On Wed, 28 Jan 2004 14:57:38 UTC, Todd Pattist
wrote:

: "Ian Johnston" wrote:
:
: : So your answer to my question seems to be that 1) anything
: : that's certified is safe enough by definition,
:
: No, I mean it has been carefully checked and found to be safe at
: anything a competent instructor should be asking it to do.
:
: This comment and many others like it assume that the flight
: test of a new aircraft design that demonstrates the ability
: to recover a spin after a limited number of turns is
: sufficient for us to know that all spins are recoverable.

Hence "should be asking it to do". It is not competent instruction to
explore the wilder reaches of spinning behaviour with a pupil on
board.

: If I've stayed within my ability limits and survived, and they have
: strayed beyond their's and died then, yes. Bluntly.
:
: Sounds like me the first 10 years I instructed. :-(

Hey - you're still alive. You must be doing *something* right!


: Agreed partially. Might lead to the curse of over rule-dependence and
: under brain-dependence which seems to be creeping through the gliding
: movement.
:
: CAll them recommendations if you like. I've done lots of
: spins without chutes - probably more without than with, but
: only in aircraft I trusted and had spun before, with a
: similar loading.

Then we're agreed!

: : limitations on which instructors give the
: : instruction,
:
: No, no, no, a thousand times no! Well, two "no"s anyway:
:
: Aren't you the one who says the deaths were the instructors
: fault? They didn't have the skill to recover? So you'd be
: against limiting full spin instruction to senior
: instructors?

No - I reckon all instructors should have the skills to recover from
any spin they end up in, and all instructors should be competent and
happy teaching basic spinning. Can you imagine a club in which only
the more experienced instructors were allowed to teach winch launch
failures? (And, by the way, I have had a senior instructor at a Very
Large UK Club explain to me that they always rotated straight into the
full climb on the winch because "we've got a modern winch and we
change the cables regularly - we don't have cable breaks "

: It was far better to give the first spin experience to a
: student as the base to final overruddered break and
: recovery.

That is effectively how I was initiated, though in the contect of a
slow, overruddered turn while hill soaring. Just as nasty - you're
even nearer the ground then than on a final turn!

: but we have to pay attention when people
: repeatedly die using existing procedures.

I'm with you there. I just don't think "Better instructor training"
and "better choice of training aircraft" should be ruled out ...

: So you go through the list of deceased instructors and tell
: me how they differed from those who still live. I don't
: think you can.

In one way it's glibly easy. They died. And unless that was because of
an unforeseeable mechanical or structural failure of the aircraft, or
because some unexpected turbulence through the glider into a strange
and unrecoverable spin mode, then it was their fault, just as the
overwhelming majority of gliding accidents are the pilot's fault. I
really don't like being this blunt but, since you ask, the ones who
are alive are better pilots.

: It should be checked, in theory, but I do a bit extra when
: I'm going to fly inverted, or some other unusual maneuver.
: I've noticed that "full" rudder on the ground may be only
: achieved at the maximum leg extension, combined with maximum
: foot extension

I'm fortunate (for once) in being 6'4" then - hgetting full pedal
travel is - cough - not an issue.

: Emphasis on
: seating position and rudder adjustment so that each pilot
: can apply a high level of force tot he rudder at full throw
: might be just sufficient to alleviate some of these training
: deaths.

In which case I am all for those precautions - before every flight!

: You seem to be saying that our existing procedures are fine,
: and if only everyone would do it right, we wouldn't have
: these accidents. That's fine, in theory, but I don't know
: anyone who thinks they do it wrong.

You misunderstand me - or maybe I just misspeak myself ((c) R.
Reagan). Obviously the procedures are not perfect. But I think we
should look at every part of them: what makes me unhappy is a regime
which works fine in nice docile two-setaer trainers, but then doesn't
apply to single seaters. Every presolo K13 pilot in the UK checks
"undercarriage" and "flaps" going downwind ...

Ian