of passion
surrounding aviation. If your young eagles do not express it to you, their
parents do. Statistics prove it very strongly. I commend you sincerely for
taking deserved pride in this activity, but certainly this has not divorced
you from the rather stark reality.

(John Clear) writes:

In article ,
Jay Honeck wrote:

That's sad. I see so many multi-million dollar boats down here in
Texas, I know it's not a shortage of rich people. It's...something
else. I wish I could identify it, and fix it.

Any yahoo that can open a beer can drive a boat, and can take all
their friends on their boat. Entry level boats can be purchased
for around the price of a new car. Planes priced in the same range
are 40 years old and not nearly as pretty as a boat and can only
take 1-2 friends. LSA was supposed to save GA, but the planes are
all over $100k. To really sell in volume, they need to be in the
$40k range.

I think it is a combination of the level of training required to
fly, and the value for the money. What looks better, a 40yo burnt
orange and lime green plane, or a brand new ski boat? Even new
planes look pretty shabby after the first few annual inspections
with loose screws and loose side panels/etc.

To stick with aviation, you really need to have the flying bug.

John

Exactly so. The whole country has moved away from tinkering on something
as a pastime, to watching something as a pastime. Or at best, playing a
video game. Flying, unlike other motor sports, requires a LOT of
committment to get started, and to keep it up. It's relatively
solitary. Not for the modern American.
--
Write injuries in sand, kindnesses in marble.
~ French proverb

gpsman writes:

Practically, I think you have to train and remain proficient in IFR.

Eh? Not at all. Even in Seattle or such areas there are plenty of VFR
only pilots. Weather clears up in a few days. Cross country trips are
very much possible strictly VFR.

Of course, the above assumes flying for a hobby. Flying for
committments and deadlines, yes, IFR is necessary to be safe...or
safer.
--
Truth is for the minority.
~ Baltasar Gracián