In military flying, I have seen live examples of excessive risk taking, usually from fresh single cadets while in civilian that tends to come from the very old or the very young, the driver is clearly the cheap price tag on life !
Luckily most get trained many times to keep training reflexes (some call these rational decisions) in use insead of basic instincts when the time come in, however, no training or skill will help you to get away from improvising “on the go” outside your envelope, even most experienced thrill-seekers or test pilots have fallen into that trap.
I will bet anyone of us, irrespective of experience, will pull the stick during the first two seconds after an EFATO if taken by surprise…
I’ll bet any of us who started on cable-lauched gliders, when cables were much poorer quality than today, will start dropping the nose as the engine note changes. I have a log of 6 launches (3 cable breaks), solo, from the early 60s.
Good for you Maoraigh, at least you have that wired in the head from your early flights, not everybody had that luxury to train on poor quality cables.
But, I still see pilots (including myself) who used to winch cable breaks struggling when they get surprised by a low rope break on aero-tow: most just push nose down (good reflex but your are already at 65kts) and get puzzled for three seconds on what to do next ??!!
I used to treat winch cable breaks lightly, till two years ago when a I heard a very experienced flying buddy died after he went for the wrong decision…after the fact it is easy to debug but we rarely do when things are live, most of us should have stopped that heavy takeoff before clearing the hedge? Or have gone around on that fast approach? Or land straight after that EFATO…
Same, for the impossoble turn, if you get cought by surprise the best you could come up with are simple default options (e.g. get excess speed, land ahead, wing level…) and hope for the best, of course when you expect it you can surely train to get away with 1/2 spin turn !
normally you are better off not doing it.
EuroFlyer wrote:
Terrible outcome of the American legal system. I guess.
Of course, when it comes to flying, the US is still 100x more free than much of sad old Europe.
kwlf wrote:
I lived in Eastern Slovakia for a time (a few decades ago) and you came to realise that, in contrast to Britain, you had to take a greater responsibility for your own wellbeing. You could open train doors whilst the train was moving. Lamp-posts might be electrified and often had bare wires showing. School discos would have all the fire exits locked.
While I suspect electrical standards were better in the UK, a few decades ago you could open train doors while the train was moving in the UK too, and look up the Summerland fire in the Isle of Man for a disaster made much worse by all the fire exits being locked.
I suspect things in Eastern Slovakia are probably also changed from a few decades ago.
Peter wrote:
Also the “American legal system” is not like it is constantly portrayed here in “intellectually superior” Europe
The proof of the pudding is airports outside of opening hours.
In the UK at least, if you want to go to an airport outside of its opening hours, you have to – in advance – sign a huge legal disclaimer. In some cases, you are charged money for this, and in some cases you can only do it by post many days in advance of your trip (e.g. Oban). It’s one of those things that destroys the utility of GA here – part of the advantage of GA is you don’t have to book stuff weeks in advance and have flexibility. So the airport operators take it away!
In the USA, no one gives a damn if you land after the airport staff went home.
Either the probability of being sued in the UK is greater than the USA, or the fear of being sued is greater in the UK.
The 3rd (most likely IMHO) possibility is that it is nothing to do with getting sued and everything to do with a (real or perceived) loss of control 
Allegedly, reportedly, and to me very believably, out of hours ops in the UK are disliked because too many pilots avoid paying the landing fee.
Or take the pi$$ in some other way. Where I am based, an out of hours scheme was terminated some years ago because one based pilot took the pi$$ by operating out of the out-of-hours period. Due to pilot controlled lighting being historically banned by the CAA, you can’t allow “night” ops because some % of pilots will try landing at night, and the crashes will give the place a bad name (as well as being reckless and illegal and whatever).
As so often, one bag apple damages the whole basket.
Jacko wrote:
These people shine a ray of hope in an era of dull neo-totalitarian conformity, and we should honour them as we do the men, women and children who died for freedom in Europe in the last century.
Most just perished in the hands of Nazis and Communists. Freedom has nothing to do with it, it’s more like being born in wrong time period at the wrong place. The neo-totalitarian conformity is only an expression of selfish intolerance towards others and felt (bit not real) personal danger (hysteric anxiety essentially). But, those pilot in the video would be considered stupid regardless of time period or regime
Peter wrote:
Or take the pi$$ in some other way. Where I am based, an out of hours scheme was terminated some years ago because one based pilot took the pi$$ by operating out of the out-of-hours period.
But why was there even an out-of-out-of-hours period? In the US, no one cares. Every airfield is essentially H24 if it has lights, and it’s extremely rare that someone tries to operate from one without lights at night. Or ar the Americans just a lot smarter than British people?
