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Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 11:09:13 -0600
From: Snowbird <snbird@ibm.net>
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Subject: Re: NTSB fatals: Dopes in the air?
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Sam wrote:

>    I shouldn't have selected the word dope, especially since it looks
> like I won't solo until the 60 hour mark, hopefully.

Oh, that has nothing to do with dopiness or the lack.  More to do
with how often you get to fly, how naturally coordinated you are, 
what level of skill and comfort your CFI wants to see, what sort of 
airspace you're dealing with etc.

> I was simply struck by the number of accidents that seemed to be truly
> avoidable---insufficient fuel, pressing on in bad weather, failing to
> remove a pitot tube cover, in one case, which, BTW, I'M GUILTY OF!

Absolutely -- most accidents are completely avoidable.  But I
guess my point was, it might not be so clear cut that the person
involved was a "dope", and not a reasonably careful, methodical
pilot who made a bad decision or who missed something.  Those
accidents might not be as easily and obviously avoidable as it
appears from reading the accident report.

Example, I flew into clouds myself VFR a couple months back.  Was
I an ijit who didn't check wx?  That's a negative, "clear below
12000" was the wx from briefing and from flight watch just after
the incident, also from the AWOS of an airport we'd just passed over.
Was I flying in marginal wx?  Well, flight vis was a good 4-5 miles, 
but it was hazy with little horizen--common conditions in the NE in
summer, esp. along a lakeshore.  Certainly wasn't scud-running in <3
miles.  I was just bopping along at 7,500 ft and alakazam, the
windshield turned white around me. Took me about two minutes to turn
around and 2,500 ft of altitude loss to get under the stuff.  If I
hadn't been current on instruments (I'm not instrument rated, btw),
flying an instrument-capable plane, and well aware of how much altitude
I had to play with before finding hard objects, maybe I'd be one of
those "VFR into IMC" statistics you read about, but the only way it was
avoidable (that I can see) is to avoid flying in less than CAVU
conditions.  I'm suspicious now about watching the reported
temperature-dewpoint spread esp. when flying along a body of water 
in hazy conditions.  I think the temperature-dewpoint spread might
have been falling, and might have clued me that clouds were a
possibility to form at my altitude.  Those clouds showed up in the wx
forcast along with our Pirep a couple hours later.  It's not the first
time I've found clouds much lower and thicker or located where the
wx briefing didn't declare them to be, and it won't be the last.

Before that incident, I guess I kind of had an attitude myself 
that people who fly VFR into IMC are dopes and it's completely
avoidable.  Now I know it can happen under conditions where I
hadn't thought about it.  That's the kind of thing I mean.

BTW, a pitot tube cover shouldn't cause anything more than aborted
takeoff -- "airspeed alive" should be a call-out item on your
takeoff roll along with "gauges green".  A faulty ASI or partially-
blocked pitot should still be a non-event VFR.  I took off with 
one once as a student.  I thought it was wrong (low) on the takeoff 
roll but it was a hot, high DA day and my CFI was telling me "rotate"
so I did.  I knew at once that the picture over the nose and the
VSI didn't match the airspeed so I pointed this out, we covered it
up and went around to land.  Spider webs in the pitot tube, took a
mechanic 5 minutes to blow them out.  Know your pitch attitudes, be
able to fly VFR with no airspeed.

> Good point about not being there, however. It is hard to know
> exactly what happened.

Exactly, and Happy Thanksgiving!

> I remain properly admonished, and humbily retract the word "dope".

I didn't mean to admonish you.  I guess my point is maybe "We are
All Dopes sometimes".

Snowbird


