Contents
Risk Analysis.
More exact measurement techniques have given new precision to the process of determining the numbers to probabilities of a specific outcome of a series of events or of one event. This means that the FAA can decide with some accuracy as to how to allocate resources of personnel and technology to education, prevention, enforcement or punishment.
A pilot makes hundreds of risk assessments prior to, during and even after every phase of a given flight. Much of the risk management skills we use in our personal lives flows over to our flying. If we have failed to manage our perceptions of risk and reality in our personal lives, we are likely to have difficulty in our flying. Hence the FAA's interest our driving records and life style.
Airplane accidents are sources of spectacular deaths that attract media attention and political responses. The FAA as a political empire is very sensitive to the publicity of flight accidents because of the media impact. This is reason there is a historic correlation between an accident and the bringing into existence of an FAR.
The public has an enlarged presumption that every aircraft accident will lead to dramatic deaths and mysterious causes. The historical facts are that over 80% of aircraft accidents can be attributed to the pilot's inability to correctly assess the risk/probability factors being dealt with. It's called pilot error. Flying is a self-created risk program that is blown all out of proportion to the probability of a fatal occurrence. Only 6% of aircraft accidents result in serious injury or a fatality. The natural risks of everyday life are incorrectly perceived as less dangerous than the risks endemic to flying.
The FARs relating to flight safety are politically motivated by knee-jerk and special interest legislation. The FAA is forced into the committing of statistical homicide by applying limited resources to eliminate negligible risks. Flying will never be safe. Reduction of inherent risk in one area will only increase them in another.
The confidence of the poor pilot usually exceeds his ability to perform. Poor pilots are more prone to express this confidence than are competent pilots. There is a handholding relationship between the competent pilot and the recognition of this competence. The poor pilot's hand holding relationship is such that there is no recognition between skill required and the reality of what is required.
Conscientious pilots are noted for spending a proportionate greater amount of time in consideration of the flying they have done and are going to do. The pretentious among us would claim more for themselves and their aircraft than exists. There is something every pilot can do to remedy any proliferation of this condition.
1. Don't try to dominate pilot conversations.
2. Hand fly at every opportunity.
3. Fly new places and different aircraft.
4. Fly with anyone who will fly
5. Safe is not the same as risk free.
Trying to Define Risk:
To the degree that behavior is consistent and predictable it can be measured. Why do certain pilots take unnecessary risks? Student pilots are unlikely to take risks because they have entered a world of uncertainty and doubts. Private pilots at 5 to 500 hours are beginning to think that they know how to fly. The VFR pilot uses surface features to correlate position to the chart. Situational awareness is a region of comfort brought by knowing where you have been, are now and will be. Industrial accident studies have shown that a given risk situation can occur up to 300 times before an accident actually occurs. This type of study does not apply to flying or aircraft. In air and ground operations there are differences in that there is a consistent combination of elements that lead to accidents. Time is such an element. Weather is another element. Every flight, regardless of locality distance or time of day, contains the same elements of risk. Risk control improves as the pilot acquires preparation, proficiency, and situational awareness .
Flying a given direct route is about ten times more dangerous than driving the same route by road. Every person knows more people who have been killed while flying than they know who have been killed in cars. Flying is not as safe as pilots think it is. For every one-hundred million automobile miles fewer that two people are killed. Not quite two people are killed in every aircraft accident. One of these accidents occur every day of the year on average. Flying fatality rate is nearly 18 per one-hundred million miles. It would seem that the biggest factor of difference between the rates lies in the control the 'driver' has over what happens. Risk exposure in terms of what you can do about what happens is much greater in cars.
Pilots deliberately undertake a known risk every time they fly. Assumption that any existing risk is manageable can be instantly removed. Do pilots get better in assessment of risk? There is no certainty in life or flying. A pilot who is self-confident of his ability to fly complex aircraft into complex situations will not seek out these situations but will get gratification by showing that his mastery will actually reduce the risk. Such a pilot is cautious when dealing with the fuzzy areas of safety.
Creating Risk
Safety is a fundamental in flight instruction. However, there are variations in the quality of the safety instruction being given. A student may be paranoid in his need to maintain a traffic watch. One of my recent students had, early on attended an AOPA seminar about mid-airs and arrived in my hands in such a condition. Mid-airs do occur but concomitant to this should be probability, survival rates and avoidance. The quality of safety instruction exists only in the totality of the presentation.
Recently, I was working a pilot through his flight review. Today took our second flight. Initially did some airwork after finding that pilot was unclear as to meaning of "Demonstrated Crosswind Capability". He indicated that he never flew in crosswinds above 13 knots. We got that straightened and also the use of flaps. Just as I did many years ago he believed that every landing had to use full flaps.
The higher aircraft performance the more efficient must be both traffic scan and radio procedures. Rate of closure often requires rapid interpretation and response as when a Hawker Jet was pointed-out to us. He failed to interpret the Hawker's five-mile final to our turning down wind. He looked all over the sky until I told him where and how to look Laziness is the source of inventive genius.
The poor landing is the place when a pilot can suffer the greatest damage to ego. Weather is where he is more likely to end the aging process. Weather accidents are more often to have serious or fatal results. The VFR pilot who challenges weather is raising the risk level of the entire flight. The IFR pilot on the same flight has an increased risk level but much lower than the VFR pilot because of a higher skill and experience level in dealing with weather. Both IFR and VFR pilots have greatly increased risk levels when flying at night. In all cases the primary risk of a pilot lies in the thought-processes available and used.
Beyond that, he never gave his altitude on any radio call. He had always believed that he was always giving position information to someone on the ground. When an airplane was pointed-out by ATC he never included his altitude as part of his location and response. He would continue to seek out and find an airplane even though its flight direction and altitude could not possibly pose a conflict. Being able to interpret the third dimension of traffic avoidance had never been taught to this particular pilot. Situational awareness must be three-dimensional. A decrease in ceiling and visibility is a major risk factor to the VFR pilot. The same ceiling and visibility need not be hazardous to the IFR pilot unless it is accompanied by turbulence. The risk is always there. A higher training level is one of the ways a pilot can control some areas of risk. Improved judgment usually accompanies additional training, or at least it should. A pilot must accept the fact that there is always some risk available and just waiting for the opportunity to become active.
Reducing the Risks
Pilots can reduce the already low probability of a midair collision by flying where risks are lowest. Avoid altitudes of even thousands and five hundreds. Fly standard patterns. Avoid VORs. Avoid airways and be vigilant when crossing since airways are eight miles wide. Do your airwork over hills when possible since direction requirements are effective when 3000 feet AGL. Know local obstacles as they intrude into your safe zones. Find your safe night altitudes during daylight. Don't fly IFR corridors during low visibility VFR.
Once you have determined where to fly safely, you are ready to use your eyes and communications. When making an arrival call-up use a prominent local checkpoint referencing your position one-mile to either side. Some checkpoints collect airplanes like flies. Try to use uncommon but known checkpoints both to educate ATC and other pilots. Always include your altitude in radio calls even to ATC. You do this as an advisory to other pilots. When making a departure I suggest that you request of ATC to proceed on-course to a specific destination. Wide angle departures such as downwind, crosswind, or straight-out can be valid over 90 degrees or more. A destination allows other pilots to draw a mental line as to where to look for you. Make a study of aircraft appearance and performance so you know what to look for and what to expect.
I teach a careful selection of flight areas, routes and altitudes for safety. It is not unusual for us to fly a two hour lesson without encountering a single aircraft in one of the most heavily flown areas of the world. When we do see aircraft it is remarkable how my emphasis upon unusual altitudes gives us an additional margin of safety. My expectation is that my students will pass this practice on to those pilots who come under their influence.
Just by staying out of high performance planes and adverse weather survival rates improve markedly. The aircraft that cuts travel time by a factor of three increases the accident probability factor by ten. What we do in the air is dangerous. Knowing the degree of risk exposure is vital information not often available to the inexperienced pilot. An accident is the end result of a chain of events. A short flight is statistically no safer than a long one. They both have an equal number of events that can and may go wrong.
Single pilot operations have an increase in risk factors. The single pilot is more likely to be ego driven to do things that would not be done before another pilot. Far too many pilots fly in a manner of seeking the reward of the thrill without being prepared to manage the risk. An airplane is a precious commodity that does not lend itself to carelessness or abuse.
Factors that both increase and decrease risk.
1. Self confidence
2. Organized and disciplined
3. Patient to avoid precipitous actions, yet willing to act.
4. Gathers information and updates when able.
5. Emotions are separated from decisions
6. Communicates easily
7. Committed to proficiency and currency
8. Gives precedence to safety over all other considerations.
9. Density altitude that is most likely to be ignored by operators of high performance aircraft.
10. When your brakes fail, consider changing seats to use the other set of brakes.
11. The computability of safety and conditioned behavior is open to question.
12. Find an appropriate and expedient way to resolve problems.
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