Lawsuit in HPN accident

"Bob Noel" wrote in message
...
In article . net,
"Mike Rapoport" wrote:

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

hmmm, I don't doubt that flying instruments from the left seat
is easier than flying instruments from the right seat. However,
that doesn't matter if one can safely fly instruments from the
right seat. A CFII friend always flys from the right seat. He's
done that for decades. It would be interesting to see you two
discuss this.

--
Bob Noel
no one likes an educated mule


I can't dispute any of what you say but I'd point out that this CFI couldn't
fly well enough from whatever seat he was in and also that a CFI with around
1000hrs, 900 of which were gained while employed as a CFI, has very minimial
time actually flyiing instruments, perhaps under 50hrs. If we just do the
math and consider that almost all of his time was sitting in the right seat
instructing, and that most of his students were probably not instrument
students, that most of his time with instrument students was in VMC, we are
left with *very* little time where this CFI was actually flying IMC and it
may have been his first time trying to fly IMC from the right seat.
Admittedly all this is somewhat conjecture but this guy sure as hell wasn't
some 30,000hr retired airline captain, this had to be one of the few times
that he had done this and he was doing it in very low conditions. I don't
think that it was reckless for him to go out and do this on his own but to
do it as part of a lesson was criminal.

My basic belief is that a student (of anything) need to be able to make
mistakes and learn in a protected enviornment. We must also provide more
protection to those unable to assess the risk of what they are doing. You
can see this in how the FAA regulates for hire operations more stringently
than Part 91 operations. I agree with most on this thread that exposure to
IMC is beneficial but I think that the CFI in this case went way over the
line. In fact, I suspect that he undertook this final flight for himself
rather than his student.

Mike
MU-2