Mooney_Driver wrote:
As a father of a year old daughter I have to ask myself serious questions here and it is not yet clear if I will continue flying after all that has happened combined with the fact that time has become a very precious commodity. Personally I think the 12 hours a year currency is not anywhere close enough to operate safely, someone who does not fly more than once a week has to question whether not to be honest with themselfs and find a hobby which is not so demanding. I tend to believe that 100 hrs p.a plus regular proficiency checks would be a more adequate minimum requirement, but then of course this would ground 90% of all PPLs immediately.I agree! My amount of flying started dropping rapidly when when my oldest kids were 3 and 1. A year or so later I stopped flying entirely. I resumed 18 years later when the youngest one was 16. It was easier than I expected to renew both the PPL and the IR, so it is never too late to return to flying.
I really don’t think that the bulk of the very low currency community that has difficulties even e.g. looking up the ATIS frequency and listening to it, let alone planning a simple 100nm trip has low currency because they are – forgive the stereotype – men in their 30s who have been banned by their wife from flying because they are supposed to “behave like responsible fathers” 
Although 100 hours would be a good number to really stay proficient – it is completely unrealistic.That’s more than 8 hours per month, and for a high percentage of PPL pilots that’s unaffordable, and a big part of the rest does not have the time … And then we have the weather. In my 23 years of flying (and the 33 years before that when I flew with my father without a licence) I have seen many winters where it was not possible to fly VFR for two months. … And Bavaria is not the worst part of northern Europe for weather.
If PPL pilots flew 50 hours per year the safety level would be raised significantly. And it would climb even more if pilots would actually practice. Just ask yourself: How many deadstick landings, go-arounds or other maneuvers (stalls, steep tuns, …) have you done this year? I admit i didn’t do many …. but at least I practiced two full days this year and did a one week IFR refresher and emergency training… in 2016. I should do that every year, but I don’t … for the same reasons you don’t. No time, other obligations, weather too bad or too bad on the one day where you could get away … kids’ birthday, grandma’s anniversary. There’s always something. And I shouldn’t complain, because beeing self employed I can run away more easily than most people.
By the way: This is not only a topic in flying. How many people do I know who have a driver’s licence, and how many of those have ever practiced doing an emergency braking maneuver? I have done a couple of these courses, and some short race driver courses, so I think i can do it “ok”. But really, nobody ever practices anything. People sit in offices all year, no sports, then they go to the Swiss Alps for skiing and pretend they are great downhill racers. Not only to they break their arms and legs, some get killed every year. I shouldn’t talk though: Relatively unfit I “showed” my kids how to properly jump on skis in February and tore a cruciate ligament in my left knee … 7 months later i still feel like an idiot.
Do the same stupid stuff in airplanes and you will kill yourself easily. Go to youtube and search for “barrel roll … Cessna”.
What I wanted to say: Many people behave the same in all aspects of life. The problem with flying is that the consequences are much tougher. In my small carreer as a CRI, doing free BFRs for club members and some private pilots in my area I have flown with some people who should really not fly. “Do I really have to do a steep turn, the last time I didn’t have to” is a sentence I remember. It was only two I can recall in the last ten years, but still. But then, a CRI has no power to stop a pilot flying, and it takes a lot of guts to report an unsafe pilot to the authorities. My way was to practice with them, but how much can you really do in an afternoon?
I have also flown with many great pilots. I felt kinda stupid doing the BFR with an airline guy who does aerobatics in his Extra … but I learned some new stuff :-)
Unfortunately it’s always only the real enthusiasts and experts who practice…
One difficulty in this discussion is that most of the stuff we train for, or are supposed to train for, e.g. engine failures, actually happens very very rarely.
If engine failures were common, GA would be wiped out, because a % of forced landings kills or severely injures the occupants and eventually most pilots would be too scared to continue, and most of the rest would be dead.
I recall reading an account from an ultralight pilot who said an engine failure can be expected every 100-200hrs. He was flying something like this
and some of those engines are terrible, not to mention the build quality of the whole thing, but against that you have a very low stall speed of 20-30kt.
Mechanical failures in general are very rare. The report makes that very clear.
So the issue is not training more for the stuff which almost never happens.
It is training the very basics of preflight and flying itself, and keeping those (rather basic) skills current.
Peter wrote:
It is training the very basics of preflight and flying itself, and keeping those (rather basic) skills current.
I agree but training the stuff that happen rarely is also important. I can draw a parallel to cave diving – we always train few basic stuff like out-of-gas drill and valves manipulation drill however the unlikely the events where you need this are. But it happens from time to time and if you’re not current it bites you. And when it bites you in the underwater cave 1 km away from the entrance it means only one thing – you’re done. Clogged regulator situation (from some debris, almost unable to breath from it) happened to my buddy last year 1.5 km from cave entrance – we shared the gas, he closed the valve on one tank, disassemled reg, cleared it, assembled again, opend valve, checked everything and we continued the dive towards the exit. I don’t see much difference in practicing engine out scenarios.
That’s a very good point, and this forum helps a lot with this (in my mind, reading Euroga is part of what keeps me current).
There are some things in the survey which really surprise me, although maybe they shouldn’t; like the average hours (620) of the respondents, feels a lot higher than what it should be. There is obviously a bias in the survey, which is that it didn’t reached pilots who are currently not into flying.
Practicing engine out scenarios is defintely a good idea. They are rare, but that’s why they are so dangerous. And they are especially dangerous in IMC. Flying IFR there’s some other stuff that should be practiced – and learned, and repeated every now and then. I for one FORGET stuff I have learned. Good system knowledge is very important. In the Cirrus for example it can be life saving to really understand the electrical system – and what it does in case one of the alternators dies.
Pilots of HPA and turbine aircraft, and of course of all jets, get professional and standardized training, and they simply have to learn that stuff for the type rating. In the SEP sector Cirrus has done a great step towards a “mini type rating” with their CSIP program – and with the decision (only some weeks ago) to pay for the transition training even for used airplanes. Probably other companies have similar programs (Diamond?).
There is obviously a bias in the survey, which is that it didn’t reached pilots who are currently not into flying.
I am not a statistician but AFAIK one could have addressed that by going out into the field and walking up to random pilots and asking them some questions, and compare the data with the other (main) data. The problem with walking is that it tends to involve the use of legs and the whole point of getting a PhD is to minimise the use of legs 
(only kidding). My GF used to be a PhD supervisor…
training the stuff that happen rarely is also important
Agreed, but one needs to attack the biggest stuff first. I don’t think it is being even touched, whereas forced landings etc have an established coverage in the syllabus.
Balliol wrote:
I know that’s an extreme compared to what may be required for an average PPL, but it amazes me that people will happily go years without practicing a stall or forced landing until their biennial check
One recent accident, quite close to home, two guys needing to get home, inadvertent entry to IMC, loss of control, both perished. The accident will be noted ‘weather related’. In the USA this year there have been a large number of accidents where the term ‘weather related’ crops up. In all of these incidents, weather causal is a more appropriate term. It would seem that in the vast majority of the cases, nothing wrong with the aeroplane, but a huge amount wrong with the decision making process. Inadvertent entry to IMC, inadvertent entry into storm cells, arriving at the airfield with a 200 overcast, all flying VFR, in IMC conditions, and the list goes on. There is not nearly enough training in these areas. From the concept of lets look at the weather, both actual and forecast, and understand what it is telling us, to the made a hash of it, ended up in the crud, and requiring a thorough knowledge of upset recovery techniques. The concern is that if pilots continue to crash, with perfectly operable aeroplanes, onto roads, and houses, and sometimes people, then sooner or later an authority will look at the situation, and recommend that the industry sorts itself out, or they will. No one wants that.
There was an accident in the USA, September 15, that really bothered me: Guy with 150 h TT, VFR only, takes off in his SR20, from an Airport in the Rocky Mountains, in the middle of the night, into IMC, with thunderstorms all around the area (football games in the are were cancelled) … and with his wife and two small kids on board. CFIT a short time after takeoff, all dead …
I am not sure that you educate people with that mindset … I mean that’s so far away from intelligent decision making.
