My wife getting scared

Margy Natalie wrote:
Jay Honeck wrote:
...
We'd all like to believe that we are superior pilots, possessing
superior judgement and skills. In fact, as private "hobby" pilots,
we're probably at the bottom of the skill heap, simply because we
don't fly often enough to get/stay really good. Once I accepted this
fact, not long after obtaining my ticket, I found myself becoming a
much more conservative (some might say "boring") pilot.

Conservative seems to be the best approach to longevity. It's the
strategy I'm planning to use so that I'm still around to fly with my
grandkids...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"
I always say "boring flying is good flying" when it gets exciting it
usually means you did something stupid.

Margy


.......................oh, I don't know........... :-))

--
Dudley Henriques

On 10/1/2007 5:42:34 PM, "Paul Riley" wrote:

I retired from the Army in 1978. I have not flown since. Not because she
wanted me to stop, my decision. Financial, with 2 kids in college, and
then, after final retirement, our desire to travel, flying was not
economically something I wanted to do that might prevent OUR enjoying
retirement activities

She is now an invalid, and I am her caregiver, a task I take on willingly
out of love. I can never repay her for the support she has given me all
these years, but I try.

There are some people, even on Usenet, that just exude class and honor. Paul,
IMO you are one such gentleman.


--
Peter

Dudley Henriques wrote:
Margy Natalie wrote:

Jay Honeck wrote:
...

We'd all like to believe that we are superior pilots, possessing
superior judgement and skills. In fact, as private "hobby" pilots,
we're probably at the bottom of the skill heap, simply because we
don't fly often enough to get/stay really good. Once I accepted this
fact, not long after obtaining my ticket, I found myself becoming a
much more conservative (some might say "boring") pilot.

Conservative seems to be the best approach to longevity. It's the
strategy I'm planning to use so that I'm still around to fly with my
grandkids...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

I always say "boring flying is good flying" when it gets exciting it
usually means you did something stupid.

Margy



......................oh, I don't know........... :-))

Well, fun flying can be fun (but I tend to deposit my breakfast on the
neighbor's shrubbery soon after) but exciting, sucking in the seat
cushion flying is NOT fun. I'd much rather leave my plane in Richmond
or Lancaster (done both this year) than have an exciting flight home.
Avis loves us. Of course when the duputy director of the museum informs
you that you can "take whatever time you need" to go retrive your plane
it helps. I love having a job where I'd be in more trouble if I scud
run home to get to work on Monday than if I didn't show up :-).

Margy

Paul Tomblin wrote:
In a previous article, Jay Honeck said:

2. Mary and I could be killed driving on the highway any day of the
week.


Statistically, that's true. In human terms, though, my wife knows maybe
25 pilots, and 2 of them have died in airplanes in the last couple of
years. She knows hundreds of drivers, and none of them have died in car
crashes recently. (Ok, one of them was kidnapped, raped and killed by a
guy impersonating a police officer who stopped her driving, but that's
another fear of hers regarding our four teenage and early twenties
daughters.)



I'd rather die in my plane then get kidnapped, etc. For sure!

Margy Natalie wrote:
Dudley Henriques wrote:
Margy Natalie wrote:

Jay Honeck wrote:
...

We'd all like to believe that we are superior pilots, possessing
superior judgement and skills. In fact, as private "hobby" pilots,
we're probably at the bottom of the skill heap, simply because we
don't fly often enough to get/stay really good. Once I accepted this
fact, not long after obtaining my ticket, I found myself becoming a
much more conservative (some might say "boring") pilot.

Conservative seems to be the best approach to longevity. It's the
strategy I'm planning to use so that I'm still around to fly with my
grandkids...
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

I always say "boring flying is good flying" when it gets exciting it
usually means you did something stupid.

Margy



......................oh, I don't know........... :-))

Well, fun flying can be fun (but I tend to deposit my breakfast on the
neighbor's shrubbery soon after) but exciting, sucking in the seat
cushion flying is NOT fun. I'd much rather leave my plane in Richmond
or Lancaster (done both this year) than have an exciting flight home.
Avis loves us. Of course when the duputy director of the museum informs
you that you can "take whatever time you need" to go retrive your plane
it helps. I love having a job where I'd be in more trouble if I scud
run home to get to work on Monday than if I didn't show up :-).

Margy

This just shows that you're a first class pilot Margy. It's like Kenny
Rogers says, "You gotta know when to fold up" :-)

--
Dudley Henriques

This is the same approach the the King's have been pushing for a couple of
years. Flying is dangerous (as is crossing the street). Denying the danger
by citing safety stats is not addressing the inherent risks.

Dudley's advice is right on. Convince her that you are aware of the risks
and dangers and that you work proactively to avoid them. That doesn't mean
that you will fly forever but it does increase the odds. Nothing in life is
risk free. There are many people who have a similar experiences related to
other activites. Entire families that are killed in a car crash. Tornadoes
wipe out entire towns. Etc.

That and, gosh honey, maybe we should spend the money for a twin engine
plane and put in a stormscope and a better autopilot and a ...

--
-------------------------------
Travis
Lake N3094P
PWK
"Dudley Henriques" wrote in message
...
Paul Tomblin wrote:
I've been a pilot for 12 years now. I've been married (this time) for
10.
Three years ago, the DE who passed me on my private and instrument
tickets
died in a stupid accident. My wife had met him a few times at flying
club
dinners and around the airport. A few weeks ago, a club member who she'd
also met several times died in his float plane, a plane that I'd flown in
a few weeks before that. He died with his best friend, a former club
member who I knew a bit but whom my wife didn't.

Now that two people she's met have died flying in a relatively short
period of time, she's getting less and less secure about my own flying.
Every time I head out to the airport, she gives me the talk. "Be
careful.
Don't die. If you have the slightest doubt, come back." Etc. And so
on.

I don't think she'll tell me to stop, because she knows I was a pilot
before we married. But what can I do to reassure her? The pilot
community is pretty small, and losing three people associated with our
little club is pretty scary for her.

At one time, I thought when the kids were finished college I'd finally
have enough money to buy a share in a float plane and we could have some
adventures together. Now I'm not even sure she'd come flying in a club
plane.


During the fifty odd years I've been involved in professional aviation;
most of that teaching in and flying high performance airplanes I've buried
32 of my friends and associates. My wife was with me through forty of
those years and knew many of these people personally.
I've dealt with this issue both in my own home and as an adviser to
others.
I can tell you this in all sincerity and honesty.
I realize you might not be involved in high risk aviation so what I am
about to say to you might even be easier for you in your personal
situation as a pleasure pilot.
I believe I have looked at this issue from enough directions and have
enough experience with it that you might want to give serious
consideration to my advice.
When it comes to handling something like this with a loved one, you can of
course attempt to convince your wife you will be safe based on the
favorable statistics you can go dig up that say general aviation is a safe
pastime.
But my advice is to use this approach but with a caveat.
Forget using the statistics alone without additional input from you as
that road to convince a loved one is filled with pot holes.


In order to reach your wife, don't down play the dangers involved with
flying, as she is already convinced of a potential danger and has seen
what can happen when things go wrong.

The best way to handle these issues is to start immediately to convince
her that rather than denying any danger exists, you are completely aware
of the potential for danger in flying and are capable of avoiding that
danger by the way you approach the issue of flying.

In other words, what you want to accomplish here is to convince your wife
that YOU PERSONALLY are an aware pilot with a professional attitude that
is highly tuned in to the avoidance of areas of danger when you fly.
What you want to do is steer your wife into thinking of you as a pilot
separated from other pilots. You need to have her consider you
INDIVIDUALLY as competent and professional instead of viewing you as just
another pilot among many. It's the thinking about a large group where some
get hurt or killed that frightens loved ones. Once she looks at you
individually, she will realize that you PERSONALLY are aware of danger and
competent enough to stay away from it.
She will feel better knowing that.

All this having been said, there is nothing cast in stone that will solve
these kinds of issues. Accidents happen and pilots get killed once in a
while. What it boils down to is that YOU are the only one who can address
this issue with a loved one. It takes tact and it takes understanding, but
most of all it means recognizing her fears as legitimate instead of down
playing them with safety statistics.
Bring her into your world as a pilot more than you have and let her know
that above all else, you are aware....and you are a SAFE pilot.
Hope this advice has been of some help.
DH


--
Dudley Henriques

I like that approach. When the day comes that the weather is right and the
rest of IMSAFE, she'll have a hard time stopping you. She'll feel so sorry
for all the times you didn't go. For that matter, I may just start planning
to fly every day... Think of the sympathy points!

--
-------------------------------
Travis
Lake N3094P
PWK
"BT" wrote in message
...
I'll echo Dudley.. and add .. let her see that you are actively staying up
to speed to remain safe
- get on the faa mailing list and attend local pilot safety meetings
- attend AOPA safety meetings.. take their on line courses
- take a weather course..
- add that next rating.. a commercial rating is the simplest to add.. a
new rating means "additional training received".
- don't wait for a sunny day and decide to go flying.. pick a day two to
three weeks out.. and then if the weather is bad or something "just is not
right"... make the decision not to go and let her know why you decided
that it was not a good day to fly.. maybe it was just because you had a
"bad day" at the office the day before.. and "your mind was not in the
game".. remember and practice IMSAFE

BT


"Paul Tomblin" wrote in message
...
I've been a pilot for 12 years now. I've been married (this time) for
10.
Three years ago, the DE who passed me on my private and instrument
tickets
died in a stupid accident. My wife had met him a few times at flying
club
dinners and around the airport. A few weeks ago, a club member who she'd
also met several times died in his float plane, a plane that I'd flown in
a few weeks before that. He died with his best friend, a former club
member who I knew a bit but whom my wife didn't.

Now that two people she's met have died flying in a relatively short
period of time, she's getting less and less secure about my own flying.
Every time I head out to the airport, she gives me the talk. "Be
careful.
Don't die. If you have the slightest doubt, come back." Etc. And so
on.

I don't think she'll tell me to stop, because she knows I was a pilot
before we married. But what can I do to reassure her? The pilot
community is pretty small, and losing three people associated with our
little club is pretty scary for her.

At one time, I thought when the kids were finished college I'd finally
have enough money to buy a share in a float plane and we could have some
adventures together. Now I'm not even sure she'd come flying in a club
plane.

--
Paul Tomblin http://blog.xcski.com/
...I'm not one of those who think Bill Gates is the devil. I simply
suspect that if Microsoft ever met up with the devil, it wouldn't need an
interpreter. -- Nick Petreley

You may not agree, and maybe your mechanic doesn't agree ... but as said
in an earlier post, if you think about all the airplanes in flight
schools that are doing simulated engine failures far more frequently
than we would (some much more powerful than an 0-320 ... I can't
remember what engine you have), there would be many more engine problems
in rental/school airplanes than there are if there's nothing worse for
an engine than simulated engine-outs.

My mechanic -- a guy with over 40 years of experience as an IA, A&P,
grand champion home builder, and owner of an engine and prop shop --
says it this way:

The average privately owned GA aircraft is flown AT MOST once a week.
As a result, rust (from inactivity) is the #1 killer of the average,
privately owned GA engine. Many don't make TBO because of
inactivity.

Touch & goes are the #1 worst thing you can do to your engine. Flight
school planes do them all day long, but it's because they are flown
daily, sometimes 8 hours per day, and they therefore NEVER experience
the ravages of inactivity. Therefore, although it's STILL the worst
thing you can do, the engines often make it to TBO simply because they
are flown all day, every day.

Engine out practice is essentially the same engine management
procedure as a touch & go. Long periods of high power, followed by
suddenly low RPM, followed by a sudden application of power at the
end. Bad, bad, bad.

Are the engines designed to take this kind of abuse? Sure. But they
were designed to be run daily, not weekly, too. And when you are
paying something in the range of $20,000 for an overhaul (as we did
for our O-540) we don't generally make a practice of stressing the
engine any more than necessary.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

So, I've seen scads of real-life experience that says that shock cooling
is just not real. The real part is people who don't practice engine-out
landings and then crumple an airplane botching the real thing.

I don't believe shock cooling exists, either. Or, if it does, it's
fairly insignificant.

But I do believe that repeated and sudden applications of full power
are harder on an engine than steady-state operation. Touch & goes
and engine out practice require this type of engine operation.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Was it your own aircraft?

Yes. It's a rare occurrence. When something like this happens, you then
hear accounts from the few who knew of something similar. One such
account was of a NEW oil cooler that failed in its first 3 hours.

Our oil cooler failed last year, too. Luckily it was a relatively
slow leak, and we weren't even aware of it till we landed.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"