If an airplane loses an engine during climb out, its pilot had better lower the nose now; likewise, low-altitude power loss in a helicopter requires entering autorotation without delay. In an engine fire, heaven forbid, every extra second lost shutting off the mixture and fuel selector, and getting that aircraft on the ground, diminishes the chance of survival.
But in most situations, hurry is about the worst possible response. Doing the wrong thing faster rarely helps.
A student pilot flying a Cherokee 140 at night tried to stop for fuel at an unattended airport. Clicking the microphone didn’t bring up the runway lights, so he tried to land without them, aiming for two lights he thought marked the threshold. He was almost on the ground before he realized they were actually on a building; his go-around was too late to avoid hitting the airport fence.
It turned out he had the correct frequency tuned on Comm 1—and the radio selector set to Comm 2. It would have been a good moment to remember that he didn’t have to get down right now. Taking a few minutes to circle the field while reviewing the frequencies listed in the airport/facility directory, checking the sectional for other airports nearby, and maybe sneaking another glance at the panel would have been time well spent.
West winds led the pilot of a kitbuilt Tiger Moth replica to land toward the setting sun. The glare kept him from seeing the runway, but he decided he could “get through the blind spot” and continued. The airplane’s left wing hit a tree. This happened just 17 minutes before sunset, so flying around a little longer would have seemed like a reasonable option.
A Cessna 182 landed long and slid off a turf strip because power lines at the far end made a go-around look risky. Turns out the landing was downhill as well as downwind; the pilot said he would have gone around sooner if he’d known the grass was wet. Good call!
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