On Mar 29, 5:01*am, Walt Connelly Walt.Connelly.
wrote:
Opinions are like rear ends. *Everyone has one. *Check lists are good
ideas, they should highlight the critical events like locking the canopy
and putting down the landing gear. *I heard a story of a glider pilot
who landed gear up on the runway with a student pilot in back of him.
He couldn't make it off the runway and the student with limited skill
and experience dinged his wing. *Perhaps a checklist on the panel with
"put the gear down," would have saved some repairs.

Just my opinion

Walt

--
Walt Connelly

I don't think anyone on this thread was saying "checklists" are a bad
idea. The majority of the discussion has been about whether the list
needs to be written or mnemonic and what the content of the list
should be.

The extremes range between mnemonic+short, and written+long.

The key thing about any list is that it only contributes to safety if
you actually use it. I contend that a pilot is just as likely to fail
to execute a written list as a mnemonic list. I therefore contend
that a written list has no advantage over a mnemonic list unless the
list is so long it cannot be easily memorized. As others have stated
a mnemonic list does not distract from keeping eyes outside.

I also have gear warning to every glider I have owned. It went off
once in 23 years and that was as I turned downwind.

A story about airline pilots and checklists. I recently participated
in a flight test program in which we leased a modern 100 passenger
twin jet. A condition of the lease was that it would be flown by the
airline's pilots not our company test pilots. Several crews rotated
through during the test program. With only one exception during the
preflight checks the crew responded to "cockpit door" with "closed and
locked". That was interesting because the door was secured wide open
to allow instrumentation wiring to pass to the rear cabin.

Andy