All military branches plan for combat loss in order to effectively replace losses. Replacements implement the continued combat readiness of a unit. Acceptable loss is therefore calculated. Greater than acceptable loss will trigger a process to rectify training and leadership problems that contribute to unacceptable loss or the misusing of troops. Under the Uniform Code, leadership is responsible for everything that happens or fails to happen to a unit. This includes training and operational accidents. With military aviation accidents, the military branch is the operator, the pilot, and the mechanic. There is no political damage control. The Army tries to fix the problem rather than to look good.

We are under the FAA, which is quite a different bureaucracy. Let's consider a hypothetical stall and spin accident in the pattern. Our friend was trying to climb and turn to 1,000' pattern altitude at Vy+or-5 knots while also trying to determine, by radio call, where another airplane was. He usually limited bank to 20 degrees but inadvertently stalled and spun. NTSB assigned the FAA the investigation. The FAA made the FAA look good (number one), assigned the fault with our friend for exceeding the critical angle of attack, and listed distraction and load factor as contributing factors. There was no consideration nor mention of training, control technique, or leadership problems.

Could the ACS requirement to pull back on the elevator to make climbing turns to crosswind and downwind at Vy+or-5 knots, involving integration of contact and instrument flying skills, have contributed to this accident? Absolutely not as that would make the FAA look bad. Neither integrated instrument training control technique nor maintenance of V speed was mentioned. Had this been an ITO, on the other hand, ATC would be responsible for the other traffic and he would have been enveloped in a world that allowed constant instrument cross check and control, and he would have been following a prescribed safe procedural track. The difference between VFR and IMC is extreme.

Could training and leadership be part of the problem? Could teaching all pilots to always pull back on the stick in all turns be misusing pilots? Wider patterns, allowing bank angel limitations, have decreased the number of inadvertent stall and spin accidents in the pattern, but have not reduced the number of fatalities per accident. Stall and spin recovery training, evolving from dumping the nose to not dumping the nose and finally back to dumping the nose, has not reduced the number of fatalities per accident.

Could teaching pilots to allow the nose to go down in all turns, as designed for safety, have prevented this inadvertent stall, most stalls, in the pattern? Our friend was flying exactly as taught. Will Vy+or-5 knots prevent stall and spin in the pattern? Evidently not. Would designing airplanes to dynamically return to trimmed airspeed, given their head, have prevented this inadvertent stall? No, it was default disabled by the training system and leadership. Can we fly all the way to the crash with this control technique? No, we will fall to the crash with this trained, default, control technique.

Would we screw up the whole traffic pattern by allowing the nose to go down in turns and then return to level, climb, or descent as required? Is the change to integration of instruments VFR and adherence to certain programmed V speeds, regardless of the situation a contributing factor to pattern stalls? Is there some real problem with just allowing the nose to go down in turns as a muscle memory, except during flight by reference to instruments, IFR? Is there a real problem with default anti-stall turns? Are training and leadership contributing factors in all stall and spin accidents in the pattern? Are we, leadership and instructors, misusing pilots? Are nearly 100% fatalities from stall and spin in the pattern acceptable loss?

Well put.

Destruction and creation. What do we have to destroy to create anti-stall airplanes. Nothing, tractor airplanes were designed that way over a century ago. We just developed the bad habit of pulling back on the stick when the airplane didn't want to climb or to stay level in the turn. So Fred Weick designed the Ercoupe with the elevator travel limited so the pilot could not stall the airplane that was already designed not to stall itself. Probably the most unpopular airplane ever designed. Why so unpopular? Probably because great skill was not required. What great skill? Allowing the airplane to do what it wanted to do by design: NOT STALL.

V speeds, for efficiency and anti-stall when flying by reference to the airspeed indicator, increase IFR safety. They reduce the efficiency and safety of contact flying, however, by diverting the pilots attention to inside the cockpit. Reference to the outside world allows the efficiency of the basic ground effect takeoff, zoom climb, the law of the roller coaster, energy management turns, normal turns allowing the nose to go down as designed, on course thermalling, use of orographic lift in the mountains, and the apparent brisk walk rate of closure approach.

But the main life saving advantage of contact flying in a non-ATC world is the ability to make normal turns allowing the nose to go down as designed default. The only reason not to allow the nose to go down naturally in turns is to simplify flight by reference to instruments. Strict maintenance of airspeed, altitude, and procedural track are flight by instrument skills that increasingly decrease safety in the contact flying world the closer we get to the ground. That is why pattern stall and spin is so common and so fatal.

Unless the pilot is suicidal, stall in the pattern is inadvertent. During ITO we are maintaining maneuvering airspeed solely by reference to instruments. Inadvertent stall is unlikely. Midair collision is unlikely. During contact takeoff we don't need more altitude than just over obstructions. We can maintain really good maneuvering airspeed, especially with the extra zoom reserve of a low ground effect takeoff. We can constantly observe where we are going and look for other aircraft. We can egress down drainage and look for orographic lift.

During integrated instrument takeoff, we are neither maintaining an instrument proficient cross check nor are we flying a bit closer to obstructions to maintain maneuvering airspeed nor are we maintaining constant observation outside for other traffic. Inadvertent stall is more likely in this scenario. Midair collision is also more likely in this scenario. Add a pilot pulling back on the stick in all turns in this unhappy mix and inadvertent stall becomes even more likely.

Given the extensive training in level turns, in pulling back on the stick in all turns, we actually are having too few stall spin accidents in the pattern. Here, there is no getting away with it without getting caught. So when the stall warning comes on, except on short final coming into ground effect, the students and trained pilots must be cheating. They must be letting go of that back pressure on the stick or yoke. They must be allowing the nose to go down as designed for safety. Should we call this a safety workaround?

We have obligations to follow the law, to follow the science, to do what's morally right. What is the law concerning pulling back on the stick in all turns? What is the science? Which technique, to pull or not to pull, would result in fewer fatalities in the pattern? What is morally right concerning those we teach or influence?

I now ask the question about what I have always wanted to know, but was afraid to ask: Do you automatically pull back in all turns or have you experimented with a little pitch up wings level if fast but always allowing the nose to go down naturally in the turn? Am I just pissing in the wind?

Just took an online course offered by AVEMCO to get a 5% discount called Learning to Turn. You might find the course very interesting as many of their suggestions are contrary to your philosophy. I have been using your techniques and appreciate them. Would put in a link but not computer savvy enough to do that. Thanks

Thanks, Nodrama. I have been watching National Geographic about salmon swimming upstream to spawn. I have been using safe maneuvering flight techniques many years, but I have not figured out how to swim upstream like salmon. That is what is necessary to change FAA or even AVEMCO. My techniques would reduce fatalities but, like with airline passengers facing forward, AVEMCO knows fatalities are less expensive to insure than are serious injuries.

Instructors of the world unite. Teach them to fly first and then teach them to pass the test. PPL and CPL pilots work on learning safe maneuvering flight techniques for the first one thousand feet. ATPs and any pilots flying IFR are protected by safe and legal airspeed, altitude, and procedural track requirements with ATC help throughout.