VFR At Night - SAFELY

[Eric Janson]

In the country where I live night VFR with a single engine piston aircraft is prohibited.

However you could take that same aircraft and legally fly night IFR with it - infinitely more dangerous imho.

The logic behind this escapes me.

[Colonel]

I've never really understood the difference between night VFR and night IFR.

Sometimes you can see something, and sometimes you can't.  You'd better not
rely on seeing very much.

Not sure I buy that single-engine night / IFR is all that dangerous.  99% of the time
it's the pilot that fails, not the engine.  So, if you arrange for the pilot to not fail, and
you don't fly junk, it's really not that much more dangerous than during the day.

The biggest thing that single-engine has going for it, is that if the pilot can actually
NOT LOSE CONTROL and touch down under control, the certification requirement
of a Vso of 61k (70mph) or less, means that you just need 25 feet to decelerate,
which is not much.  Ask Arlo to explain the high school physics.  Bet he can't.

People make a big deal out of engine failure in a single, but it's really not that hard.

[size=14pt]Don't lose control, and put your shoulder harness on.[/size]

If you do those two simple things, you will survive.  If you don't, come back to me and
we'll discuss it some more.  Call me PM MacKenzie King, who used to run Canada
based on his seances and crystal ball, which provided counsel from his dead dog and
mother, whom he was fixated on.  Probably Canada's best Liberal PM:

https://www.e-know.ca/regions/east-koot ... nzie-king/

[JW Scud]

[quote author=Eric Janson link=topic=10258.msg29704#msg29704 date=1576885633]
In the country where I live night VFR with a single engine piston aircraft is prohibited.

However you could take that same aircraft and legally fly night IFR with it - infinitely more dangerous imho.

The logic behind this escapes me.
[/quote]

I don’t believe you are living in a country known for logical thinking. I have done a fair amount of single night VFR. Don’t remember any significant issues but never had to do a forced landing either. More of a calculated risk.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

There are thousands of single engine two people airplanes.

How many two hundred people single engine airplanes are there?

[Colonel]

Two engines is not always safer than one, because most pilots aren't
trained to handle a real engine failure in a twin, and they do this:

[url=[/url]

and that's with a [i]turbine[/i] twin - not a lowly piston twin.

If that was a PC-12 that took off, instead of a King Air, and an engine failed at rotation, he
would have had a much better chance of survival.  All the single engine pilot has to do after
an engine failure after takeoff, is

[size=18pt]let go of the control column[/size]

which lets the nose drop, avoiding a stall.  The airplane will land itself much, much better than
that King Air in Addison, which burned upside down in a hangar.

With the popular decrease in pilot handling skills - they can't even handle a crosswind - two
engines decreases safety.  Doubles the chance of an engine failure, and they simply are
incapable of dealing with yaw.

An engine failure in a single merely requires that the pilot tighten his shoulder harness, keep
the wings level, and slowly trim all the way back for minimum speed at impact, which as I
mentioned before, requires 25 feet.  That's pretty simple, and maximizes the chances of
survival, but you would be amazed at how many pilots are incapable of even doing that.  The
idea of putting [i]those[/i] people at the controls of a twin is scary.  Irresponsible to the point
of homicidal, actually.

Given a good pilot, two engines is safer than one, but over 90% of the time, you won't have
what I call a good pilot at the controls, any more.  Single engine is safer for the weak pilots,
because the failure mode is less challenging (and they even manage to screw that up)

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Who's to blame for poor pilot training?

And even more important who is to blame for them having been given a license?

[Eric Janson]

Some interesting points being made - one of the good things about this Forum.

If I'm flying IFR I'd always chose 2 or more engines.

I have zero turboprop experience so I'm not sure if I'd be happy flying a single engine turboprop IFR.

[Colonel]

Who's to blame for poor pilot training?

Back up a bit and ask, "Why are pilots so shitty?"

A 1000 hour pilot is going to be a totally different animal than a 50 hour PPL
and that is, as it should be.  Experience - hopefully - results in increased knowledge
and skill.

But why are 50hr PPL's so shitty?  And why does it even take them 100 or 200 hours
and years (at a government-funded pupply mill) to get even a basic PPL?

Civilian flight training, in my opinion, has no emphasis on efficiency and is terribly
unfocused and is concerned with all the wrong things.

A 50hr PPL should develop a foundation of skills to build upon, and that's what's
missing.  Skill is considered unimportant in the 21st Century.  Wearing the right
shirt and reading a long, long checklist in the cockpit is where it's at.

[size=18pt]WRONG[/size]

If there was ONE THING I could do, to improve civilian PPL flight training, it would
be to emphasize high-alpha flight.  See, this skill has been bred out of the pilot
population.  Instructors fear stalls and spins, and their students inevitably have less
skill at dealing with them.  This is not a good trend.

High alpha flight needs to be taught differently.  The TC brain trust wants to emphasize
airspeed and altitude control when students are just learning to fly at high alpha, and
that's incredibly fucking stupid.

Take the student up to 4000 AGL, put 20 flap and 1500 RPM on, and cover up the dashboard
so the student has to

[size=18pt]LOOK OUTSIDE[/size]

and he ignores the airspeed and the altimeter.  He must learn to fly the airplane on the stall
warning indicator, however it is implemented.  This requires practice.  No one gets good at
this without spending considerable time doing it.

The student must learn to asymmetrically stall a wing, drop it, and recover, and continue
high alpha flight.  This is not an optional skill.  This is a required skill, if you want to avoid
becoming just another numb-nuts four bar looking for a place to dig a hole.

[size=18pt]CONTROL YAW WITH YOUR FEET[/size]

First, the student must learn to control the AOA, just shy of CLmax.  One degree of alpha
can make all the difference.

Once the student learns to control the aircraft precisely, other stuff like airspeed control
on final and centerline control during crosswind landings, can be worked upon.

But nobody gives a shit about skill any more.  Crashing is just a "learning experience".



Future four bars.  All white shirt, no feet.  Gotta love aviation in the 21st Century!

Advanced Note (which means I am completely wasting my time):  After you learn to
see yaw, and control it with your feet, in a multi-engine aircraft you have asymmetric
thrust available to help you control yaw, too.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

If there was ONE THING I could do, to improve civilian PPL flight training, it would
be to emphasize high-alpha flight.  See, this skill has been bred out of the pilot
population.  Instructors fear stalls and spins, and their students inevitably have less
skill at dealing with them.  This is not a good trend.

High alpha flight needs to be taught differently.  The TC brain trust wants to emphasize
airspeed and altitude control when students are just learning to fly at high alpha, and
that's incredibly fucking stupid.

At least one person here knows the reason why.

The problem we have is how do we get rid of the incredibly fucking stupid people who are responsible for flight training in TC?

[Colonel]

The problem that you and I have, Chuck, is that we labor under the
false impression that there are people at TC who care as much about
aviation as we do.  I think you'd have to look pretty hard, to find anyone
there that honestly gave a flying fuck at a donut about aviation.

I know this is bizarre, given their hyper-micro-management style,
but that's about reinforcing their [i]power[/i], not ensuring [i]quality[/i].

They could just as easily be employed by Supply & Services, or Indian Affairs.

It's just a government, bureaucratic job to them, with politics and pensions
and promotions and defined benefits.  Fisheries or Aviation, all the same to them.

One improves aviation [i]despite[/i] TC - not with their assistance.

Your tax dollars, spent wisely.

This guy spends [i]my[/i] tax dollars more wisely than I can:

[img width=500 height=332]https://s.hdnux.com/photos/36/56/73/805 ... 20x920.jpg[/img]

The only thing better than his hair, is his teeth.