Cirrus attracting pilots with 'The Wrong Stuff'?

But we have to rationalize those 40 year old spam cans we own
somehow...

Don't get me wrong -- I'd take an SR-22 in a heartbeat. If I could afford
the insurance.

But I'd be very cautious with it.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" writes:

Don't get me wrong -- I'd take an SR-22 in a heartbeat. If I could afford
the insurance.

But I'd be very cautious with it.

As you no doubt already are in your current airplane, and as you should
when transitioning to any new aircraft. Beyond that would you be more
cautious, and if so why, and what form would that take?

As you no doubt already are in your current airplane, and as you should
when transitioning to any new aircraft. Beyond that would you be more
cautious, and if so why, and what form would that take?

I think being aware of the current spate of mishaps should make ANY Cirrus
pilot more cautious.

If I were lucky enough to own a new SR-22, I would make a more concerted
effort to learn all the gee-whiz stuff while I was parked in my hangar. I'd
also make a conscious effort to keep my eyes outside of the plane while in
flight, and avoid difficult flights until I had a few hundred hours in the
bird.

Otherwise, I don't think I'd change anything from the way I fly today.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Thomas Borchert" wrote in message
...
Jay,

All of this seems to add up to a lethal concoction.


Uh, just ONE of the THREE recent accidents ended with fatalities?

But we have to rationalize those 40 year old spam cans we own
somehow...

Speak for yourself. My spam can was built in 1999. Still, that was during
the last century....

"Jay Honeck" writes:

As you no doubt already are in your current airplane, and as you should
when transitioning to any new aircraft. Beyond that would you be more
cautious, and if so why, and what form would that take?

I think being aware of the current spate of mishaps should make ANY Cirrus
pilot more cautious.

I keep them in mind and try to learn something from each one. But
simply being "more cautious" is a lot like the government asking us to
be "more vigilant" when they start talking about Credible Threats.
Trying to make an honest self-assessment is important. Simply being
more worried isn't helpful. I haven't changed my flying habits based
on any of the accidents, however, but I'm a pretty conservative pilot.

If I were lucky enough to own a new SR-22, I would make a more concerted
effort to learn all the gee-whiz stuff while I was parked in my hangar. I'd
also make a conscious effort to keep my eyes outside of the plane while in
flight, and avoid difficult flights until I had a few hundred hours in the
bird.

All of your points are spot-on, though I might rephrase the last one
as "work my way up to more difficult flights by becoming experienced
and comfortable with easier ones, and by bringing an experienced
instructor to help expand my skills and build confidence." A few
hundred hours is an awfully long time. It probably took me 30 hours
to become comfortable with the plane, and another 30 to become as
proficient as I thought I was. ;-)

The points that you make are not about being "more cautious" though;
they are fundamental to flying any plane of this complexity, and the
training reflects all of them.

Clearly the most difficult aspect of all of the new planes (including
the new-but-venerable Cessnas) is learning to manage the avionics.
Flying solo IFR with them is crazy until you have them down cold.

Tom Borchert asks:

What does "have been flying longer" mean?

Mike: Cirrus SR series first delivered 1999. Lancair 300 series first
delivered 1992.

Tom: The Cirruses have flown way more hours than the Lancair fleet.

Mike: I don't know.

Tom: There are virtually no Lancairs out there in the field.

Mike: Cirrus has 1000 units delivered. Lancair has 1870 units
delivered.

Tom: These numbers are certainly too low to conclude anything from
them.

Mike: I agree.

I used the Lancair 300 for comparison due to the similarity with the
Cirrus SR.

I am impressed with the Cirrus SR. It represents a major advance in
design and concept for GA. Use of composites and state-of-the-art
avionics, not to mention the speed and rate-of-climb performance is a
giant leap forward.

I am perplexed to the negative comments about this airplane. There are
no stats to support a negative image. NTSB reports 18 total
accident/incidents, with 8 being fatal. Of the fatal accidents, one was
during test, and all the others were pilot error. If you review each of
the 7 other accident reports, there is nothing to indicate that the
airplane contributed to the fatality, and that unfortunately the Cirrus
pilots made the same mistakes made by other pilots flying other
airplanes.

Mike $$$ (PA28)

You've neatly taken this discussion full circle. (Beats what
usually happens with long threads!)

The original question was, how come this type, which on the
face of it is a perfectly normal, reasonable plane (just about
anybody who has flown one would agree with that) has such a
high accident rate per whatever? And a summary of the discussion
is, various people have opinions, mostly to do with the kind of
people who are tempted to buy a Cirrus, but nobody really knows.
Does buying a Cirrus suddenly multiply your chances of flying
into a mountain on the hairy edge of the scud? Seems pretty
improbable. Of the various incidents, only one is definitely down
the plane, and that was faulty maintenance. The rest all appear
to be pilot error (or just plain unknown/unknowable).

I guess we're done.

John


"Mike Money" wrote in message
...
Tom Borchert asks:

What does "have been flying longer" mean?

Mike: Cirrus SR series first delivered 1999. Lancair 300 series first
delivered 1992.

Tom: The Cirruses have flown way more hours than the Lancair fleet.

Mike: I don't know.

Tom: There are virtually no Lancairs out there in the field.

Mike: Cirrus has 1000 units delivered. Lancair has 1870 units
delivered.

Tom: These numbers are certainly too low to conclude anything from
them.

Mike: I agree.

I used the Lancair 300 for comparison due to the similarity with the
Cirrus SR.

I am impressed with the Cirrus SR. It represents a major advance in
design and concept for GA. Use of composites and state-of-the-art
avionics, not to mention the speed and rate-of-climb performance is a
giant leap forward.

I am perplexed to the negative comments about this airplane. There are
no stats to support a negative image. NTSB reports 18 total
accident/incidents, with 8 being fatal. Of the fatal accidents, one was
during test, and all the others were pilot error. If you review each of
the 7 other accident reports, there is nothing to indicate that the
airplane contributed to the fatality, and that unfortunately the Cirrus
pilots made the same mistakes made by other pilots flying other
airplanes.

Mike $$$ (PA28)

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:OiQhc.2643$aQ6.415323@attbi_s51...

What's the group-think on this one? Is Cirrus just good at attracting
crappy pilots? Or is there something else at work here?

I think this will become the subject of lots of human factors research in
the future.

Personally I think a big part may be that Cirrus have oversold the plane by
planting the seed in pilots' minds that their equipment makes it an
all-weather airplane that reduces pilot workload. The fact is that no
piston airplane can compete with jets in terms of weather capabilities
and -- more importantly -- no amount of cockpit automation can replace the
required pilot dispatch judgment.

On top of that, the Cirrus is being sold to pilots with serious
high-utilization cross-country aspirations, yet the plane has no weather
datalink, no radar, is not known-ice certified, and only has a Stormscope if
that is purchased as an option.

So I think Cirrus has underemphasized the weather experience and equipment
needed if the airplane is to be used on serious IFR flights. And even at
that, there is still a limit on what is practical IMC for a piston airplane,
no less a piston single.


--------------------
Richard Kaplan, CFII

www.flyimc.com

On Sun, 25 Apr 2004 09:49:22 -0700, "C J Campbell"

Personally, I enjoyed the one Cirrus flight I took. Realistically, though, I
think the Klapmeiers may be the worst thing to happen to general aviation
since Jim Bede. They took new and promising technology and made it
disreputable, probably setting general aviation back more than 20 years. I
think that is unforgivable.

On Sun, 25 Apr 2004 09:49:22 -0700, "C J Campbell" wrote:

Realistically, though, I
think the Klapmeiers may be the worst thing to happen to general aviation
since Jim Bede. They took new and promising technology and made it
disreputable, probably setting general aviation back more than 20 years. I
think that is unforgivable.

I can't even process what you said there. "Worst thing to happen to
general aviation"? Huh? Comparing the K brothers to Bede? Huh?
Unforgivable? WHAT?

The PRESS is making the technology disreputable. It's an example of what
they do best.

Some thoughts:

The K Bros have made a bold attempt to correct some of the lame-ass
things that some pilots are apparently still willing to live with - e.g.
critical instruments that absolutely depend on a 70-year old technology
that MIGHT work for UP TO 500 hours, etc. etc. Hey, whatever, go buy a
$200,000 airplane that still has a vacuum system - I'm not gonna do it.

I LIKE a transponder that goes into Active mode automatically when I
exceed a certain ground speed on takeoff. I LIKE not having to
continually reset my heading indicator to the whiskey compass. I LOVE
having a decent TCAS system. There are other workload-reducing aspects
to the Cirrus, as I said in an earlier post, but I totally support this
concept - making the pilot's job easier and less life-threatening so
that he can actually *enjoy* the art of flying. This is the future of
aviation - the Cirrus is on the bleeding edge of that but I'm very
comfortable flying the aircraft.

Several lives have been saved in the last two or three weeks due to the
BRS system, and those people would've almost certainly've died in any
other airplane. I think that these incidents validate the concept of the
parachute.

The SR airplanes certainly require type-specific training due to their
significant differences with traditional GA aircraft, but what you say
is IMO nonsense. I am not trying to be confrontational but like I said,
I just can't figure out how introducing/integrating several pilot
workload-reducing technologies can be a bad thing.

Any airplane type is unfortunately going to have its share of idiots at
the wheel/stick, and I am certain that there are SR pilots and/or owners
that have more money than brains. It reminds me of the so-called
"doctor killer" Bonanza high-performance aircraft that were the Thing To
Own back in the day...

What I'm hearing here us a traditionalist crying fould because this
next-generation aircraft is DIFFERENT than the crap that we would
otherwise have to choose from in the quarter million dollar range (e.g.
C172, Archer, and especially the new Tiger). I'll take an SR20 over any
of those any day of the week.

I will treat the SR with respect as I do any aircraft, and I'll be
conservative in my flying decisions as I always am. And - FWIW - the
fact that the aircraft has a parachute doesn't even enter into my
decision process while flying. I consider it to be there primarily for a
mid-air or airframe failure situation only. I'm not going to test more
clouds or worse wx because I have a parachute to save my ass.

I'm probably rambling here a bit, but your declaration really left me
scratching my head. I Just Don't Get It. The Cirrus is one of the
reasons that encouraged me to get my pilot certificate, and I can't see
how that's a bad thing. I consider myself to be really lucky to be able
to fly one.

Dave Blevins