Accident Analysis

Neither effective nor safe

Dual sets of flight controls are the norm in aviation. Side by side or front and back, it's nice to know that you can bring another pilot along and share the flying. Fully functioning dual controls make flight instruction possible, not to mention effective and safe, in most aircraft. Sometimes flight instructors confront situations where the right-seat controls are not as complete as those on the left. Then they must decide whether safety can be maintained during the kind of lessons to be conducted in the aircraft. For instance, some older training airplanes lacked brake function on the right-seater's rudder pedals. Others, such as some older Beechcraft Bonanzas, had only one control yoke. The process of transferring the well-named throw-over yoke from the left side to the right side could be quite a production.

Now visualize that second set of controls in most modern aircraft as a potential liability. It's also a potential hazard to keep in mind whenever a nonpilot passenger comes aboard without a clear understanding that all the controls in front of him are "live." There are many ways in which passengers and flight controls can become uncomfortably intertwined. Be aware of this gap in passengers'knowledge when you begin taking nonpilots for rides and address it in your preflight briefings. A simple way to make the point is to wiggle your yoke and point out that the other yoke is following along too.

It's worth noting that what gets people in trouble most often is their feet. Unconscious pressure on a rudder or brake, or even conscious pressure on occasion, has caused numerous accidents during takeoff runs or when landing. Conscious pressure? Yes indeed. If you have ever driven an automobile with a nervous right-seat passenger, you may have observed the interesting behavior of that person stepping on an imaginary brake pedal if he or she was afraid that you, the driver, was not going to stop in time. A similar thing can happen in airplane cockpits. A tense rider, unhappy about turbulence or the confusing sight picture during a wing-low or crabbed crosswind landing, may extend one foot or even both feet forward and jam them against anything available. That anything will probably be a pedal. So, do remember to brief people about that--and then remind them before landing for good measure. Then, to be certain, glance at their feet.

Homespun instructional sessions, often employing an ill-advised "follow me through" method of showing and mimicking a maneuver, also have led to trouble. In the follow-me-through scenario, one pilot is flying and the other is mock-flying, and when things go wrong this supposed technique bags its share of aircraft and pilots, as the following reports illustrate.

Does it come as a surprise that "follow me through" is not considered good instructing technique? Indeed, it has been discouraged for teaching primary maneuvers by such experts as William Kershner in his classic work The Flight Instructor's Manual. Kershner did find some limited use for "follow me through" in aerobatic instruction, however.

Why is follow-me-through frowned upon? First, it's not really possible to glean much information about how to fly a maneuver by lightly shadowing someone else's control inputs. It's better for the student to be manipulating the controls freely and feeling the aircraft's responses. The other part of the method's defect, stated in contemporary, clinical aviation parlance, is the lack of a positive transfer of control that such a method imposes, especially if the two pilots are not used to acting as a well-coordinated flight crew.

A follow-me-through session was under way when a Piper PA-12 taildragger went out of control during landing on February 23, 2007, in Lewiston, Idaho. Summarized the National Transportation Safety Board: "According to the pilot, at the aircraft owner's request, he was flying with the passenger to help him become current since the passenger had not flown any type of aircraft in the last eight years. The pilot was making a no-flap three-point full-stall landing with the passenger following on the controls with him. During the landing roll, as the airplane slowed down, the pilot let some pressure off the rudder pedals to slide his toes up onto the brakes. As soon as the pressure was released from the rudder pedals, the airplane started to swerve 'one way then the other.'

"The pilot attempted to correct, but the airplane 'spun a 180-degree turn to the left.'The left wing tip and the right elevator struck the ground. The pilot reported that the passenger was wearing heavy boots and may have inadvertently 'kicked hard right or left rudder and then became briefly entangled in the rudder pedals.'" Neither pilot was injured. The probable accident cause was determined to be the passenger's "inadvertent use of the rudder," which resulted in "an inadvertent ground loop."

Several days earlier, "follow me through" led two pilots into difficulties during the landing of a Luscombe 8A in Compton, California. In this February 17 incident, a noncurrent pilot was landing a taildragger being flown principally by another pilot. The current pilot was following through on the controls.

The airplane, "owned and operated by the pilot, veered off runway 7R during landing rollout at the Compton Airport, Compton, California. The airplane impacted a parked and unoccupied airplane and then came to rest upon impacting a wall, on the north side of runway 7L," the NTSB said. "The pilot reported to the National Transportation Safety Board investigator that he allowed the passenger, who was not a current pilot, to land the airplane, but that he was 'following'him on the flight controls. The passenger did not remove his feet from the rudder pedals during landing rollout, despite the pilot's repeated requests." Both suffered minor injuries.

Aside from the inherent ineffectiveness of "follow me through" caused by its Novocain-like effect on one pilot's trying to sense what the other is doing, the method's other clear peril is its ambiguity regarding who's in control. Now toss into the mix a skittery taildragger, and in one case a tandem configuration that can render cockpit communications difficult. That's a recipe for damage.

Flight instructors learn a better approach to teaching a maneuver: start by giving one or more demonstrations. Then let the learner fly. All this should be in conjunction with discussions conducted before the flight began. "In your initial demonstration," wrote Kershner, "explain the maneuver as you perform it, keeping your explanation as close as possible to that you made during the preflight briefing." He added, "For primary-type flying the 'follow me through method'of instruction is not valid in most cases." The italics are Kershner's.

Many pilots are well-intentioned and want to help another pilot get back in the air. But, unaccustomed to flight instruction's tolerances for student errors, they feel uneasy about relinquishing full control to the other person. The hastily invented compromise solution is "follow me through." But if you total up the higher risks and lesser rewards associated with that method, it would be better for everyone involved to seek out a better way to bring a lapsed pilot back into currency and proficiency. Reclaiming currency in the company of a qualified instructor is the recommended alternative.

Dan Namowitz is an aviation writer and flight instructor. A pilot since 1985 and an instructor since 1990, he resides in Maine.