Dave Doe writes:

The short of it is, flying a sim is so far removed from the experience
of the real thing, that pilots are still required (thank fuk) to fly the
real thing when training.

That is somewhat a legacy of the past; it won't always be that way. Flying a
large airliner, for example, is sufficiently different from flying a small
plane that there isn't necessarily a clear advantage to compelling prospective
pilots to do the latter before the former. With the increasing demand for
pilots, particularly outside developed countries, training specific to
commercial flying with simulators alone will inevitably become common practice
in the future.

This DOES apply to ATC comms too.

So how do air traffic controllers manage to handle communications without any
piloting experience?

Being on your sim (as you've never
flown the real thing) your mind *CANNOT* imagine what it would really be
like, you can only assume and guess and imagine.

Speak for yourself. What I can imagine might be quite different from what you
can imagine.

I'm reminded of an article I read once on the reaction of a primitive tribe
when it was shown images of itself in a movie. The tribe members were unable
to interpret the images because they were flat, and they apparently lacked the
ability to set aside this difference in order to extract some utility from the
movie (or they were unwilling to use it).

Have you simulated (or even imagined) smoke coming out the heater vents?

No. How does smoke get into the heater vents in a Baron?

Does your simulator simulate that?

No.

What about a low setting sun, does it really dazzle you?

Yes, you can simulate that, but I usually have it turned off.

Have you simulated dropping a cellphone on the floor and it bounces down
by the rudder pedals somewhere?

I don't use cell phones while operating vehicles.

Would you consider that to be a potential problem?

Not for someone who keeps the cell phone stowed during flight.

Simulator:
a device, instrument, or piece of equipment designed to reproduce the
essential features of something, e.g. as an aid to study or training.

Yes.

By itself, yes. However (and surely you can imagine this), to properly
gain a picture of, for example and in context of this discussion, an ATC
comms failure/breakdown, you need to imagine what could happen in
reality.

Actual breakdowns and failures are too rare to worry about. The simulation
normally concentrates on just communicating information properly. You can do
that with a pair of walkie-talkies, and of course it's all the easier to
conduct with a flight simulator.

So not taking up my challenge, even though you don't *really* have to
get your wallet out, or drive to the field, or even do pre-take-off
checks - you could actually setup the sim in about ONE MINUTE. OK.

I don't really have any money for it, and I have no transportation, and the
only type of flying I could do isn't entirely congruent with the types I like
to simulate. The avionics I have in my simulated Baron and Bonanza, for
example, are far too expensive for flying clubs to afford--heck, they often
can't afford either of these aircraft to begin with. Flying some lame little
fabric-and-wood airplane by the seat of my pants with just a compass, in and
out of some dirt strip, really doesn't appeal to me. I'm scarcely interested
at all in physical sensations.

Anyway, doesn't sound anything like real flying to me.

It depends on what type of flying you are simulating. There are many kinds of
flying.

Well... you crash a plane in *real life* - you don't
walk away from it (very few do).

I see quite a few accidents in the NTSB database that do not result in loss of
life or sometimes even any injury at all.

I would put it do you that if you knew
you were going to crash (and very probably die) you'd be feeling very
differently to the same situation in the simulator.

So? The objective is not to simulate crashes, it is to simulate flight.
Avoid mistakes and you can generally avoid crashes.

Your not *really* scared, you're not *really* thinking I have just four
more seconds before I go in; more you're probably resigned to that fate
and thinking well I buggered that up, oh well... RESET.

Some people aren't scared in real life. In life-or-death situations fear is
often deferred, such that people remain relatively level-headed up to and
including the crash. If they survive, they may be terrified afterwards and
may even go into a state of shock, but they'll stay clear-headed until the
crash. Of course, people who react in this way are more likely to survive to
begin with. Apprehension does get the adrenalin going and can help one to
handle emergencies, but abject fear and panic usually lead to bad things.

But hey you say you can accurately simulate and imagine reality.

In certain respects, yes. That's what simulation is all about. The simulator
isn't very good at simulating crashes, but the entire idea is to avoid
crashes, not to simulate them.

OK, question then, have you *ever* crashed a plane in the simulator?

Occasionally--just a few days ago, in fact. If it's a serious simulation
session, it's quite stressful. It the most recent case, at the end of an
uneventful flight, I became overconfident with my onboard TAWS and lost
situational awareness after making a poor decision to switch runways at the
last moment. With a 6-knot wind on the ground, I decided to stop the
straight-in approach for which I was already aligned, and attempt a right
downwind for the opposite runway. However, it was completely dark and I could
see nothing outside the airport, and although I knew there was rising terrain
nearby, I pressed on. To avoid terrain that I couldn't see, I turned to base
almost abeam the threshold of the runway and tried to scoot in. I also spent
too much time looking at the TAWS to see if I was clear of terrain. In my
preoccupation with doing this, I had left the AP on heading hold, and when I
saw that and disengaged it, naturally I rolled abruptly to one side. I
couldn't see the runway behind me nor could I see the terrain, and the sudden
turn caused me to lose altitude dangerously. The TAWS did indeed warn me of
terrain, but by that time it was too late, and I stalled in the darkness well
short of the runway and hit the side of the mesa.

Of course, you don't die in a simulation, but if you take your flying
seriously, the knowledge that you would surely be dead in real life and the
reflection on your flying skills that this represents is already quite a blow.
On the other hand, if you dismiss it all as just a game and a simulation, you
learn nothing, your ego is preserved, and when and if you're in the same
situation in real life one day, you die.

If so - why?, how? - you're DEAD! - how you could have let that EVER
happen?

Yes, I ask myself the same thing. When one is simulating for "fun," it
doesn't matter, but when the objective is serious simulation, it is a sobering
and humbling experience. And unlike pilots who have more ego than brains, I
do not claim that some sort of vague difference between the simulator and real
life caused the crash--it was pilot error, pure and simple, and it would have
happened in exactly the same way in real life, only with more permanent
consequences.