UK AAIB(H) May 2012
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Good post well made.
I don't like talking about my experience and prefer the logic of the argument to speak but when I was about 12years old I was flying with a then very experienced pilot on a rough dark night somewhere between Yorks and Lancs - I remember the importance attached to keeping sufficient visual references - (this had all ways been important in all my ordinary flying up until then also) - As we started to run out of 'easy cues' I started to think that it was hard to see enough to fly - he started to get impatient with my (obviously now in hindsight) ineptitude, he kept re-emphasising to keep visual refs - I could not see how - gave control back - watched carefully, asked questions and could see how it was done. Subsequently there were many more permutations which re-enforced the ABSOLUTENESS of the need and possibility to GUARANTEE keeping sufficient references.
Since then I have flown with many other pilots (professional and private) and am often surprised to find a half-arsed approach to keeping visual references... one such inadequate method is to choose an arbitrary visibility limit in which it is deemed that there is an unacceptable risk to become Inadvertently IMC. It is not Inadvertent under those circumstances it is Inevitable.
One helpful thought is that a pilot can manoeuver to determin the absence of cloud (or other obstructions) - you can't just rely on avoiding clouds you have to avoid places which could be cloud. So i agree you cannot see all IMC but you can see what is definately not IMC.
I have now since flown all over the world through most of the worst weather in the world by day and night - but I have never been 'forced' to loose Visual References.
I think the early introduction of IMC flight makes pilots casual about temporary loss of Cues - particularly since as you say the consequences are trivial in those cases you allude to. I find it hard to understand how in the Police role anyone is getting close to being unable to GUARANTEE keeping visual references other than (as you observe) it's not very important to those pilots to stay Visual since the consequences are trivial... ?
This mindset results in advice which may be inappropriate to VMC pilots... IM(H)O
I don't like talking about my experience and prefer the logic of the argument to speak but when I was about 12years old I was flying with a then very experienced pilot on a rough dark night somewhere between Yorks and Lancs - I remember the importance attached to keeping sufficient visual references - (this had all ways been important in all my ordinary flying up until then also) - As we started to run out of 'easy cues' I started to think that it was hard to see enough to fly - he started to get impatient with my (obviously now in hindsight) ineptitude, he kept re-emphasising to keep visual refs - I could not see how - gave control back - watched carefully, asked questions and could see how it was done. Subsequently there were many more permutations which re-enforced the ABSOLUTENESS of the need and possibility to GUARANTEE keeping sufficient references.
Since then I have flown with many other pilots (professional and private) and am often surprised to find a half-arsed approach to keeping visual references... one such inadequate method is to choose an arbitrary visibility limit in which it is deemed that there is an unacceptable risk to become Inadvertently IMC. It is not Inadvertent under those circumstances it is Inevitable.
One helpful thought is that a pilot can manoeuver to determin the absence of cloud (or other obstructions) - you can't just rely on avoiding clouds you have to avoid places which could be cloud. So i agree you cannot see all IMC but you can see what is definately not IMC.
I have now since flown all over the world through most of the worst weather in the world by day and night - but I have never been 'forced' to loose Visual References.
I think the early introduction of IMC flight makes pilots casual about temporary loss of Cues - particularly since as you say the consequences are trivial in those cases you allude to. I find it hard to understand how in the Police role anyone is getting close to being unable to GUARANTEE keeping visual references other than (as you observe) it's not very important to those pilots to stay Visual since the consequences are trivial... ?
This mindset results in advice which may be inappropriate to VMC pilots... IM(H)O
AnFI
Imagine you are looking for a bad boy at night, you have selected what seems like a good height to keep you out of the cloud and can't operate lower or you may alert said bad boy to your presence. You may be in the hover or flying a racetrack pattern whilst the sensor operator is tracking the villain - the mobile weather system you are flying in produces a shower that drags the cloudbase down just as you turn into it - voila, instant and pretty much unavoidable IIMC.
It seems your experience of flying will remain a mystery as you have failed to give details on so many other threads but you don't appear to have done a job where IIMC is a real threat due to operational pressure.
I find it hard to understand how in the Police role anyone is getting close to being unable to GUARANTEE keeping visual references
It seems your experience of flying will remain a mystery as you have failed to give details on so many other threads but you don't appear to have done a job where IIMC is a real threat due to operational pressure.
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Careful Crab I think you have met your match here. This guy has been flying helicopters NVFR since he was 12 years old when most of us were still at school. He knows a thing or two I'll warrant.
Last edited by Epiphany; 16th May 2012 at 16:32.
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just as you turn into it - voila, instant and pretty much unavoidable IIMC.
There just seems to be a strange (to me) mindset that it is something that happens to you - whereas it's really something you (one) do(es)
You can't just fly where you want unconditionally - it must be conditional on an instant basis...
Anyway I don't want to demean anyone - but it has to be a half-arsed attempt to stay visual if you'll just turn into something you can't be sure is not a cloud
AnFI - as mentioned previously, your 'experience' does not extend to situations where just flying the helicopter is not the only issue - in the military, the police and other types of flying you are operating the helicopter to achieve a mission and sometimes that mission takes priority. IIMC is a risk which is why such missions are conducted in an IFR capable twin with suitably qualified pilots such that IIMC is just an inconvenience and not a drama.
No-one is being blase about entering cloud but sometimes bad things happen.
There have been several occasions when I haven't wanted to go IMC but, in trying to complete a critical mission (lifesaving) in marginal weather, it happened because the weather is unpredictable, especially in the mountains.
No-one is being blase about entering cloud but sometimes bad things happen.
There have been several occasions when I haven't wanted to go IMC but, in trying to complete a critical mission (lifesaving) in marginal weather, it happened because the weather is unpredictable, especially in the mountains.
I can't believe this thread is still running - really. The same points have been made a dozen times by a dozen pilots and yet AnFI still won't concede to the reality of situations that catch out even the most highly trained and experienced of us.
Time to move on methinks...
Time to move on methinks...
