AOPA Pilot Magazine

Measure of Skill

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As a pilot, how do you measure your skill? Is landing five feet left or right of the centerline good enough for you? Do you know the drill for engine failure? Can you plan your descents to arrive in the traffic pattern at precisely the correct altitude and speed?

“Measure of Skill,” this series of articles from the 1997 editions of AOPA Pilot, will help to sharpen your flying skills. If you're proficient at all 12 of these tasks, you can probably count yourself among the ranks of skilled pilots. — The Editors

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January, A REG OVERVIEW, The rules you most need to know, by Alton K. Marsh

Here are the regulations sure to be covered on any flight review. Based on your calls to AOPA, we believe there are a few others that are not well understood. This discussion is limited primarily to VFR operations.

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February, PERFECTING PREFLIGHTS, How to make the most of your walkaround, by Peter A. Bedell

It is hoped that every pilot has at least some sort of preflight routine. Some inspections may be more thorough than others, but that may be true because some pilots simply don't know why they're looking at specific items or performing specific tasks. Sure, you take a fuel sample before the first flight of the day, but do you know why? In the second part of our Measure of Skill series we look at preflights and, we hope, answer some questions and clear up a few mysteries.

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March, LANDING PROFICIENCY, Getting down safely and in style, by Thomas A. Horne

Fair or not, pilots and passengers alike assign tremendous importance to landings — especially the events surrounding the touchdown. A flight's takeoff and en route phases may have been perfectly planned and executed, but if the landing's a bouncer or a crabbed slam-in, the pilot's in the doghouse. He's a lousy pilot. Can't land worth a damn. Hard on the nerves, back, and landing gear. The word will get around.

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April, MANEUVERS THAT MATTER, Knocking off the rust with some basic airmanship, by Marc E. Cook

Pilots as a rule aren't particularly lazy. After all, the very act of piloting requires preparation, concentration, and ongoing effort; it is not, as we all know, an armchair pursuit. And yet who among us can claim that there is no room for improvement?

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May, NAVIGATION NECESSITIES, Getting from A to B should be more than just pushing buttons, by Thomas A. Horne

Thanks to the marvels of the Global Positioning System (GPS), most pilots these days think of navigation as no more than a sequence of button-pushing exercises. When setting up a GPS flight plan, punch in your departure airport, maybe define a few en route waypoints, name your destination, and — presto — there's your course, track, heading, groundspeed, time to destination, and even winds aloft, all on a moving-map GPS unit that can rest on your knee.

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June, STAYING AHEAD OF THE AIRPLANE, Setting goals for each flight, a step at a time, by Thomas A. Horne

Pilots, much like photographers, should do a great deal of previsualizing. This is one way of approaching the job of flight planning, maintaining control of the situation at hand while flying, and helping to ensure that the flight's outcome is a safe one. In other words, always think ahead of the airplane.

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July, VFR RECOMMENDED?, The go/no-go decision for VFR, by Peter A. Bedell

Flying under visual flight rules can be easy, fun, and helpful in adding a sense of spontaneity to flying that only pilots and passengers in private aircraft can enjoy. But there are times when flying VFR can become a hairy experience, to say the least. Busting your personal limits and letting the weather catch you between a rock and a cloud are just some examples of how VFR can suddenly become an anxious way to fly. Here are some ways to avoid getting bitten by poor go/no-go decision making.

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August, Discretion and Precaution, The fine art of throwing in the towel, by Thomas A. Horne

Pilot training places a great deal of emphasis on forced landings — and rightfully so. Being prepared to execute a successful emergency landing is an important part of a pilot's repertoire of skills. Of equal importance, however, is having the knowledge and judgment to be able to make the decision to perform a precautionary landing. Precautionary landings are procedures designed to avert forced landings or to prevent bad situations from becoming worse.

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September, Escaping Cloud Encounters, IFR Skills For VFR Pilots, by Alton K. Marsh

Remember the uncomfortable feeling you had under the hood when you were a student pilot? You climbed or descended when you meant to stay level. The aircraft seemed to turn on its own when you wanted to maintain a heading. Sometimes you thought the airplane was turning, but it really wasn't. Fortunately, the instructor would usually end the session in 10 or 15 minutes, and any discomfort disappeared quickly. But it wasn't really scary. You had the advantage of knowing that an instructor was there and that the weather wasn't really bad.

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October, Night Fright, The rules you most need to know, by Alton K. Marsh

Night flying has its rewards. Pilots are treated to a private showing of spectacular electric light shows as cities slide beneath their wings. The air is usually calm, and winds are light at the destination airport, affording an honest shot at a textbook-perfect touchdown. But night flying is also a fragile skill, one that must be renewed if left unused.

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November, Having an Out — And Using It, What's Your Plan B?, by Peter A. Bedell

One trait that most long-lived pilots have is good judgment. Make the right decision at the right time and it's hard for things to go wrong. Unfortunately, decisions involved in flying an airplane are generally not that cut- and-dried. Many variables play in the equation depending on the severity of a particular situation and the options available for getting out of it. One way around a sticky predicament is to have an alternative plan available at any time — a perpetual Plan B, of sorts.

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December, Atmospheric Insights: Developing Weather Wisdom, by Thomas A. Horne

In the past 11 months, this "Measure of Skill" series of articles has addressed a number of important airmanship skills — skills that, if mastered and applied, would make us all better, safer pilots. But there's more, much more, to safe flying than precise airwork. Learning how to deal with weather must certainly rank as one of the most important skills a pilot can learn. Unfortunately, these skills are difficult to teach. Sure, learning about aviation weather is easy enough, and ground school covers the basics fairly well. However, teaching in-flight, weather-related decision making continues as one of the biggest challenges facing flight instructors.

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