Does a checklist make a bad pilot a good pilot?

[Eric Janson]

To answer the question - no it doesn't.

The objective of any flight is to take-off, perform your flight and land without hurting yourself, your passengers or your aircraft. A checklist is a tool to help accomplish this.

As PIC your primary task is to fly the aircraft. Everything else is secondary to this.

On the aircraft I fly we do "flows" to set everything and then use a checklist to verify a number of items have been done correctly.

That's how the manufacturer wants the aircraft to be flown.

From the time we sit in the seat until top of climb we have 30 items on our checklist.

From Descent to parking we have 23 items on our checklist with a further 7 items if we are powering the aircraft down.

it's not excessive and only 4 items are done from take-off to 10000 and only 4 items are done from 10000 to landing.

In a multi-crew operation one Pilot flies and the other Pilot monitors and reads any checklist.

We frequently fly with 2 or even 3 Captains. All Captains are qualified to sit in the right seat but only as the non flying Pilot. Our company has seat specific tasks when the aircraft is on the ground so there are different flows depending on the seat you are occupying. It's easy to miss something especially if you haven't sat in one seat or the other for any length of time.

Most of my flying consists of 11+30 flights at night across the ocean. We may be 800nm from the nearest airport. This does require careful preparation. We use a long range checklist to make sure all steps have been done correctly.

Last year I was sent to a completely unfamiliar part of the World to fly a different model of the aircraft I normally fly with people I had never met before. You still have to be able to complete your flight safely under these conditions.

Regarding jet engines

Most larger jet engines have some recommended practices to reduce wear on the components.

For example on the CFM56 you ideally want to idle the engine for 3 minutes after start or before shutdown for thermal stabilisation.

On the CFM56 10 minutes at idle thrust will give lower EGT on take-off (prevents an overtemp when its +46C outside).

[Colonel]

idle the engine for 3 minutes

Not sure what airports you are flying out of,
but even at my tiny, quiet little airport, I can't
taxi and backtrack for takeoff (and vice versa)
in less than 3 minutes.

I should mention that some guys like to taxi
out with some engines shut off, to save fuel
in the long lineup for takeoff.

Piston guys transitioning to jets are usually
amazed at how much kerosene you can burn
on the ground, before takeoff.  See previous
comment about idle RPM.

L39 for example is around 150 gph in cruise,
300+ gph on takeoff, and 70 gph at 56% idle.

My father once told me about when he was
on Sabres in Europe, they all got drunk and
there was a MiG scramble.  They climbed into
the wrong airplanes - which were armed - got
lost taxiing around the airport and burned so
much fuel screwing around on the ground and
taxiing the wrong way they had to come back
and refuel.  The glory days of the RCAF.  My
poor father remembers holding onto the leg
of Mitch (an incredible shot, drunk or sober)
as Mitch tried to climb into my father's Sabre.

[Liquid Charlie]

Damn -- site blocked me from replying when I was using my VPN -- interesting

Piston guys transitioning to jets are usually
amazed at how much kerosene you can burn
on the ground, before takeoff.  See previous
comment about idle RPM.

I can remember taking 3000 lbs of taxi fuel during the ice storm in YOW --

Check Lists -- I guess we are splitting hairs here a little because I'm thinking we are referring to written/read hard copy check lists as opposed to a flow checks (which I consider a check list) -- flying single pilot I never use a check list but rather a flow check but with  multi crew - of course -- because it's a division of duties and how else would you make sure someone didn't fuck up -- look at Korean Air -- forgot mode selector and proceeded to get shot down --

that's my slant on check lists ---

[Nark1]

My take: military aviation see, to like the idea of "read-and-do".  However there is a little provision in the rules that state " When time doesn't permit, you may forgo a checklist." 
The idea, is that if your getting shot at...

On the civilian side a checklist is exactly that, check "what you should have done during your flow" list.
We must under all circumstances use a checklist. However the smartest thing to do is not fall blindly to a checklist.
On the Airbus we need a 3 minute warm up if they We're running  within he last 2 hours if not, 5 minutes. We single engine taxi as often as we can to conserve fuel. (Not that we are under fueled, but rather we pay for it, and it effects my annual bonus)

The hardest transition into a high by-pass turbo fan, is the delay in power response. You need to anticipate power adjustments. And conversely, slowing down and descending. Choose one, because your not going to do both.

[Strega]

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of flying the "cozy Jet"  was a blast!

The only Checkist items in the cockpit (the guy that owns it is an ex F14 navy guy) are start RPM and Temps,  and  "Dont Do Nuthin Stupid"

[Liquid Charlie]

slowing down and descendin

  -- explain that notion to ATC -- lmfaooooo

[Colonel]

The hardest transition into a high by-pass turbo fan, is the delay in power response. You need to anticipate power adjustments.

Exactly - it's all about the throttle.  Combine
that with significant momentum, and you'd
better be ahead of the aircraft.

I tell people that the current airspeed is of
only historical interest - the trend of the
airspeed is what matters.

I'm not sure pilots are interested, but they
are in the closed-loop control business.  See
the "PID loop":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PID_controller



This stuff has been around for what, 100 years?
We should try to learn stuff that has been
understood for the last century.

[Eric Janson]

Not sure what airports you are flying out of,
but even at my tiny, quiet little airport, I can't
taxi and backtrack for takeoff (and vice versa)
in less than 3 minutes.

I should mention that some guys like to taxi
out with some engines shut off, to save fuel
in the long lineup for takeoff.

I agree that under normal conditions it will take more than 3 minutes to be ready for take-off. There's one airport where I want the 10 minute idle time (surface temperature is well above 40C on departure).

Taxi with engine(s) shut down could lead to a take-off with less than 3 minutes of idle time on the engine.

Taxi with engine(s) shut down is prohibited at my Airline - the engines are all running prior to taxi and are left running until parked at the destination. For most flights the client pays for the fuel  ;D

Normal taxi fuel is 500kg except at places like London Heathrow or New York JFK where we have 900kg.

We operate into places where the unexpected is all part of "normal" operations.

2 months ago the airport staff managed to block access to every parking position on the main apron using only 3 aircraft! We ended up parked on a taxiway 150m from the runway threshold. A good crew could be ready for take-off less than 3 minutes after engine start under these conditions.

I have flown into airports where the time from selecting idle thrust on landing to the time we are parked was less than 3 minutes.

The issue here is when you are parked ground staff will sometimes approach the aircraft ignoring the still running engines and red flashing beacon. I've had to shut the engines down early on a number of occasions to avoid injury/death to ground staff.

[ScudRunner-d95]

Damn -- site blocked me from replying when I was using my VPN -- interesting

Whats this?? I don't really have any blocks set for this site

[Liquid Charlie]

It was strange -- It would not let me post a reply - I was logged in and using a american IP address and I go an error message when I tried to send a reply -- I disconnected from the VPN and everything immediately went back to normal -- maybe it was dropping packets or something because I am again logged in under a VPN and all is normal.


Cheers