3 lives lost

Colin,

You are very 'on' with both points. There are quite a few (not a
majority, but enough to drive up the statistics) for whom no amount of
education will eradicate their emotionally-driven ignorance. And I
fully agree with you that the real problem was that he took off in the
first place. The conditions were iffy enough that his own flight
instructor called him and said words to the effect "It looks pretty
bad, let me go with you." And he is reported to have replied, "No,
this is something Ive got to do by myself." That statement is all
about proving that he is 'good enough,' which is, I believe, where he
drove off into the psychological 'ditch.'

I have been told that there were two CFI's holding down a couch in the
lobby just a couple of hundred feet away when he was loading up. When
his sister in law was 2hr late, and forced his planned daylight flight
into a night departure, that was the point where he shoulda walked into
that lobby and said "Which one of you guys wants to make $300?" (He
was reportely collecting $5mil a year off of his trust. $300 would
have been pocket change.)

I have also read that he and his instructor had been having problems
with the autopilot; it apparently was prone to occaisionally doing a
roll-axis hard-over failure for no apparent reason. Given that, and
his low time in type (30hr), and thus a probable lack of familiarity
with that autopilot, it may be that he was reluctant to turn it on.
Maybe he *did* turn it on, and it did its hard-over thing and made a
marginal situation worse.

I have, as of late, made it my business to study the human factors
issues associated with these kinds of accidents, because I agree with
you that it was the decision to go under these conditions that was the
real problem. My research has led me into the psychology of
narcissism, and I believe that is a major factor in this seemingly
mysterious penchant some pilots have to go ahead and launch when
prudence would dictate another less risky course of action.

If you trace the history of the Kennedys and the behavior of the men
(date rape, skiing into trees, trophy wives, affairs with actresses,
need to prove, and angrily blaming others when something doesnt go
right), and then bounce that off the DSMV-IV diagnostic criteria for
narcissistic personality disorder, you wil find it is a near perfect
match.

Unfortunately for our industry, a large percentage of the people who
have the money to fly are highly driven, type A, take-no-prisoners
types--and these traits are often symptoms of the narcissistic
personality.

The downside includes a need to constantly prove oneself 'good enough,'
trophy seeking, and the appearance of competence being valued much more
than the actual competence itself.

I wrote an article about this that was published in Plane and Pilot ,
called "The Wrong Stuff." It is available to view on my website at
www.genehudson.com if you care to read more about this stuff.

Become a therapist and open an office in LA? You are not the first
person to have said that... others have offered that I already have
done both... I don't want to advertise it too much, though, for fear
that then *all* my time would be spend wrestling with these types! (It
is, in fact, *very* hard work--getting some of these types to 'see
through their own bs.')

And, as you point out, it only works some of the time. Probably much
less than half the time.

A couple of years ago I lost one... ex-fighter pilot, took his
commercial training from me... I thought I had really made some
progress when after many hours of pushing and pulling, I finally got
him to agree to actually use a checklist. A year later he was leading
a flight of two, 'hot-dogging' at low level in mountainous terrain; he
turned up the wrong canyon, and found he could not outclimb the
terrain, and could not turn around. Both aircraft impacted the ridge
600 feet below the pass.

The unfortunate reality of this is that he and the other pilot took
four other (trusting) souls with them into the fireball. Six lives
snuffed out--and for what? To prove that you can fly up the canyon at
low level? Big deal.

He proved it all right. So did JFK Jr. ('I can do it by myself!')

I think this is in large part the answer to the painful question raised
by the accident that started this thread; why would someone who 'knows
better' take off in conditions such that the impact could be heard, but
not seen, from a hangar a 1/4 mi away?

I bristle at the notion that the weather just 'closed in'
unexpectedly.' The aircraft was airborne for about 60 seconds. I
argue that the conditions did not change that fast. She knew fully
well she was launching into a low vis condition (IMHO).

Why would Jessica Debroff's CFI allow them to depart, over-gross, in
the summer, at a high alt airport, in a non-turboed airplane, when hail
was falling on the roof of their car as they drove to the airport, with
a huge cell sitting directly on the airport, and the 414 that departed
before them called back with a windshear report, stating that he (with
620 turbocharged hp) 'almost didnt make it?'

What are we trying to prove? Can't we re-define 'good pilot' to mean
one that has the guts to tell everyone else to 'put a sock in it, I
a-ain't a-goin'?'
I gotta get a new soapbox, I am wearging this one out.

Regards,

Gene

) wrote:

What are we trying to prove? Can't we re-define 'good pilot' to mean
one that has the guts to tell everyone else to 'put a sock in it, I
a-ain't a-goin'?'
I gotta get a new soapbox, I am wearging this one out.

I hope you stick around. During your short time here you have quickly
become one of my favorite posters.

--
Peter
700 hr instrument-rated private pilot

wrote in message
oups.com...

What are we trying to prove? Can't we re-define 'good pilot' to mean
one that has the guts to tell everyone else to 'put a sock in it, I
a-ain't a-goin'?'

Maybe my take on this is a little more cynical. I tend to think that the
people like this fighter pilot are simply unrecoverable. *Maybe* if they get
into a real close call, or a good friend of theirs buys the farm doing
something stupid, the shock will wake them up. But, if they were amenable to
reason and logic, they probably would have found it on their own long before
you got there. Like motorcycling, skydiving, rock climbing, etc., flying
attracts a certain percentage of daredevils who will take the dare too far.
Perhaps the best we can hope to do with them is limit the damage they cause.
JFK was certainly part of this group, something his mother seems to have
recognized far better than he did.

However, I find cases like this one to be much more interesting, in that you
have pilots who have displayed good decisionmaking for perhaps decades, and
one day take off, VFR, into 1/4mi viz. These cases seem to me far more
interesting in that these are presumably people who can actually be helped,
because they are willing to listen. I look at these very closely because if
my research has taught me anything, it is that I am not too good to make
this kind of mistake. In this case though, I really wonder whether this lady
didn't have something physiologically bsuted in her brain. I'm
instrument-rated and current and I wouldn't take off into those conditions,
even 1mi viz. is tighter than I prefer given my skills and equipment.
Continuing VFR into IMC on a cross-country I can understand. This one simply
defies rational analysis.

-cwk.

"Colin W Kingsbury" wrote in message
ink.net...

wrote in message
oups.com...

...in that you have pilots who have displayed good decisionmaking for
perhaps decades, and
one day take off, VFR, into 1/4mi viz.


Did you read the story? She did not take off in IMC, vis was 4sm at takeoff.

Nobody,

Come on. It was *reported* to be 4sm vis. In fact, the aircraft was
airborne for 60 seconds. The reported ceiling was 500 overcast. The
crash was heard, but not seen, from a hangar a qtr mile away.

She took off into conditions that were entirely visibile to a casual
observer. That the weather report says the conditions are 4 sm does
not absolve the PIC from looking out the window.

She did not maintain conservative safety margins; and her emergency IFR
skills we inadequate.

Please get this. It was not an 'act of God.' This was entirely
preventable.

Gene

There is no way visibility goes from adequate VFR to low IMC in less than
sixty seconds. I'm calling bull**** on this.

"nobody" wrote in message
...

Did you read the story? She did not take off in IMC, vis was 4sm at
takeoff.

Colin W Kingsbury wrote:

There is no way visibility goes from adequate VFR to low IMC in less
than
sixty seconds. I'm calling bull**** on this.

It's not usual, but I've had it happen once or twice. Only once did I
get caught in it, and then only for about 5 seconds, but it can happen,
even in daytime. You fly out of BED in MA, IIRC, right? I fly out of
FIT in MA usually, but once at BED I took off, was flying a pattern in
VFR conditions with 6 mile visibility, 1500 ft. ceilings, and just
managed to get down and land before a rainshower came through at about
30 kts and vis. went to .5 miles with a 200 ft ceiling.

The 5 second time was with 1200 ft. ceiling and 4-6 mile vis., and then
I just flew into a cloud, which I THOUGHT I could see through and was
just light rain. Boom - white. I knew that the weather was clear to
the left, made a shallow 90 deg. turn, and popped out 5 seconds later.
Went back to FIT and landed.....

I agree with you that even with 4 mi. vis. and the ceilings reported at
the airport, you've got to wonder what the pilot was thinking, but
weather CAN close in very quickly, especially if you're moving at 100
mph.....

--
Marc J. Zeitlin
http://marc.zeitlin.home.comcast.net/
http://www.cozybuilders.org/
Copyright (c) 2004

Colin W Kingsbury wrote:

There is no way visibility goes from adequate VFR to low IMC in less than
sixty seconds. I'm calling bull**** on this.

Well, you've obviously never lived near a coast of had warm moist air
move over snow. I've had my house go from sunshine to completely fogged
in within this amount of time, and I live on top of a hill nowhere's
near water. Snow can cause fog very quickly under the right conditions.

I personally think the pilot should have seen this coming, however, it
is amazing how fast conditions can change. Even so, usually the
conditions that might cause these changes can be known in advance, which
I'm assuming is your fundamental point - and with that I agree.


Matt

On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 17:32:53 GMT, Colin W Kingsbury wrote:

There is no way visibility goes from adequate VFR to low IMC in less than
sixty seconds. I'm calling bull**** on this.

Colin,

Having lived in the area for 4 years before I moved to MS, it does happen.

I have seen the fog rolling in no time flat due to warm frontal passages.

Please keep in mind the the ground had a 12 to 18 inch snow pack, and with
warm air advecting into the area, you get some incredible fog formations in
the North Central Ohio area with this combination of weather.

The closest reporting airport is MFD (Mansfield), and the second closest
airport is MNN (Marion). I have seen it raining at both airports and
snowing at 4I9. The distance from each airport is rather small for such
diverse weather conditions.

I personally thought that 4 mile viz and snow cover is not condusive of any
sight seeing anyway, thus I would have question the decision to launch FOR
SIGHT SEEING PURPOSES. There would have been no visible horizon with that
kind of visibility and snow cover once you left pattern altitude.

But, since I wasn't there, Monday night quarterbacking is only speculative.

Allen

Colin,

I agree that the fighter pilot was probably unrecoverable. The tough
part from my position is how to separate those from the recoverable
ones *before* they make their airplane into an aluminium plate on the
side of a rock. Since I have not yet figured out how to tell, I tend
to give it my best to try to get to whatever common sense might still
be operating while there still is time to try. A lot of that effor is
wasted.

In the interest of effort that probably will not be wasted (you seem to
be listening) , I want to point out that the idea that there was
'something psychologically busted in her brain' misses the most
important point. Most likely there was not; the fact is, we all are
susceptible to the same kind of error. That's the point; that she
*wasn't* different from the rest of us, that the only thing that
separates us from 'them' is a will to choose--and it is a choice--not
to succumb to the same temptations.

There was nothing 'wrong' with her. She was just like us. We could do
the same thing tomorrow, except that--if we choose--we can realize that
and learn from her mistakes and decide to take actions to make sure
that when we are being taken down that path by our emotions, that we
then *choose* to do not what we want to do, nor what everyone else is
doing, nor what will make us popular, but rather that which we know is
better from a purely rational point of view. It sounds easy when we
are not in the midst of it, and in fact it is not.

Gene