Student interest, and also to emphasize the correct reaction to a bad wing drop (immediate opposite rudder to prevent further yaw). I also enjoy it, and I am comfortable flying and teaching the full exercise 11 in the C152 as I was taught in the FIC - that is with immediate recovery from the incipient spin. Optional does not mean prohibited...
My question is really about how far to take it, since the more developed spin I entered at the hands of a panicked student (on wing drop, the student applied full anti-spin aileron and pulled back sharply in shock... and over we went... and he kept pulling...) was a lot harder to recover than the exercises I had flown so far.
And I don't want to fly an exercise where I do not know where the limits are, so I can stay well away from them, to allow for own and student errors.
What is the reason for training developed spin recovery to non aerobatic students?
Peter, the spin resistance of aircraft was gradually improved until about 1960, at which point they seemingly had most new types pretty much figured out. If you stall an earlier type regularly, or at least many of the earlier types, you become aware that its likely you'll get into a developed spin inadvertently some day. And you do slow flight for fun, that's why, the same reason you fly beautiful old aircraft...
Earlier aircraft had powerful, light rudders, ailerons that would stall the tips, lots of adverse yaw, not much washout etc. They'll bite occasionally. I got into one steep nose down spin entry (eventually a spiral dive) during dual PPL stall training in a 1937 design, and I was being careful to keep the ball centered. I don't think my instructor pushed the rudder although I wouldn't put it past him... Anyway, he was quite justifiably nervous about sending me off to do solo stalls until I knew how to recover from what can happen when a relatively unskilled student is flying an older type aircraft. I was in complete agreement after the incident described above!
As for codified lesson plans, learning in FTO 'programs' that teach only what some ill defined authority thinks the students will 'need to know', marginalizing aeronautical knowledge that isn't directly applicable to making money driving airborne buses etc the less I say the better ;-) I'd just as soon my bus driver knows how to fly, and also understands what he may not know.
Later on when I flew a Duo Discuss sailplane with a friend, I was vastly impressed at how you could stall it uncoordinated if you wished, and it would do nothing to bite you. They need to be that way because they're flown in circles all the time at just above stall speed, with others like them nearby doing the same. Wonderfully developed aerodynamics.
As I remember the old US/Canadian study AeroPlus is referring to, the risk increase from spin training does not come from training accidents, but from spin trained pilots spinning after obtaining the license. The study showed a surprising risk increase after spin training, even after correcting for aircraft types and kinds of operation.
As for the original question, I guess there is no telling what can happen if a student freezes at the controls. I have contemplated it, never experienced it but is now reminded again that it can happen. Side by side is obviously an advantage if that happens, but the only spin instruction I have done for many years is in Bellancas. Some of my spin students for that have been certified pilots actively seeking spin training and supposedly less prone to panic, but some have been event flights performed as trial lessons. But now aerobatic trial flights have effectively just been prohibited in Denmark, following the accident report of a tragic crash last year caused by a low-level maneuvering going wrong. (Nothing there to suggest the student/passenger freezing at the controls, rather a serious error of judgement on the part of the pilot/instructor.)
To me the question is how to make the best stall awareness/recovery training, but that is probable best saved for another thread.
And I don't want to fly an exercise where I do not know where the limits are...
The problem with these spin exercises is that the limits constantly change. Even normally docile aircraft can become difficult to control with minor shifts of the center of gravity or slight imbalances of the fuel quantities in each wing. The limits may change a lot between the beginning and the end of the flight. They change even more between flying two-up and solo, so having demonstrated that he can handle a spin with his instructor on board does not mean that he will be able to do so when flying solo - because the same aircraft may have completely different spinning characteristics.
And the same applies to spin training done in an aerobatic type with students who will fly Cessnas, Pipers and TBs later on. Knowing how to stop the spin in an Extra 300 at 5000ft might not be really helpful if the Pa28 with your family, the dog and holiday luggage on board starts to spin at 1500ft. Teach them to always keep their aircraft in trim instead, to know the pitch attitudes and power settings for the various phases of flight, to look at their airspeed indicator from time to time (helpful also when trying to visually land Boeing 777s...) to develop an intuitive feel for the energy management in three-dimensional space and how to recover safely if something does not look right.
And if ever someone wants to fly a (vintage) type with known peculiarities than spin recoveries will be part of the differences training anyway.
ADDENDUM for Cobalt: I just downloaded the POH of the C152 from our FTO website because I didn't have it on this computer yet: Spinning with flaps extended is NOT ALLOWED with this aircraft!
Anyway, in our part of the world it dosen't matter as spinning has been removed from the training syllabus longer than I fly and that would be more than 35 years (instructing for more than 20). I have not spun a powered aircraft yet and no desire to ever try it (maybe some day in an aerobatic type but only with a parachute...).
I did spin training in the C152 as part of my PPL at a well known FTO at your homebase EDDS. There was no placard about intentional spinning and it was an exercise well worth it. I have to say that the CFI asked me whether I want to do it.
Spins are a major topic in aviation, see how many people post about it. This is why I think every pilot should actually know what it is, i.e. do it. It's a stable flight condition and there are aircraft approved for it.
I've had my share of CFIs teaching sissy stalls -- as soon as the Cessna toots, push the nose down. Unfortunately that is about 5-8kt from a stall so students get their PPL without even knowing what a stall it.
Accidents like the Air France Airbus 330 clearly show that the "machine operator" approach towards pilot training is not perfect. The B777 in San Francisco is of the same type.
Accidents like the Air France Airbus 330 clearly show that the "machine operator" approach towards pilot training is not perfect.
Certainly not, but their crash was not due to the lack of stall recovery skills (which they might or might not have had) but to their lack of realization that their aircraft had actually stalled. And I am pretty much sure that these guys had done some real stalls back in their C152 days.
I've had my share of CFIs teaching sissy stalls -- as soon as the Cessna toots, push the nose down. Unfortunately that is about 5-8kt from a stall so students get their PPL without even knowing what a stall it.
This is how it is described in the training syllabus. Which is approved by the authority and therefore binding for the instructor. I doubt that our competition, where you probably did your training, uses a syllabus much different from ours, because they also require approval from the same authority. For an instructor this is a real dilemma because you are not supposed to instruct outside the syllabus, even if you personally might consider it useful. But how far do you go? If anything goes wrong, I as an instructor get the full blame without being covered by my company or the insurance, risking to lose my house and forcing my family to sleep under a bridge. And all that for 12,50 Euros per flying hour (or whatever a PPL instructor gets paid these days)? Certainly not.
AF447 was a number of interesting holes in the cheese lining up, with (to me) the most bizzare one being the stall warning being disabled below 60kt IAS. The "software engineer" who thought of doing that should go back to writing FSX models. If you need to kill the stall warner when the plane has landed, you wire it up into the, ahem, landing gear squat switches...
The other big hole (crap crew training for actually flying the plane) is pretty common everywhere, by all accounts, and isn't going to change anytime soon. You only have to hang out at an "airline pilot" FTO for a few days (as I did for the JAA IR ground school) and see the sort of bollocks which those young men with close to zero flying knowledge are learning (actually in most cases copying from each others notes in the lounge at the hotel)... and when they get their CPL/IR, done in some shagged Seminole, all that stands between that and the jet RHS is the brief TR course.
How much aerobatic training have you had?
Is the aircraft fitted with an accelerometer?
... and when they get their CPL/IR, done in some shagged Seminole, all that stands between that and the jet RHS is the brief TR course.
Unfortunately this is all true, but right now there is no other way. Back in "my" days (not so long ago but long enough) there still were operators who carried night freight with Cessna 404s where a 200 hour newbie could learn his trade the hard way for another 1000 hours before being allowed to get closer than 200 meters to a Boeing or Airbus (or Citation). Nobody flies piston twins commercial any more because their operating cost has risen to the same order of magnitude of a bizjet, at least regarding the mileage. Now we can consider ourselves (as passengers) lucky if he had the chance of flying on a bizjet for a couple of hundred hours before being let loose at 300 passengers in an Airbus.
But what worries me more than anything is that the prerequisites for becoming an instructor have been lowered to a ridiculous level. The 200 hour newbie frozen ATPL holders can now do an instructor course (including CPL, IR and multi engine) right after passing their own checkride and start instructing other ATPL newbies without having flown IFR themselves a single second without an instructor or examiner beside them in the cockpit. This will end in tears very soon. We've already seen two fatal training accidents with German registered light twins caused by "Vmca demonstrations" gone wrong and this is only the beginning.
The "software engineer" who thought of doing that should go back to writing FSX models. If you need to kill the stall warner when the plane has landed, you wire it up into the, ahem, landing gear squat switches...
There is no "software engineer" who decides on these things (I have made software for a large European aircraft manufacturer long enough myself... but luckily not for flight guidance) but a large international body composed of members from Airbus, it's various suppliers and representatives of the customer airlines and national authorities. The software engineer simply codes what these guys write into his book. If he has concerns about what he is supposed to do (but how should he, as he probably earned his degree in computer science and not in aerospace engineering) then he can address them to the rulemaking body and, unless they decide differently - and quickly, continue according the initial specification.
What's described above is a very good example of over regulation decreasing the quality and safety of the activity it covers. What would concern me is regulators, plus commercial aircraft companies creating more of the same in reaction.
I think the solution to maintaining more widely experienced commercial pilots is to cultivate an aviation culture that has the bare minimum of taxation and regulation, grows in size and scope, and thereby automatically offers the young pilot opportunities to fly different kinds of stuff. Detailed centralized debate and planning, creating an approved training system, and regulatory action has proven not to work. Regulatory inaction works better.
As long as the pilot meets the Practical Test Standards, I don't think anything else related to training methodology should matter to the regulator.
