Lawsuit in HPN accident

"Matt Whiting" wrote in message
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Mike Rapoport wrote:

"Matt Whiting" wrote in message
...

Mike Rapoport wrote:

What you are proposing is totally different from what I understand
happened at HPN. Flying LIFR with a passenger is OK whether the
passenger is a student pilot, astronaut, or garden varierty human. This
is totally different from either flying an approach from the right seat
with no copilot instruments or letting a student pilot fly the approach
and you trying to save it from the right seat (with no copilot
instuments). I'm an ATP with 1500hrs in an airplane with full CAT II
ILS equipment and I would not let a student pilot fly it to 200 and a
half. How much can you let him get off centerline or GS before you take
it away from him? If you do take it away, how out of trim is he?
Learning is incremental and a pre-solo student pilot is not going to
learn much from trying to fly a low approach. An instrument student
might learn something.

Are you a CFII?

Matt


No but I don't think that CFIIs are qualified to fly the approach that
was attempted at HPN. I don't think anyone is.really qualified to fly an
approach cross-cockpit to minimiums with WX below minimiums, particularly
if they let a student pilot begin the approach. It is certain that the
CFI in question wasn't

I'm not a CFII either so I can't say for sure. My primary instructor
could certainly do anything from the right seat that he could do from the
left, and more than most pilots could do from the left (he's now in his
80s and has more than 50,000 hours of flight time, a good part of that in
the right seat). I'd hope the same from a competent CFII, including
approaches to minimums, but maybe the instrument layout in most light
airplanes makes that impractical.


I doubt anybody can fly instruments as well from across the cockpit as they
can when they are in front of them.

I agree that the CFI in question wasn't up to the task on this particular
day in this particular airplane, but then isn't that true of any pilot
involved in an accident? The hard part is knowing this is going to happen
before it happens! :-) Easier said than done.

It isn't really that hard..simply don't take risks for nothing. There was
nothing to gain from taking this pre-solo student up to fly low approaches.
The student *can't even fly visually yet* and he probably hasn't learned
about tracking a VOR yet. It isn't in the syllabus, it isn't going to be on
the checkride.. The first rule of practicing anything is not to create a
real emergency. Ski schools don't teach beginning skiers on slope ending
with cliffs. Bull riding schools don't start you out on champion
superbulls. Martial arts students don't train with steel swords. I could
go on but you get the point. These things may all be appropriate for
advanced students but not beginning ones.

However, I still don't think that one accident such as this proves that
all such operations are faulty, hazardous, irresponsible, etc. It simply
shows that this particular operation went terribly awry. If we legislate
or sue out of existence every operation that results in an accident, then
we'll soon have a very small envelope in which to fly. That would be as
dumb as increasing the required fuel reserve every time a pilot
miscalculates and runs out of fuel. The reality is that this pilot busted
minimums ... period. The fact that he was an instructor and had a student
along is not relevant.

If we want to keep the decision making freedoms that we have, we have to
show that we are responsible. This student pilot probably had no idea of
the risk that he was exposed to. He probably didn't even know what the
minimiums were. I don't think that we need new rules but the flight school
will probably lose the lawsuit and rightfully so IMO. This was not a tragic
accident, it was a stupid one.

Mike
MU-2