Insights

Wisdom Overcomes Ineptitude

Happy New Year! Last August the FAA implemented a few changes to the Practical Test Standards for private and commercial pilots and flight instructors. For the past few years, I thought the inmates were running the asylum. It now appears that people with practical experience and common sense have taken command of the situation.

Slow flight is a good example. It will now be taught correctly, just as it was before common sense was abdicated. It will be flown at a speed at which any appreciable increase in pitch attitude will result in a stall.

During the 1980s, the term slow flight was replaced with flight at minimum controllable airspeed. That lasted for a few years, before it was changed to flight at critically slow airspeed. That, too, lasted for a few years before it was changed back to slow flight, but with the bizarre requirement that this maneuver be performed at 1.2 times the airplane's stall speed with landing gear and flaps retracted - and flight instructors were mandated to teach stall/spin awareness during this time? Give me a break! This situation reminded me of a line from the movie Forrest Gump: "Stupid is as stupid does."

Now that slow-flight instruction is back to normal, there is only one big distraction - the stall warning horn. In our current legalistic society, I can't tell anyone to do this, but I do remember when we would deactivate the stall warning sensor with tape for initial slow-flight training. Students learned to feel and listen to the airplane without the distraction of a blaring horn. They learned to feel for the pre-stall buffet and therefore avoid the stall. It was very effective.

Here are the aerodynamic demonstrations that I conduct during slow flight training:

• Flight on the front side of the power curve. Establish cruise flight at approximately 2,000 rpm and note airspeed. When pitch attitude is increased, the airplane climbs initially.
• Flight on the back side of the power curve. Reduce power to idle, maintain altitude, and just prior to stall buffet return power to approximately 2,000 rpm. Maintain altitude until airspeed stabilizes. Now, when pitch attitude is increased, the airplane descends.
• Control feel and control response during slow flight versus higher airspeeds.
• Adverse aileron yaw. Move the yoke back and forth between full left and full right aileron. Adverse yaw becomes readily apparent.
• The left turning tendency and the rudder's effectiveness for controlling bank angle and heading.
• The different aileron and rudder pressures required for rolling into and out of left and right turns.
• Turns require more power in order to maintain airspeed and avoid the stall buffet. When rolling out of a turn, reduce power to prevent airspeed from increasing.
• The increased turn rate and decreased turn radius compared to flight at higher airspeeds. Do not look at the flight instruments to make this observation. Look outside the cockpit and evaluate turn rate by watching the Earth's surface. You might also see a traffic conflict in time to avoid a midair collision.
• The difference in stall speed and power required as flaps are extended and retracted.
• Climb performance with partial and full flaps, and the effectiveness of making two-step corrections.

Two-step corrections are a critical piloting skill. When you detect an error, apply a correction that you know will be excessive. This may be a power change or an attitude change. When it becomes apparent that the correction is working, remove half of the initial input. This technique keeps you from concentrating on that problem, and it allows you to continually divide your attention and monitor all flight parameters.

Pilots who add a little, add a little, and add a little more spend too much time on that problem. They are snake bitten because an adder is a poisonous European viper. Use two-step corrections so that you stay ahead of the airplane, and do take full advantage of proper slow flight training now that it's FAA approved.

Ralph Butcher, a retired United Airlines captain, is the chief flight instructor at a California flight school. He has been flying for 43 years and has more than 25,000 flight hours in fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft. Visit his Web site ( www.skyroamers.com ).