RK Henry writes:

In one common exercise, referred to as Recovery from Unusual
Attitudes, the instructor, or eventually a FAA-designated pilot
examiner, will ask the hooded student to look down or conceal his
eyes. With the student unable to see what is going on, the instructor
will take the airplane through a series of maneuvers calculated to
disrupt the student's inner ear equilibrium. Once that has been
accomplished, the student is asked to look at the instruments and take
over control the airplane. Immediately, the student will notice that
the airplane's attitude is seriously out of whack. He has to recognize
what's wrong and fix it. The challenge is complicated by the fact that
the previous maneuvering has given rise to inner ear equilibrium
sensations that conflict with the instruments. He may level the wings
but still have a sensation that the airplane is continuing to roll. He
may bring the nose to the horizon but experience a sensation that the
airplane is continuing to pitch up or down.

But isn't it simply a matter of looking at the instruments and doing
what they say? Surely a person should be able to override distracting
sensations and trust the instruments, especially when he knows that
they are reliable.

You just have to learn to ignore the sensation through sheer mental
willpower.

And you say that there's a lot of variation in this? Does it actually
prevent some people from becoming pilots? It seems straightforward,
even if it requires willpower.

The thing is, the instruments should be trusted over the sensations of
the inner ear, but they can't be trusted completely. Another facet of
instrument training is understanding the limitations of the
instruments. One example is precession errors. All gyroscopic
instruments exhibit this behavior to some extent. You may roll into an
intensive series of maneuvers and after rolling level may discover
that the attitude gyro no longer indicates "up." It's slightly tilted.
From the other instruments, you deduce that it's the AI that is wrong
and that the airplane is actually level.

Which other instruments will tell you this?

Similarly, most of us fly airplanes in which we have to
reset the directional gyro regularly to keep it in agreement with the
magnetic whiskey compass. Otherwise it eventually drifts off to
indicate some heading that has little basis in reality.

But doesn't the compass drift as well?

And then sometimes the instruments perversely decide to fail. During
instrument training, expect the instructor to pull out a piece of
paper, or a suction cup thingy, to cover one, or more, or maybe even
all of the instruments. Then instead of looking at the attitude gyro,
you're deducing the state of your airplane based on what's left,
including airspeed, changes in altitude, and maybe even just sound.
You'll then be asked to perform some maneuvers to demonstrate your
ability to compensate for the lost information.

So you are expected to trust instruments, but then not to trust them?

If two different instruments indicate two different things, how do you
know which one to trust? There isn't always a third instrument to
break the tie. I suppose I could deduce that I don't have the wings
level from a turn indicator or my changing heading, but how do I know
that it's not the heading that is changing inappropriately, or the
turn indicator that's broken?

Instrument flying doesn't come from the instrument panel, it comes
from between the pilot's ears. It's a mental process, which is why so
many people seem to find it so difficult. It isn't about making the
instruments do something, it's about making the airplane do something.
It's about challenging the forces of nature and prevailing, and
celebrating your triumph with your beverage of choice at some pleasant
spot hundreds of miles from where you started. It's about seeing and
doing things you've never done before.

I don't think instrument flight would pose a problem for me. I think
VFR would be more difficult, as I have virtually no experience with
looking out the window and none with motion, and I'm not very
coordinated.

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