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Avoiding VFR into IMC accidents

Old 21st Jan 2020, 22:22
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Avoiding VFR into IMC accidents

Hi all,

It seems that every few weeks there is another GA accident in Australia where the likely cause is a planned VFR flight into either night conditions or IMC. I don't have the data analysis to support this but I suspect that the accident rate is getting worse. It seems to me that the concept of "dont fly in IMC as a VFR pilot" is about as effective as the abstinence method of birth control among teenagers. Is there something better that can be done to prevent this type of accident?

With each of these incidents I reflect on what I would have done differently if I were in the same situation. The danger in this thinking is to lump it all into the term "pilot error". It is too easy to dismiss the accident as happening because of some shortcoming in the pilot that crashed. If you find yourself thinking "well I would never do that" then you are probably underestimating the risk. Many of the pilots who crashed were experienced pilots and its not like the pilots that have crashed took off with the intention of crashing on that flight.

I have some thoughts on what we can do to prevent this sort of accident but before I post them it would be good to get some feedback from others on the forum.

It might help to break the thoughts into 3 groups,

1: In the years before up to the crash. eg training, equipment, ...?
2: In the hours before up to the crash. eg planning, weather,
3. In the minutes before... eg pilot actions, ATC help/intervention.

What are your thoughts?

Last edited by no_one; 21st Jan 2020 at 22:22. Reason: spelling
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 00:44
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Students should learn to fly in tough and marginal conditions so that they can be exposed as to what is suitable for operating in, and what diversion weather looks like. Flying in CAVOK only gives them a false sense of security.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 01:06
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Wow! every few weeks huh?
I did not know the 'accident' rate was so high!
You have NO data analysis for reference,

What are you doing here???

Last edited by Petropavlovsk; 22nd Jan 2020 at 01:10. Reason: spelling
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 01:39
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VFR pilots getting themselves trapped in IMC conditions has been a problem since the Wright brothers.
There are many causes, such as press on itis, blatant disregard of rules, or simply unintentionally getting caught out.
Considering the dwindling number of GA pilots in Australia there seems a disproportionate number of these incidents
compared with the massive industry in the USA and our weather conditions are far more benign than theirs.
Our aviation police endeavour to tackle the issue with convoluted draconian regulation and penalties.
In the USA the FAA approach is education and mentoring.
There is also the fact that almost 80% of private pilots in the USA hold instrument certificates.
They do so because sensible regulations make it relatively cheap to obtain a certificate and maintain it,
they are not burdened with the same regulatory cost burden that apply here making aircraft far cheaper to operate thus
increasing participation and therefore recency.
Unlike Australia committing aviation is encouraged in the USA, Inane security requirements just don't exist in the home of 9/11.
Airports are not locked up by local owners with silly restrictions and burdensome costs.
All this aids and encourages participation. A practiced pilot is far safer than an out of practice one.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 01:52
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There should be a law prohibiting a VFR flight continuing into IMC. Oh wait...

The penalty for breaching a law prohibiting a VFR flight continuing into IMC should be the death penalty. Oh wait....

The price paid for the regulatory ‘reform’ program would have paid for IFR ratings for every Australian pilot. Lucky the money was instead spent on the oh-so-successful regulatory ‘reform’ program.

It should not be so hard to get an IFR rating in Australia. Not only is it made hard by the unnecessarily complex rules imposed by a regulator that overreacts to most perceived risks, the number and location of organisations that have the approvals to deliver the training are slowly dwindling.

CASA’s education program is manifestly inadequate. That’s not a criticism of individuals involved in the program (except for the ones who think it’s a medium for them to promote their pet theories). It’s a criticism of CASA’s abject failure to understand the practical importance of and accordingly properly resource effective education programs.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 02:41
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Back in the 1960's I wrote to the then Department, and suggested that at the completion of the Private Pilot Licence flight test the applicant be placed under the hood and be required to make a 180 degree turn without losing altitude. After entering the probable spiral dive the hood could be removed when the examiner considered control had been lost and any continuation would result in an accident. The examiner could reinforce the lesson to be learned after the flight and the new Private Pilot would have seen first hand the results of flight into IMC.

This suggestion was obviously not considered to be very helpful as I never heard of it being implemented and I never had a response from the Department.

I agree a simpler and cheaper IFR rating would help.



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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 02:44
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USA pilots also get a night rating with their PPL. That might help stop pilots dying from entering NVFR and black holes. Wouldn’t that be nice to have here!
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 03:11
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Originally Posted by Falcon99
Back in the 1960's I wrote to the then Department, and suggested that at the completion of the Private Pilot Licence flight test the applicant be placed under the hood and be required to make a 180 degree turn without losing altitude. After entering the probable spiral dive the hood could be removed when the examiner considered control had been lost and any continuation would result in an accident. The examiner could reinforce the lesson to be learned after the flight and the new Private Pilot would have seen first hand the results of flight into IMC.

This suggestion was obviously not considered to be very helpful as I never heard of it being implemented and I never had a response from the Department.

I agree a simpler and cheaper IFR rating would help.
Unless, of course if your shiny new PPL were to get lucky and perform the 180 perfectly with no loss of control or altitude then all you have done is reinforce to him/her that they can cheerfully fly into IMC because they’ve mastered the 180 under the hood.

IFR flying for PPLs work in the USA works because of near universal radar coverage, a particularly helpful ATC and good weather reporting and forecasting. None of which is found here.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 03:30
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Another consideration here is that today's modern LSA and VH reg kit planes have more fancy gear by way of flight instruments than most basic older Airliners, that alone would entice hapless VFR pilots into non VMC at the drop of a hat! We are fortunate that our WX is generally far more benign than the States where freezing rain/snow etc is a big factor in VFR flight for many accidents! An IFR rating is one thing, having the plane to deal with such WX and remaining proficient is another!
There will always be accidents attributed to poor pilot judgment WX related or not, just a fact of life in the bottom end of the aviation sector!
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 03:32
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Dick Smith and I wrote a compelling letter to the director of CASA around 10 years ago about the USA concept of the PPL having a NVFR rating built in. We got a very nice reply from the caretaker director saying that it will be actioned by the new incoming director.

Crickets since then... nada. Tried to follow-up and it fell on deaf ears despite their promise of a reply under their SLA’s.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 04:53
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CASA couldn’t give a toss about private pilots killing themselves at all. They are only concerned about the noisier members of the general public giving the Minister a hard time. Witness their treatment of Angel Fight.


As for training????? CASA cheerfully let SOAR remain in operation, so the idea that CASA has any consideration for the well being or safety of pilots is completely alien.

I have yet to witness the slightest concern of CASA for the safety of anyone but the Minister and it’s own staff.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 05:19
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I find there are are generally two schools of thought when this comes up:
1. Don't teach VFR pilots how to fly on instruments because it will lead to a false sense of security and cause them to push on in worse weather than they otherwise would, or
2. Give everyone some basic instrument training so if they happen to be in an aircraft that at least has an AI or AH of some kind, they might have a fighting chance of maintaining control when visual reference is lost.

I believe 2 is best, and am very thankful for my instrument training, the more so because it was old school and covered limited panel (i.e. no attitude instrument) UA recoveries. Make it compulsory, I reckon, particularly as noted above by machtuk that many more modern machines, or old ones with a TV screen added, have a decent AI and compass built in.

And don't only teach how to maintain control on instruments, and climb and turn, but hammer home some scenarios about how to avoid losing visual reference in the first place, but if you do, extending the thought process into 'now how am I going to safely get visual again'.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 05:36
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Take 'education' away from CAsA because it only confuses them. Let them stick to all that they are, a regulator, nothing more, nothing less.

My into country (TPNG) brief from Ron Green of DCA was, "stay out of cloud" and "don't make me come looking for you and have to pick up some bits to send home to your Mum". He also mentioned one back door is not enough, 4 or 5 would be good.
Those 3 bits of advice have stuck with me for over 50 years and they seem to work.

The current regulator is far too confused by their own regulations to actually see things as clearly and succinctly.

CC
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 06:01
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Another vote for NVFR training. Saved my bacon after a few poor decisions.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 06:42
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Flying schools generally don't take a student out into marginal weather. The flight would be cut short, the operator would not be paid for a completed lesson, and the paid-per-hour instructor would not take much home that week.

Hopeless. I used to try to take students on nav trips where they would HAVE to make a diversion around Cadbury clouds, but the boss didn't like "DNCO" (Duty Not Carried Out) flights. So, Bloggs only ever flew on CAVOK days and the decision-making process wasn't well developed.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 07:01
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Originally Posted by Ascend Charlie
Flying schools generally don't take a student out into marginal weather.
Totally depends on the instructor (& student to an extent). When I recently completed my PPL, if it was VMC, we flew. That wasn’t always pleasant but I didn’t want to be the sucker caught out after only flying in ‘nice’ weather.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 07:48
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I've never seen a 180 turn in IMC as a safe way of regaining VMC, especially so for an inexperienced pilot. As someone wrote earlier, it is likely to end in disorientation and a spiral dive, which will probably end in tears, even if VMC is then regained. I say that after experience of first obtaining an IR for fixed wing in 1978 and rotary wing a year later. These days I regularly operate RW from field locations, flying VFR to an IFR transit (and usually back to VFR).

I've stuck my heretic neck out before in saying that it's often safer to reduce power and descend straight ahead to regain VMC below cloud then to carry out the 180 turn. Obviously, this won't help if the pilot has flown up a blind alley in the hills, but then neither would getting into a spiral dive because if your first visual reference on breaking cloud is the steep side of a valley, you might well find it impossible to quickly re-orientate yourself.

One good example which sticks in my mind: About twenty years ago I was required to operate by night, flying an unstabilised police helicopter at a site with very little helipad lighting (less than that required for public transport) and no cloudbase measuring equipment. For that job, we were not required to hold an IR and we therefore received no recurrent instrument training, so I was mainly out of practice, although to hover at night one does need to scan the flight instruments. One night the met forecaster got it very wrong and an occluded front brought the cloudbase right down to 200 feet agl, rather than the expected 800 to 1,000 feet. We had flown earlier that night before the weather front arrived and the forecast at that time had seemed reasonably accurate. We launched again later to a vehicle pursuit but we hit cloud almost immediately on departure. I descended straight ahead to VMC, carried out a VERY low level circuit and landed safely back at the helipad and went for a cup of tea and informed operations we were offline due to weather (while we recovered our composure). Less than two hours later, the same front caught out another police pilot from an adjacent county force. He also entered very low cloud, but he descended in the turn, became disorientated and hit trees adjacent to the helipad, One occupant was killed in the crash and both others were badly injured.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 08:23
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I took a buddy up in his aircraft, after he recently gained his Night VFR rating, and he wanted to try some 'under the hood training' for a possible upcoming IF course.

Within 30 minutes of some basic coordination exercises and a few Unusual Attitude recoveries, he called 'Time Out' and we landed.

He commented that he thought it might be easier, given his NVFR rating, but that he didn't appreciate just how demanding Instrument Flying was - and at that time he had no thinking about approaches to do, merely learning to correctly interpret the AI and other instruments in his scan.

End result - he's determined to get his Instrument Rating ASAP. The NVFR can provide overconfidence...
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 08:46
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As a very inexperienced pilot but one who is experienced in risk management in other pursuits, I believe training is necessary, not necessarily positive “I can do IFR” training but a series of structured “oh s##t!” encounters with flying VFR into IMC with a suitably qualified instructor to recover you. You CANNOT do this artificially with Foggles! You have to cop it full force so to speak.

’The purpose of such training is to:

’(a) recognize the warning signs that you are about to encounter IMC.

(b) respond appropriately to the threat of entering IMC, AND/or recover into VFR.

You cannot do (b) if you are startled, fearful and have never experienced IMC before.

There are a multitude of ways IMC can sneak up on you, just ask me. Luckily for me I once had an instructor who let it happen and we calmly discussed what was happening and what the available options were best.

If all you’ve been taught is “don’t enter IMC’ and don’t know what it feels like, your chances of recovering are not as good. it can sneak up on you and if you don’t know the signs then you are asking for trouble.

While everyone has war stories, some might include:

- gradually deteriorating afternoon light with smoke, fog and haze (even in the circuit at YMMB!).

- gradually decreasing ceiling perhaps with drizzle limiting visibility and surrounding hills - makes navigation very hard.

- “That’s not really a cloud!”

- “ My autopilot will get us through that!”

- “I know the ceilings low but it will get higher as we go north/south/east/west.

etc. etc. I’m sure there are plenty more that I don’t know.


Three escape doors are my minimum, cup of tea and a wait is the best.
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Old 22nd Jan 2020, 08:53
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I would suggest if you inadvertently enter IMC in controlled flight the additional training from NVFR may assist you in a positive outcome. If you don’t learn from your misadventure and continue to push the envelope it is probably going to end badly at some stage.

Re overconfidence from the extra training, that is probably an individual personality trait. I like to think additional training/ratings makes me a little safer and hopefully smarter.

Last edited by Frontal Lobotomy; 22nd Jan 2020 at 11:54. Reason: .
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