Backcountry Pilot

[OregonMaule offline]

Brother pilots, I have been reflecting on the sad recent events. My intentions are not to offend anyone, so right now I’ll say sorry. Correct me where I am wrong so we all might learn.

As pilots we accept greater risk than normal people do. We don’t have a death wish, but we are our own worst enemies. IMO this is why most crashes are pilot error.

I have 27 years fighting fires here in Portland, Or. The trainers always talk about complacency. Does it happen, your damn right it does. Flying, you bet it does. If we followed all the feds rules not as many would fly.

Here are some examples I saw at JC. Lets start with myself. Landing at 1 PM in gusty wind, no FSS flight plan. I told my family where I was going but they didn’t expect to see me home till Sunday. Not good. Luckily there was a phone so I call home to check in.

I never saw anyone sumping tanks, although I know someone must have done it. Gas tanks filled and not checked for contaminants. Low powered planes talking off in the afternoon. Take off early morning take off with frost or ice on the wings. Planes flying, that MAYBE shouldn’t have. In the future will I follow all the rules? Probably not. Will I do better? YES! It’s one thing to do this to ourselves, or with another pilot. We know the risk and can elect to go or not. Is it fair to cut corners if our passengers don’t have a clue?

I saw a lot of smart decisions also. Flying and landing early. Light loads. Flying in-groups. Carrying survival equipment. I chose to not fly while at JC because I knew I was in over my head. Thank you guys for all your advice, helping me to become a better pilot. Let’s all be careful when weighing the risk we all take. Fly safe my friends…Rob

[Zzz]

Rob, I like your thinking. Everything you described falls under the category of complacency.... As if we don't need to do these precautionary exercises after we gain some experience?

In the recent lull of my flying career (which has ended, thank God) I could feel my knowledge and my flying accumen getting foggy, so I made an active effort to be extra cautious, knowing I was in the danger zone of low hours (still am.) I've actually begun to take the extra time to do all the little precautionary preflight things that I had started to skimp on.

I posed a question a few months back about preflighting your own airplane that is only flown by you. No one else is flying it, surely anything that happens to it would happen under your watch, you are intimately in touch with the machine. So, why take the time to do thorough preflights?

I was met with a collective bitchslap, and rightly so.

Anyway, comfort and complacency lead to negligent flying habits. When you stop considering what it will feel like to impact trees and rocks at 100 mph, or burn to death in a ball of fuel and melting aluminum, or what it's like to control pitch with trim and power alone, you're in for some hurt.

I think.

Hey, can you add some paragraphs to your post? Breaking that blob of text up makes it WAY easier to read. Thanks.

[retired user offline]

I was met with a collective bitchslap, and rightly so.

Damn, I missed that one !

[YELLOWMAULE offline]

Keeping that ego in check is probably one of the most difficult things to do. Good job on the humility.

[CAVU offline]

On the opposite end of the spectrum from complacency and invulnerability, it's natural at times like this to wonder if we're underestimating the risks, and wonder if we're crazy and selfish to do what we do. Rational folks, including most pilots, will admit at least to themselves that "it could happen to me." (If they don't then they must think they're invulnerable and, IMHO, are a danger to themselves and their passengers.) A little bit of fear is healthy, but it can become corrosive in excess.

What prompted this thought was the statement that we take more risks than normal people. I recall reading recently that the risks of flying are similar to riding motorcycles. (I think this as AOPA ASF data.) Without getting into the variables and the validity of the comparison, that seems about right. It doesn't seem to me that mountain flying is abnormally risky when approached prudently.

Rod Machado had a great article on "overwarning" a few months ago in Pilot magazine. He suggested replacing the inner voice of "it can happen to me" with "it will not happen to me if I do things right." That, plus asking "am I doing things right?" have become my mantra.

CAVU

[punkin170b offline]

My good friend, Steve Durtschi, came up with these three rules for risk management. I am not suggesting that they are the only three, or they will unequivocally prevent you from crashing, burning, or dying. However, they have become my "mantra" as CAVU so eloquently put it!

Durtschi’s 3 Rules of Risk Management
You know you’re about to crash when…
1.) You let others make decisions for you.
2.) Extraordinary piloting skills are required to salvage a situation brought on by poor judgement.
3.) You are down to your last option.

Rule number 1: Usually broken by the onset of pier pressure (He did it, so I can too!) or multiple "pilots in command".

Rule number 2 is usually broken when the PIC fails to recognize the situation unfolding beyond the tip of the spinner, or, ends up in the proverbial "out of airspeed, altitude, and ideas all at the same time" sort of situation.

Rule number 3 gets breached if you are in a no-go-around situation wishing really really bad that you could, or, if you arrive at your destination without an alternate plan and suddenly you find you can't land, or, airplane components (like a single GPS unit taking you direct over unfamiliar & ugly terrain) suddenly fail(s and you haven't been following along on your sectional chart...)

Nobody better to share a campfire with then Steve D.

M

[GumpAir offline]

Durtschi’s 3 Rules of Risk Management
You know you’re about to crash when…
1.) You let others make decisions for you.
2.) Extraordinary piloting skills are required to salvage a situation brought on by poor judgement.
3.) You are down to your last option.

There was always a lot to be said for flying single pilot/single engine freight/mail in the Arctic...

There was never a load or passenger worth dying for.

Jobs were a dime a dozen, and a chief pilot or dispatcher could always kiss my ass when he squawked if I didn't fly because of weather or I didn't like a maintainance issue (though I gotta say that never happened, and most times I got yelled at for flying weather I shouldn't have been out in).

Slow and boring was good. Something unusual or happening fast was bad. And after 20+ years I got real good at slow and boring.

The ONLY person I wanted to impress was me, and my dog Hoser, who rode shotgun in the right seat for 17 years. Damn mutt would bark at me if I jostled him.

Got the same attitude in my private flying now. If it doesn't feel right, I don't do it.

Gump

[punkin170b offline]

Great post, Mr. Gump!

"If it doesn't feel right, I don't do it," is especially good! I call it, "listening to the little voices." They're usually right, even if at the moment, you can't quite put your finger on exactly WHY.

M

[CAVU offline]

Durtschi’s 3 Rules of Risk Management
You know you’re about to crash when…
1.) You let others make decisions for you.
2.) Extraordinary piloting skills are required to salvage a situation brought on by poor judgement.
3.) You are down to your last option.

Amen.

CAVU

[mtv offline]

Yeah, the Voices.................I hear em too. Sometimes.

Joking, folks, just joking.

Good discussion, and all right on.

I was once in a situation with deteriorating wx, in a canyon, 1 mile vis, no ceiling--as in no clouds, in smoke. Just couldn't see. Follow the creek north to meet the helicopter on a gravel bar at a predetermined point.

Get a call on the FM radio from the helicopter pilot who's coming from the other end to meet me. He says "Hey, I don't know how it is where you're at, but it's like a quarter mile vis here, and I'm turning around. Happy hour starts early today. Talk to you later".

So, now you have your basic dumb ass fixed wing guy out there turning around in a place he never shoulda been........

Yeah, the voices.....

MTV

[Grassstrippilot offline]

Part of my prebrief for taking passengers into the backcountry is to tell them that, if they don't like how something is looking, tell me. If I can't explain what they are seeing to their satisfaction, whatever we are doing is vetoed. My wife, who flies with me a lot in the backcountry, also has complete veto power. All she has to do is say, "I don't feel good about this strip today." Done! We move on to the next one. I've noticed that I've become more conservative in recent years. Taking the time to keep better terrain under me rather than cutting the corners direct, etc.

As for pre-flights, I'm probably more paranoid and dutiful when in the backcountry than I am when out of it. I guess I consider it a specialized type of flying and try to approach it from a professional standpoint, similiar to that approach that I take with my day job. Kind of like what was stated before, "Do it right and hopefully it won't happen to me."

Fly safe.

[CAVU offline]

Grass,

I struggle with how much to allow passengers to influence me, particularly my wife. I guess I would modify the rule to say "If I can't explain what they are seeing to MY satisfaction, whatever we are doing is vetoed BY ME." It's good to have input from others, but the decision making authority has to remain with the pilot in command until he relinquishes the responsibility. Otherwise, you're setting up a violation of Durtschi's First Rule.

If it was possible to limit passenger input to situations where their suggestions always result in a reduction of risk, it might be ok to grant veto power to someone else. The problem is that the alternative preferred by the passenger might not really be as safe as Plan A (like turning around into worsening weather--compounding an earlier error). Also, over time, I might come to rely on my wife's silence as validation of my judgment when the fact is she just failed to pick up on a hazard that is staring me in the face.

So against all of this pilot-doctrine is that I want my wife and other passengers to like flying with me, not feel endangered and to want to do it again. I try to plan flights to minimize the likelihood that they'll be uncomfortable (like avoiding conditions that are likely to be turbulent, having rest stops for long trips, maintaining a comfortable altitude over hostile terrain etc.). I have also cut back on night CAVU trips because my wife doesn't like flying at night.

Still, a big part of my job is to educate passengers about the flight. I don't like scrubbing flights or avoiding great destinations that I am comfortable with just because someone who doesn't have a pilots license has an incorrect or irrational view of the risks. So I do my best to persuade them. If they are scared or worried after we land, then I have to ask myself whether I have taken unnecessary risks, have failed as an educator, or whether they're just plain skittish.

There have been times when I've failed to educate or persuade, but have forged on. The first time I took my wife into Cabin Creek comes to mind. She felt much better about it after it was "over," but she still doesn't want to go back. It makes a real difference to her if I take a couple hours of dual beforehand. She wants to know that I'm sharp and someone who knows what they're doing has checked me out. Fair enough. Besides, it's really fun!

Anyway, I'm lucky to have family who likes to fly with me. I want to keep them happy, so I'll listen to what they say, but I feel strongly that the decisionmaking responsibility has to stay with me. It's a tightrope.

I'll appreciate how others handle this. Thanks.

CAVU


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[mtv offline]

First, and perhaps Foremost, for most of us, we really don't carry any PASSENGERS.

We all at times carry PARTICIPANTS, though.

Treat them that way, that's all. If you screw up, they're coming along for the ride. Remember that.

MTV

[Grassstrippilot offline]

Maybe I should have more adequately put it this way. Her veto power, or influence is always in the conservative direction. By no means am I relinquishing PIC decision making tasks to her or any of my other passengers. I do, however, value their opinion. Especially with my wife, since she has been my primary passenger for the last 12 years, with a lot of that time having been spent in the backcountry. If for whatever reason she doesn't feel comfortable with something, I won't do it.

For example, the first time I considered going into Upper Loon Creek and was orbiting taking a look at the strip, I believe that she saw something either on the map or the Fly Idaho book that made her not comfortable. Now, Upper Loon is a pretty tame strip with a very cool approach that is now one of my favorites (before it burned anyway), but her input that day was enough for me to say, "Fine, we'll move on to our next strip." Maybe there was something to her gut feeling. Maybe she saw that I was more tired than I felt. Maybe she could see that I was dragging a little. Either way, I'm doing this for fun, not a job, and don't HAVE to go into any of these strips. I consider it good CRM when taking into account her take on things. She has been around aviation enough, as well as the backcountry, to warrant that I listen to her insight.

Now for the other side of the coin. A couple of years ago I took a Captain in with me that had no experience flying outside of the 121 environment recently, let alone ever off of pavement or in the mountains. I told him that if he didn't like something that he was seeing, to speak up. I told him to some extent he would have to trust me if I told him what was happening was normal. However, I figure that if I can't explain it to his liking then maybe I need to rethink what I am doing. Keeping in mind that this was a conversation between two experienced, fairly high-time pilots. What it boils down to for me personally is a safety check. A sound board, if you will, with someone that understands the lingo and principals, even if for him only in theory.

Lastly, you have those passengers that are not aviation savvy, let alone backcountry savvy (like my parents who I take into the backcountry occasionally). In this case, you have no other people to draw info from to use while making decisions. You've lost those other channels of information and are left with your own knowledge and experience. For me, that is when I feel the most inner pressure to be on my A game because I don't want to betray that complete trust that they have given to me to take them aloft and return them again safely. And you are right, those passengers give us the greatest opportunity to teach them about aviation and hopefully give them a positive experience.

My approach to it is not about sharing or giving up PIC authority, or being unduely influenced by others to make poor decisions. It is about using those valid resources to help me come to a decision. The pendulum of influence swings only to the conservative side. Like I said before, I do this for fun so I don't see any reason to be stupid about it.

However you boil it down, good decision making is the common denominator and doing all you can to do it right so you will be around to keep doing it.

Just so happens that I'm taking that Captain friend of mine back in this coming week. Being from Baltimore and never having done any Western flying, he loved it and has been anxious to get back out here and do it again. Hopefully I'll show him an equally good time this time.

Fly safe and thanks for the good post. Sorry for the lengthy response.

[Grassstrippilot offline]

Touche.

And that, for me anyway, is what makes it so worthwhile. Sharing it with family and friends. I get excited like a kid before Christmas every time I go to the backcountry. But if I were going alone, I'd be excited, but not at that same level. Like most things in life, it is better when shared.

First, and perhaps Foremost, for most of us, we really don't carry any PASSENGERS.

We all at times carry PARTICIPANTS, though.

Treat them that way, that's all. If you screw up, they're coming along for the ride. Remember that.

MTV

[CAVU offline]

Grass,

Thanks for the explanation. It makes perfect sense. Sorry if I read your initial post wrong. I know how you feel about being all alone when your passengers aren't experienced, don't understand and can't contribute. I just scrubbed a trip with 4 newbie nonpilot coworkers tomorrow morning for that reason. I was going to take them to a 6000 msl strip for some hiking. It's been a long week, I'm tired and I just got the plane out of annual a couple of days ago. So, we're golfing instead.

MTV, thanks for the reminder. There is nothing better than sharing this experience, and the folks who fly with us are anything but indifferent to it. My instructors have suggested providing a running commentary and assigning the other participants tasks, like looking for mountain goats, counting water bars, checking the stream conditions etc. I put old sectionals in the seat back pockets for folks who like to follow along on the map. I'm not real good about keeping up a running commentary. If anything, I'm too ready to reach for "pilot isolate." Having some self-participation tasks helps keep them engaged yet somewhat distracted.

Thanks for the explanations and thoughts.

CAVU

[a64pilot offline]

My background is a retired Army helicopter pilot. The Army has more airframes and pilots than any other service. I believe that's still true anyway. The Army kinda started this Safety, risk analysis thing years ago. Grass, you may be surprised to know that your Veto power you came up with is officially known as the "most conservative response rule" I.E. whenever there is disagreement between two pilots, you should default to the most conservative response or if you don't, it may not look good to the accident investigation board.
Among military pilots, the new PIC is about the safest pilot because he is aware that he doesn't know anything. He get's dangerous around the 500 hour level, because he thinks he's Chuck Yeager. Usually around the 1500 hour level if he hasn't had an accident he get's safe again, because he has made at least one bad decision and scared the crap out of himself and he goes back to realizing he doesn't know anything. Usually the people that haven't learned this by now are back on the city streets, or if they are still in, they haven't made PIC or have had it stripped from them.

[Centmont offline]

My CFI/Friend/mentor told me that he believes if you are going to have an accident it will happen at 200 hours ---and you walk away from that one--- or, at ca. 1000 hours. If you have the 1000 hour accident, you might not walk away. Unfortunately, I know of several pilots who haven't walked away from the 1000 hour accident. Ralph

[OregonMaule offline]

a64pilot, I love your last post. Very true indeed. I look forward to meeting you at the Maule fly in. Cheers...Rob

[ShamuPilot offline]

I know this is old news and true for most people, but the biggest threat I run into on a daily basis is complacency. It's insidious and something I try to work on everyday.

Even this morning I caught myself screwing up because I failed to do a thorough review of a departure procedure that I have flown numerous times but not recently. My chart review was too brief because I was relying on my memory to fill in the blanks. Unfortunately my memory failed me but, fortunately, my Captain didn't. He corrected me, we laughed at my brief loss of situational awareness, and then we moved on.

That is why I think good habits and procedures are critical. Not only do they prevent failures of omission, but they help combat complacency when you use them. Todays error was not forgetting to perform the chart review, but rather not giving it the attention it needed. Hopefully this will stay in my mind so I pay more attention in the future. I know this won't be the last time I find myself being complacent, but I'll sure a hell keep trying to do better anyway.

-Matt