Taking newbies flying...

Walt wrote:
Great story, Dan.

I've never let a "newbie" handle the controls on takeoff -I'm too
paranoid--, but last summer I took a friend's 15-year-old son on a
flight. We took off out of Gallatin Field near Bozeman, MT and flew
west to the Missouri confluence near Three Forks. Once at altitude I
handed the controls over to him. He did great.



In my younger days, I had a job in a survey party, and spent three
summers in helicopters and bush planes. I never got to take the
controls... except one time.

I was in a Beaver floatplane with a pilot I had never met before, and
we spent the day moving gas drums to various small lakes. The Beaver
has a yoke attached to a central pedestal, and on the last leg of the
last flight the pilot mumbled something about doing his flight reports,
flipped the yoke over to my side, opened his clipboard and put his head
down. Well, I could handle this. I carefully steered straight and
level. There were some showers in front of us, and I turned right a bit
every so often to avoid them, but otherwise I thought I was on course.

After about 20 minutes, the pilot finished his work, looked up and
said "Where are we?" I had forgotten about the navigation part. This
area of Northern Alberta was nothing but tiny lakes, and navigation
consisted of moving your thumb along the map when passing over each
lake. I not only had not kept track, I was about 90 degrees off course
after avoiding the rain. Fortunately we did find ourselves and had
enough fuel to get back.

I never had another offer like that.

John Halpenny

He's from Switzerland, they tend to avoid anything controversial.

Morgans wrote:

"Stefan" wrote

Have I got this right? You are not a flight instructor. (If you are,
please correct me.) Despite this, you hand over the controls to a
stranger. To a stranger nonetheless who sits the first time in his
life in a small plane. And you don't just hand over the controls at
altitude (which admittedly I have done myself), but right on the
ground and you let him fly the take off. Then you let him fly a 180 at
low altitude. And all this *with a passenger in the back*!

Yes, you screwed up royally. But for a different reason than you think.


What is the big F'en problem, here?

If the newbie happened to do it right, and it sounds like he did, there
is no problem. If he starts to get outside of the expected flight
parameters, you nudge and urge corrections, and if that doesn't work,
you say "my plane."

Do you think that he could not tell if something was happening that was
a trend in the wrong direction? Do you think that everyone who takes
the controls is going to horse them, and screw up? If that were the
case, there would be far less new students. Perhaps that is the
problem. People are so stuck on the fact that flying is for supermen,
and themselves, and nobody else deserves the chance to prove themselves.

So what difference does it make, if he is a instructor or not. I'm
willing to place money on the fact that there are many people who are
not certified flight instructors that are way better teachers than many
of the certified flight instructors out there flying people and
sometimes students with passengers around the sky. How many people
here, got to do the first takeoff that they were in the plane, and the
maneuvers following that, too? I'll bet over half got to do the
landing, with plenty of coaching and a few corrections, too.

I think your reaction is way, way over the top, on this one.

Remember the adage of many examiners, about predicting the students
abilities, and whether they will pass, or not? If you don't, it goes
something like " I can tell if the student will be able to fly, and
pass, while the plane is still being taxied out for takeoff."

So he was able to tell that the new person had a good feel for the
plane, right off the bat. It does not take a piece of paper with a
bunch of initials on it to be able to do that.

Good going, Allen. You may have just won another person over to our side.

Morgans writes:

Perhaps that is the problem. People are so stuck on the
fact that flying is for supermen, and themselves, and nobody else deserves the
chance to prove themselves.

I've noticed that.

I think your reaction is way, way over the top, on this one.

I've seen reactions like that quite frequently, too. People don't
like to admit that they may not be special.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

("Dan Luke" wrote)
Have I got this right? You are not a flight instructor. (If you are,
please correct me.) Despite this, you hand over the controls to a
stranger.

Where did you get the idea it was a stranger?


Nice save Dan :-)


Montblack

"Robert Chambers" wrote in message
...
He's from Switzerland, they tend to avoid anything controversial.

Like the sex change operations they have been doing for decades? g

Really, Stefan has been a good contributor, but I just think he missed the mark,
on this call.
--
Jim in NC

"John Halpenny" wrote:

After about 20 minutes, the pilot finished his work, looked up and
said "Where are we?"

Haw!

Beauty.

Morgans writes:

Like the sex change operations they have been doing for decades? g

Perhaps you are thinking of Sweden.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

Ok Dan, did you get a picture of them and you in front of the plane?
If not redeem yourself...do it and post it.

Ron Lee

"Ron Lee" wrote:

Ok Dan, did you get a picture of them and you in front of the plane?

Nah, I screwed up & forgot the camera.

If not redeem yourself...do it and post it.


IF M_ ever gives me another chance...

Hi Dan;

You have broken the code for flying with newbies. It's really very simple
and every pilot should do it, but unfortunately, pilots not being perfect,
sometimes forget.
The main thing about first timers is anticipating their normal apprehension
and dealing with it PREEMPTIVELY!!!
This is the "secret" for dealing with all passenger issues.
Pilots should be especially aware of even the smallest detail and be
constantly alert to anything at all that might be upsetting to a new
passenger.
The normal procedure is to begin a flight with a newbie assuming
apprehension and "probe" just enough to verify first of all if apprehension
is indeed present, and if it is present, at what level.
The rest is simply devoting the time to make people feel comfortable in the
airplane and in the environment. Notice I mention TWO things here. The
airplane has noises and sounds that will be new to the first timer. These
should be anticipated and again handled PREEMPTIVELY. The environment can
also be an issue as it interacts with the airplane in flight. This should
also be dealt with PREEMPTIVELY as the flight progresses.
In short, a good pilot takes on the role of an active commentator and "tour
guide" so to speak when dealing with new people.
If pilots follow one single golden rule they will never go wrong in this
area. Doctors have the Hippocratic Oath that states "Do No Harm". Pilots
should take their own private oath to "See to it personally, that no one who
ever climbs into an airplane with them will be frightened by something that
pilot either did, or forgot to do to prevent it".
The handling of newbies is as much a responsibility for a pilot as the
preflight, and in fact, it has always been my personal policy when
instructing pilots, to make the issue of dealing with the matters I have
discussed here an active part of the preflight.
Dudley Henriques

"Dan Luke" wrote in message
...
...offers endless opportunities for screwing up the experience for them,
as I've demonstrated yet again.

My business partner's 21-yr. old son has been hinting around for a few
years that he wanted to try flying sometime. When he finally asked
outright to take a flight, I was happy to agree, especially since he would
be bringing along his supermodel-quality girlfriend.

So T_ and M_ showed up at the airport Saturday afternoon. T_ was
interested in everything that was happening on the ramp and M_ was
stopping students and flight instructors in mid-sentence as she walked by.
The weather was perfect and this was going to be great fun.

After the walkaround and passenger briefing, I got my pax headsetted and
buckled in and gave T_ a description of how the controls worked. I let
him steer on the long taxi out to RWY 36. Cleared for takeoff, I let him
control the yoke. He did fine on the rotation and climbout, so I let him
make the climbing 180 deg. left turn to our departure heading. He did
that fine, too. Once I got T_ trimmed out and flying level, I turned to
M_ in the back seat to ask how she was doing.

Ummm..., not so well: M_ had the look of someone who had just stared death
in the face.

" Doing OK, M_?"

"Uh, better now," said M_, attempting a brave smile. "That turn was a
little scary!"

What M_ wasn't saying, of course, was that she had just spent a few
seconds fearing for her life because an apparent lunatic had turned over
control of an itty bitty airplane to her virtually clueless boyfriend, who
promptly put it in a bank 500' from the ground.

M_ brightened up a bit as the flight went along but she mentioned the
scary departure turn a couple more times. I was cursing myself the whole
way. I had really screwed it up by doing a wholly inadequate job of
preparing my pax for what they were going to experience. As a result, I
somehow doubt that I will have the pleasure of M_'s company on any future
flights.

Lesson learned: tell your newbie pax everything that is going to happen in
advance. Be especially detailed about any plans for their controlling the
airplane, and find out if they are going to be uncomfortable with anything
you have planned.

--
Dan
C172RG at BFM