Paul A. Craig

I am not a pilot, but I’m interested in aviation and especially in risk and how we measure and apply risk evaluations to normal activities. This book was recommended as the best comprehensive examination of risk in general aviation flying. Flying, in general, has become safer, although as Craig points out, the common trope that the most dangerous part of flying is the drive to the airport, is true only for commercial aviation; it is definitely not true for general aviation. An analysis of comparative data reveals that general aviation is far more dangerous than driving.

Craig exams the problems with training, unintended consequences of otherwise valuable laws and regulations (e.g., the 1500 hr. minimum to be hired with the regionals placed emphasis on quantity rather than quality and meant that pilots would “bore holes in the sky” rather than seek experience with unusual conditions.) Changes in business practices can also have unintended effects. When it became possible to send digital copies of checks rather than the physical checks themselves, hundreds of pilot jobs were eliminated. Those jobs had provided important experience flying in adverse weather conditions and circumstances that were now much less available as a training experience. Craig points out that military pilots were flying combat missions with less than 400 hours, but were very successful because of the type of scenario training they had received.

The revolution of “glass cockpits” that replaced the old mechanical instruments made flying safer, but counter-intuitively, also more dangerous as pilots needed to become information managers more than “stick and rudder” pilots. There was the danger of thinking you are safer because of all the safety equipment and information overload that impinged on making the right decision. Was a pilot more likely to take off with a lower ceiling knowing he had auto-pilot and instruments that would have navigate through the weather. A very recent accident I learned about * involved a very experienced pilot (17,700 hours), in a very sophisticated airplane (pressurized Centurion) who mixed bad weather with night flying and poor cockpit management (fuel exhaustion) and got himself killed.

Craig examines the major types of GA accidents and analyzes them for lessons that can be learned from each. Ultimately, however, it will be the individual pilot’s decision-making skill, knowing when not to fly, and what circumstances to avoid, that will make more of a difference, I suspect. One of the biggest killers is “get-thereitis” and one NTSB investigator remarked that you should only fly if you have time to spare. Craig adds to that the admonition that in addition to their pilot’s license and logbook, pilots should be required to have an active account with a car rental company.

*https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/348006… (más)

This book is trying to be scientific without understanding basic statistics. The basic premise of the book, that low-hour pilots are in "the killing zone", a time of high danger, is just plain wrong. There are simply more low-hour pilots than high-hour pilots, which leads to more low-hour accidents than high-hour accidents.

I believe the author realized that in one of the last chapters, where he tries to calculate the risk for pilots of different hours; but at that point, it was probably too late to change the premise of the book.

There is more: For example, in one of the last chapters, the author explicitly encourages flying in challenging situations, like night and IFR, but also explicitly warns that these situations lead to accidents, without qualifying how these two pieces of advice relate to one another. There are more examples like this.

That being said, the majority of the book contains discussions of accidents. This part is interesting, and the discussion is usually insightful. Just be aware that the author's conclusions are often not much more than educated guessing.… (más)

A very dry book, a little hard to get through sometimes, and more than a little repetitive in places, but nevertheless vital reading for students or newly qualified pilots. The NTSB reports make interesting (if depressing) reading, and provide learning points - what not to do when flying! The accident reports and ILAFFT sections of magazines like Pilot and Flyer are always the bits I turn to first, and this book is sort of an extended version of those. The 40-question test at the end is interesting - I tend more to the higher end of the scale, meaning I don’t have the typical pilot personality - which is not necessarily a bad thing; I’m more likely to do the checks and make a decision not to fly in borderline weather conditions - but it also means I may not gain as much experience in dealing with more difficult conditions, unless I push myself a bit more. Any book that makes me more aware of such traits is worth reading.… (más)