For "The Corner"

By John Joerg (22 November 2006)

My addiction is aviation.

I have been airplane nuts since I was wheel-pant high. A flight simulator user since it was marketed by Sublogic for my trusty Commodore 64 back in 1983 or so. I am an avionics tech retired from the U.S.A.F. and now a DoD civilian employee. Doing the same job without the uniform. I have 28 years of working experience civilian and military in the field as of this writing. Over the years, I have been part or witness to a lot of discussion on how the skills we develop flying on our home computers would measure up in the real world.

In a recent article posted to FlightSim.Com, Chip Barber wrote:

"In the event that both pilots should become incapacitated, it would take nothing short of an act of divine providence to enable us to bring an aircraft safely to the ground."

As I said in a personal letter to Chip, I beg to differ. Almost a year ago there was an article in Flying magazine that touted the effectiveness of FS2004 as a training tool. His conclusions supported my experiences and suspicion that desktop pilots are much more prepared then they suspect they are.

I must confess that I do not have a pilot's license, this drives a few of my acquaintances almost crazy due to the fact I am so interested in flying. There are several reasons for my not having taken instruction that I won't go into here. That is another story and rather boring.

While I have flown a lot as a passenger and a crew member, and have gotten some bootleg time at the controls flying with friends who have PPL's, for the longest time I had never actually landed an aircraft in real life. The offer has been made for me to try but fear has stopped me from trying it on several occasions.

I used to have a supervisor who owns his own aircraft. And I flew with him several times. I would have to say that he is the most recent person to attempt to get me to go for my ticket. One morning (we work the night shift from 11 pm till 8 am); he was talking about having to shuttle his Piper to another local airport for its annual. He was saying how much trouble it is to get his wife to do it because of work schedules. Tom and I had been talking about flying a lot over the years. I offered to help by following with my car to one of the airports so we could leave one at each then double back after ferrying the aircraft. Granted this was a way for me to get an airplane ride, so there was a bit of selfishness in the offer. To my surprise he suggested that he just give me the keys to the plane, drop me off and he would meet me at the other airport.

The pause apparent to the outside world was, inside my head a two hour argument. The little devil almost won and got me to take the keys. I guess I am smarter than I thought I was. When I responded, "Tom, I don't have a license", he was, to say the least dumbfounded and rendered speechless for a moment.

He never knew I wasn't a rated pilot from our conversations. Even though I talked a lot about desktop simulation. It was almost a tradition for the next few years that I help ferry his plane or pick it up from its annual inspection. Each time was also an attempt to get me to go for my ticket.

And he made repeated offers to let me land the aircraft, all of which I declined. It's not that I thought I couldn't do it. But I certainly didn't want to take the chance of dinging his airplane. And besides, while he could "feel" when the aircraft was configured correctly and at the right speed, I had no such skill. And all the instruments I needed to make up for this were on his side of the panel and almost unviewable to me.

Sometime later, another friend changed this. I am now confident that I could handle a 747. Almost assuredly not as well as a professional. But I would give myself a 90% chance that the passengers in back would never know the difference. Let me explain why.

A few years ago, I bumped into a buddy of mine that I had lost contact with when he retired from the USAF. He is currently employed (since his retirement) by Flight Safety International as a simulator maintenance tech. He invited me up to play with his toys, and there was no argument there, I jumped at the chance. This is the perfect job as a good portion of your time is spent doing daily checks: testing the sims out to make sure all is working for the clients. I applied for a job there, but had to turn it down. The bliss of a dream job there wasn't worth the financial burden of the drastic pay cut I would have had to take. When I applied I thought they paid those guys a lot more than they do.

   

As added proof I have been to this facility a few times since and my skills have improved. I think, heck I KNOW that I am starting to be able to "feel" certain aircraft are right without looking at the instruments as much as I first did. By "feel" I mean both seat of the pants and sound.

THAT is something you can't get from a desktop, but you can overcome the lack of physical cues, or their presence for that matter. My friend still challenges me by throwing surprises at me. For example one night he gave me an incredible crosswind on a manual visual approach into KLGA in a Gulfstream IV, he intended to take it out when I got closer, he just wanted to see if I would notice. When I vocalized my having to keep correcting my approach to the left he admitted to adding a powerful crosswind. I told him to leave it in and I would try it. I managed three consecutive times to land in a 90 kt dead perpendicular crosswind. It was ugly, but the windows didn't go red. After sweating it down the last time I insisted he try it. We swapped seats and he crashed it three times before giving up. Admittedly, a real world pilot wouldn't have tried it (nor would I).

   

It goes without saying that I have repeatedly landed general aviation planes several times since my simulator experience offset a bit of the fear.

If you get the chance, dive in. In a real aircraft I would suggest doing it right with an instructor. I'm fairly certain if you went to a local flying school and paid for an hour or two of dual time and outlining what you want to do it would go off without a hitch. Doing it in an aircraft with an inexperienced pilot as a backup would be foolhardy. You can easily get into trouble, and having someone versed in dealing with a students mistakes is your best insurance policy.

If you have the chance to try out a full-motion professional sim GO FOR IT. It is the most fun you can have with your clothes on.

John Joerg
J3@localvertical.com

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