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Getting the "leans"...

How many people get the "leans" when in IMC?

It's caused by the balance organs telling you weird things about the aircraft motion. I have read somewhere that almost everybody suffers from it, but I almost never do.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I think I have. I recall once flying in and out of cloud (cumulus) near the tops and I passed through two columns of cloud with the AI level, but I had a visual sense and a physical sense I think of feeling like I was leaning over and needing to make a significant correction - which was not required. Maybe it was the angle of the cloud formation, however I don't recall having the leans either in solid IMC or VMC-on-top. Though when hand flying I have noticed being at an angle of 10 degrees and not having sensed the angle of bank, but I think that's a different thing - that's just an error, and probably a breakdown in the instrument flow technique.

For me, the "leans" was a sensation I had to get used to. I remember that during the first hours of IR training in IMC I was suffering from the leans quite badly, including nausea and disorientation. As a VFR pilot I was depending so much on visual cues, that once they were gone, my body couldn't cope with it ;-)

I learned to ignore the signals from the balance organs. When I fly IFR in VMC I still fly primary on the instruments, so that when I encounter IMC I don't need to "switch".

I learned a trick to reset the brain when suffering the leans: "Move your head up. Look to the ceiling. Slowly move your head down without moving your eyes. Look back on the Attitude Indicator. The leans will be gone..."

As you write lenthamen, I was also suffering during my instrument training. I started my training after 300 hours VFR so perhaps that does make things worse, as I'm so used to visual cues.

I still get it occasionally when hand flying in IMC and making turns, but haven't experienced it in the enroute phase of the flight so far.

Perhaps it's also something you get used to and you learn to totally disregard those signals. Just as some people with a slight tinnitus learn not to listen to it, even if it's there.

Similar to PiperArcher, I only ever seem to get them when flying in between or in very close proximity on top of cloud. I think this is from the tendency to assume that a horizontal line in front of you equates to the horizon when it may very well not.

United Kingdom

Another illustration of how unreliable the accelerometers in our heads are, well at least this head of mine:

At FL100, looking at down at my iPad, IFR in VMC. After 20s or so, looked up again. Was banking 30 degrees, heading 90 degrees off. Apparently the autopilot got disconnected somehow. ATC diplomatically told me that my next waypoint was in a different direction.

Did not need any stimulants to stay awake for the remainer of the flight..

Yep guys, in spite of this funny cartoon of some airline pilots, text: 'always trust yer instruments' while their ties were hanging up (can't find it right now), I would indeed say: trust your instruments and not what your senses tell you.

Private field, Mallorca, Spain

I never got any "leans" - beyond the initial funny feeling induced by rolling out of a 360 in IMC, or the slight turning sensations you get when climbing; with a bit of experience they slipped below the level of conscious awareness. When I take students into IMC, and have them fly some manoeuvres to get them used to these sensations, I notice them in myself but only so far in the background that they are irrelevant.

But, one day, I got proper vertigo, I had to concentrate very hard to keep the aircraft upright and was really worried the AI it might have failed, but suction was ok and all other instruments agreed that I was in a shallow climb. Even keeping up the scan was difficult for a minute, then my inner ear calmed down and all was back to normal. This happened shortly after entering low cloud after take-off (not immediately though, took a few seconds in cloud before it happened). Never had it since, and nothing in my practical training did ever come close to it.

Not sure I would want to subject a PPL student to that, although that would certainly teach them to stay away from cloud... but the RSPCS (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty against Students) would have me arrested...

Biggin Hill

No leans yet but 2.5'' gyros scare me.... 10" any day!!

I had them very badly one night flying in IMC during my training for my Australian IR in a Be-76. It was very turbulent in a layer of cloud. I was navigating the old way with VORs and I had to refer to my chart and retune the radio. There was some distant lightning and I was very much faced with the classic problem. When I looked up at my instruments my body was telling me I was about to stall in a climbing left turn when in fact I was entering a right spiral dive. Now my instructor knew what was happening and would have corrected had I not caught it but it showed me that the leans is very real and very dangerous.

EGTK Oxford

Had it twice, once in solid IMC and once in solid VFR over water. I can understand the one in the IMC but the one over water was strange. The swel wasat a slight angle to the aircraft's path which caused me to want to drop the right wing. In both cases it was very dificult to follow the instruments and ignore the rest.

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