IFR Flight Twice as Deadly as VFR?

1. Do you agree with Collins' statements?

I haven't read the article, but on the face of it it seems quite
reasonable. IFR flying often takes you =through= inhospitable weather -
that's the whole point. Weather flying is inherently more risky.
Although there can be bad VFR days, the biggest hazards occur in the
clouds, and where you can't see the weather coming. IFR there are fewer
outs if you get into trouble.

2. Assuming the statistics are true, how do you minimize your risk?

By getting a good weather briefing, by not flying if the weather isn't
good enough for me or my equipment, by staying in practice with MSFS (at
least for procedures and scan, which is actually the least of it), by
being continually on top of developing weather, to the extent possible,
and sometimes by flying VFR over the top with Flight Following, getting
an instrument approach at the end of the flight (allowing me more route
flexibility)

3.Since IFR flight is statistically among the most dangerous things
you can do in a light GA aircraft, and flying a GA aircraft is already
approximately as dangerous as riding a motorcycle, do you ever have
any second thoughts about what you're doing? How do you feel about
strapping your family into a light aircraft and launching into the
clag?

I always have second thoughts - that's the point of getting a weather
briefing, making the go/no-go decision, and keeping options open should
things go sour during the flight. If I am comfortable going myself, I
am comfortable taking my family.

Jose
--
Get high on gasoline: fly an airplane.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

The basic flaw with this is you will only hear from those pilots that
are still alive. The pilots who can give you a negative view of the
risk are not available to reply to your thread.

Great (if depressing) point.

I think it is
appalling that you think it is ok to keep you wife and children in the
dark about the risks of flying. LSA aircraft carry a placard to warn
passengers that the plane is not certified because the FAA thinks they
have a right to know. Does your family deserve any less?

On the contrary, my wife is an experienced pilot who is all-too aware
of the risks of flying. Despite this, we routinely launch to all
points on the map, because we have accepted the risks inherent with
VFR flight. (In fact, we're launching for Florida tomorrow.)

My children are another thing entirely, and we have debated this since
birth. Subjecting them to the increased risk of GA has always been
problematic, but we've always decided on the side of "living" versus
"waiting to die", because GA has made it possible to give our kids so
much more than would otherwise have been possible.

Right now I'm trying to dispassionately assess the risks of IFR
flight, which is a whole 'nother kettle of fish. Collins' article
was quite a wake-up call for me, in that regard.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

One thing Collins recommends to help counter the dangers of instrument
flight is to file on every single flight, and to end every single
flight with an instrument approach.

Do you guys do that?

I not only don't do that, I don't advocate it either. Sometimes better
safety is found by not filing - flying VFR until you actually need the
clearance. I am not advocating scud running, but if you are in good
visual conditions and can =see= the weather ahead, and are not
constrained by IFR routings and altitudes, you can sometimes pick a
safer way to get from where you are to where you need to be, and then
you can pop up as needed.

Jose
--
Get high on gasoline: fly an airplane.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

IFR pilots can more easily be lured into making riskier flights.

Therein lies the rub. My weather tolerance is already higher (or,
would that be lower?) than Mary's. In other words, I will launch on a
flight with higher winds and lower visibility than Mary will, and this
has held true since she got her ticket.

Why? I don't know. Her assessment of risk is more strict than mine,
and her comfort level is correspondingly lower.

Projecting ourselves into the instrument rating, say, three years from
now, I wonder how our preflight planning would go? Right now, she is
comfortable flying with me at my comfort level -- she has no problem
skipping a leg if the weather is below her comfort -- but will that
hold true in IMC?

I think if it were just me flying, getting the IR -- and using it --
would be a simple, logical next step. Factor in Mary and the kids,
and it becomes much more problematic.

Risk assessment of this sort is difficult.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Apr 14, 8:10 am, "Jay Honeck" wrote:

I understand that poor piloting and/or judgment is gonna kill you
faster in IMC than in VMC.

It's worth reading Collins' column this month, if for no other reason
than to read the IFR accidents he describes. It is pretty clear from
his narration that these pilots were not chumps, were not out of
currency, were not breaking any rules, and were definitely flying some
VERY nice equipment.

THAT is what I'm getting at here. I've flown 12 years in a lot of
different conditions, some of it IFR, some of it faux VFR, some of it
in very nice airplanes, some of it in rental beaters. Throughout,
I've endeavored to fly professionally and precisely, and I have always
been successful.

What worries me about pursuing the instrument rating is that the
pilots described in this column apparently behaved the same way I do.
Further, they were flying better-equipped aircraft than I can afford,
yet they still ended up killing themselves. There are many things --
too many? -- that can go wrong with a light GA piston aircraft, both
from a systems standpoint as well as from a personal piloting
standpoint, many of which can kill you in IMC.

This seems to be the bottom line: A slight increase in risk over
regular flying is one thing; a 100% increase in fatalities is
something different. Is it worth it?


Good points mentioned in the thread - here's my distillation. Jay, if
you look at every flight whether VFR or IFR as an independant event,
each time you measure the risk then decide to fly or not. When flying
in weather there are more factors to consider because the margin for
error is reduced. The capability of the pilot & airplane have to be
considered in the decision process, and that requires an honest
evaluation of your own abilities and comfort level flying in IMC.

Assuming a well maintained airplane and a current (and proficient) IFR
pilot, the wild card ends up being the severity of weather conditions.
A 1000ft ceiling with a thin cloud deck that you'd be flying on top of
in the sunshine is a lot less risky IMO than getting bumped while
flying in the clag the whole trip and not seeing the ground between
takeoff and touchdown. Essentially I'm comparing light IFR to "hard"
IFR where you're flying the approach down to minimums.

This risk isn't limited to light pistons either - turbine aircraft get
balled up on occasion too, probably because their pilots are under a
schedule and that influences their decision, or they overestimate
their aircraft's capabilities and fly into weather they shouldn't. We
fly the PC12 in weather that I wouldn't fly in a piston single, but
there have been times when the weather was beyond that plane's safe
capability and the flight got scrubbed. The instrument rating gives
you more flexibility as a pilot, but it also gives you enough rope to
hang yourself if you're not vigilant. I've figured out over the years
that you'll usually be OK if you never exceed your own capabilities or
those of the airplane.

I realize the latter benefit is obtained also with VFR flight following, but once you go that far, why not just file IFR?

Route and altitude flexibility.

Jose
--
Get high on gasoline: fly an airplane.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

On Apr 14, 9:26 am, "Jay Honeck" wrote:
[snip]
I agree with everything you have said, Matt, except that your
comparison assumes that you don't have the third option, which is to
stay on the ground.

Obviously flying VFR into IMC is going to kill you. Good VFR pilots
stay on the ground when the weather goes to pot.

[snip]
Jay,

You are absolutely correct: ALL competent pilots choose to stay on the
ground sometimes.

Just because you have an instrument rating dosen't mean you have to
make a particular flight. You do have more options with the rating
(and proficiency!) than without.

I've read some of your other posts where you stated that something
under 5% of your potential flights were canceled by weather even
though you only choose to fly VFR. If that's true, my personal opinion
is you don't need the rating or the extra work to stay proficient. Why
bother if you're not going to use it?

I plan to start mine as soon as I can afford it. But I want to use
mine to travel on business, and I have the kind of business trips in
my future that make a lot of sense in GA: 200-300nm trips where
airlines take 4-8 hours door to door because of routing & security &
general hassle. Being able to fly when there is weather in between
here & there, or I have to punch out of a low cloud base here or
through an overcast there will help me a lot. I will have STRICT
personal minimums (as I do for VFR) that I WILL follow.

I personally am reconciled with the risks for two reasons: 1) I want
to live, not just survive 2) There is a lot of variability from pilot
to pilot that statistics can never cover.

John Stevens

On flights of say, 100 nm or more, I file on every flight. I'd guess that
80% of those flights end with an instrument approach.

I haven't read Collin's article, but my opinion of "blanket" statements or
articles comparing the safety of VFR to IFR, or more accurately flight in
VMC to flight in IMC, is that they do a serious disservice to both
non-instrument rated and instrument rated pilots alike. To paint a picture
that VFR flight vs IFR flight is as different as black and white leads the
uninformed to believe that every VFR flight is made in perfect clear, blue,
and a million conditions and that every IFR flight is conducted in
continuous imbedded thunderstorms, turbulence, and overcast stretching from
minimums upward and beyond the stratosphere. Most pilots, whether
instrument rated or not, know better. The general public may not.
Irresponsible media personalities may not. Government officials seeking a
new reason to impose user fees on GA may not.

Hopefully all pilots, whether instrument rated or not, progress through a
continual decision making process before and during each flight. Hopefully
after each flight they do a self evaluation and critic of the flight and
their performance. Hopefully they learn something that they carry forward
into their future flights.

The decision making process begins on the ground. Just as VFR only pilots
have a set of criteria which they apply to themselves, their airplane,
equipment, prevailing as well as forecast weather conditions, IFR pilots
also have their own personal criteria.

Much has been said about personal minimums for both VFR and IFR pilots.
Much has been said about pilot proficiency vs. legal currency. Without a
doubt an IFR pilot considering a flight in IMC has a longer list of criteria
and a more complex set of decisions to make. This is when the many shades
of gray between the black and white of VFR/VMC vs IFR/IMC come into play.
Most VFR only pilots can make a quick, accurate, and safe decision about
launching into calm CAVU conditions for a quick flight ending at a
destination forecast to be the same. Most IFR pilots can make an accurate
and safe decision to launch into a stable, layered, overcast well above
minimums, in non icing conditions, over flat terrain, in a IFR certified and
well equipped aircraft. See the difference? Just as many VFR pilots will
scrub a flight that would lead them towards or into MVFR conditions, IFR
pilots scrub flights for many reasons.

As conditions worsen decision making becomes harder. It becomes harder to
find our own personal minimum level of comfort. Human factors and outside
influences come into play. Airport services must be more closely
scrutinized. Weather must be considered to be worse than forecast. All
available information must be applied to one's honest personal proficiency
level. IFR flights in IMC present more opportunities for a pilot to make
poor decisions. Poor decisions can be deadly. Poor decisions made in VMC
offer a pilot more time to correct their poor decision. IMC is less
forgiving to poor decision making and a lack of proficiency. Does this make
it more dangerous? or does IMC simply require that more decisions be made
properly if the flight is to have it's intended outcome?

Jim

On 14 Apr 2007 07:07:07 -0400, (Frank Ch. Eigler)
wrote in :

2. Assuming the statistics are true, how do you minimize your risk?

The same way one minimizes non-IFR risks: good planning, equipment,
maintenance, judgement, performance.

And recent experience.

Jay Honeck wrote:
Is your objective minimum risk or acceptable risk?

Acceptable, of course. If I was going for minimal risk, my life would
be very different, indeed.

One thing Collins recommends to help counter the dangers of instrument
flight is to file on every single flight, and to end every single
flight with an instrument approach.

Do you guys do that?

I file on every flight that is a cross country flight. I don't file if
I'm just going up for sight-seeing in the local area, but I do request
flight following.

I don't always end every flight with an instrument approach per se, but
I almost always tune in the ILS if the runway is so equipped and use it
for guidance even on visual approaches.

Matt