http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-28778728
I am surprised no one has created a thread already on this, and I wouldnt want it to be distasteful as there are the obvious jokes to be made. But it genuinely interested me that a Captain on what I assume was the Dash-8 type in the image, which I think (as a passenger) is a fairly more lively aircraft that some of the jet engine types, would be able to operate in a Captain capacity. Dont get me wrong I certainly wouldnt want to deny anyone the ability to fly (though more cautiously in control of commercial aircraft), and humanely, its great he can.
In the GA world wouldnt one always need a safety pilot? One could argue that the P2 is your safety pilot, but there only now seems to be a brief from the Captain on what to do if the situation happens again. Take off and landing, really do need both hands in co-ordination, and although split-second decisions have to be made, rightly or wrongly, I think the P2 should have ‘jumped in’ and said ‘I have control’. Maybe there wasnt enough time – I dont want to be criticising a safe landing, but I did think the CAA would mandate a special procedure in case it happened.
Or is that the OTT gold-plating we on the other hand (pun not intended actually) we often despise?
Sounds armless to me.
Somebody had to do it… 
For clarity’s sake: the arm did not come off the pilot. Of course making it seem so helps drawing public interest ==> $€£$€£$€£$€£$€£$€£
Honni soit qui mal y pense.
In the GA world wouldn’t one always need a safety pilot?
In the GA world, I think it is obvious to the pilot that he/she is missing an arm and it might be a slightly higher risk, they can make their own decisions.
I would argue that it also is quite obvious to any passengers so they can make up their own mind [informed consent and all that].
And the general public is quite safe, given that the number of pilots falling from the sky due to stupid mistakes is several orders of magnitude higher than the theoretical numbers of one-armed pilots crashing, especially if you keep in mind that the risk is concentrated around the flare, so the worst case is not likely to affect innocent bystanders. I am sure that if I hurt my hand in the cruise and could not use it again until after the landing, nobody would get hurt except maybe the undercarriage [losing it in the flare might be a different matter. I once had a student knock my hand off the throttle when I tried to initiate a go-around after a bounce, so I HAD to land off it, wasn’t funny at all].
So one can’t get a Class 1 with less than perfect sight in both eyes but prosthetic arms are ok?!
