SixTwoLeemer wrote:http://www.9news.com/story/news/local/2015/02/02/ntsb-selfies-brought-down-plane-killing-2/22781911/

Looks a lot like, "No more flying in night IMC when you're not rated for it and then flashing a strobe in your own eyes at low levels"...

Ouch.

possible Darwin Award nominee???

Still sad regardless of what the pilot was doing.... But it just hammers the notion to not take flying lightly, especially during takeoff! I can't imagine trying to take a picture while controlling the plane on takeoff.

Sometimes the right pic or vid is the most important thing there is. More important than even you and your friends lives. At least he only destroyed one plane.

Tim

He was Commercial and IR, but it's sure hard to justify taking off into a 300' ceiling after midnight, even on an instrument flight plan (which he didn't have). The selfies were just icing on the cake. Yeah, I'd say he's well in the running for the Darwin award of the decade.

Cary

Cary wrote:He was Commercial and IR, but it's sure hard to justify taking off into a 300' ceiling after midnight, even on an instrument flight plan (which he didn't have). The selfies were just icing on the cake.

I agree with this, but in alignment with the sensationalist headline this story is getting that blames the selfie... I think that's deserved as well.

I think that there's a modern epidemic of pilots giving undue focus on playing with cameras as PIC, at the expense of their situational awareness. I commonly see student pilots on Reddit post selfies they took on their first solo! I'd like to see more instructors discourage or even admonish this behavior. It's one thing to do if you've been flying for a few years, but even then, I personally feel that it's a major risk factor to have something like that competing for your attention from the flight.

Says the guy with a selfie avatar.

Zzz wrote:Says the guy with a selfie avatar.

Back-of-head Selfie? Flexible!

I agree with your entire post. Also, so long as we don't get caught up with remotely operating them I think mounted stuff like gopros are safe. Like most things though, I'd say out falls down to a maturity level, attention span, and prioritization skills of the individual in question.