Why The Hell... (random rant)

"Mxsmanic" wrote ..
Snowbird writes:

Thank you. The reason I press this issue is because aviation safety is
serious business. Claiming to have a high safety standard based on
simulator
flying only, is in my opinion close to nonsense.

I don't see why that would make any difference.

It's explained in the next paragraph.

Why? Because the sim pilot does not run the risk of getting hurt if
things
go bad.

People with a good attitude towards safety don't need to be motivated by
the
risk of getting hurt. Indeed, if the only way to make someone
conscientious
about safety is to put him into a situation where he is at immediate and
obvious risk, then there is a problem with his attitude.

In my experience, some pilot students do not have the right attitude when
they start. That concerns especially those who have a lot of MS flight sim
time and consider themselves already very proficient.

Most people run into dangerous situations because they behaved in unsafe
ways
when there is _not_ any obvious risk of harm. Since they are motivated
only
by obvious, immediate risk, any time that they do not perceive such a
risk,
they disregard safety.

So therefore risk areas are demonstrated during training, so they can be
percieved and avoided in the future.

This is how motorcycle riders crush their skulls by not wearing a helmet.
They don't see an immediate, obvious risk to not wearing a helmet, so they
don't put one on. Then, when the risk actually becomes significant, they
are
unprepared. Most people will put on a helmet if they know that they're
about
to hit a brick wall. The difficulty is in getting people to put on
helmets
even when they aren't in any immediate and obvious danger.´

I doubt a motorcycle safety expert would agree bikers don't see the risks of
not wearing a helmet. Seeing risks is different from taking risks.


Thus, a pilot who is motivated to be safe only by a risk of accident or
injury
is not fundamentally a safe pilot. The safe pilot takes precautions
irrespective of any obvious risk.

Those precautions include training to improve the perception of non-obvious
risks.


It teaches the student in the most realistic way
the consequences of not yet having the required skills - with a Flight
Instructor always there to keep the situation safe and coach the student
on
how to progress towards his goal to become a pilot.

If a flight instructor is there, it's not realistic. The risk is not any
greater than in a simulator, since the instructor can save the day.
People in
that situation are motivated by a desire for approval from the instructor,
not
by any real risk. The problem there is that they may not behave safely
when
the instructor is not around to correct them, especially if they've never
been
motivated in any other way.


The problem is that the simulator can not ruin the day.


That mental attitude -
grasping the consequences of a pilot failure - is one of the most
important
traits of a safe pilot.

Everyone can grasp the consequences when the risk is immediate and
obvious.
Many people cannot when the risk is more remote. And this is true even
for
trained pilots, which is why so many trained pilots still crash due to a
lack
of caution and concern for safety.

Simulators, especially simple one-screen variants, tend to make the risk
perception even more remote, so they are not a general solution.

In summary, if you only learn about safety when you are threatened with
immediate harmful consequences, you haven't really learned about safety.


Safety is a part of most every subject of pilot training, it's not limited
to flight training. You have to pass all subjects to get the license.