VMC into IMC

[motzartmerv]

"What is the problem with flying into cloud?".. I have lost count of the amount of times this question has been asked of me by students, and even pilots. No doubt your instructor has made comments while flying around that "we don't fly into cloud". He/ she may have (should have) quoted the rules for remaining in VMC (visual meteorological conditions), and you have filed this info away in the back of your mind, right along side things like, how to recover from a spin, in other words, in a file that contains those titbits of info that you know, but dont really understand, and think "ill be right, i'll never get myself into that position anyway"

 

Then you attend a CASA info night and after nibbling on the complementary refreshments (anything free from casa is a good thing, take advantage of it) the presenter plays a video called 178 seconds to live.

 

The music is ominous, the narrators voice is stern and serious and over a soundtrack of thunderclaps and doom and gloom he explains that a VFR pilot has entered a cloud and now has "178 seconds to live"

 

You think, holy snappers, thats not long, 178 seconds. Gee, i hope i never end up in a situation where i can count the seconds i have left on earth.

 

The presenter then goes on to quote example after example of guys just like you who got caught up in cloud and are now a 1 on the fatality's side a of a statistic's spreadsheet.

 

CASA's view on dealing with this problem is likend to pre columbis sailing days, where you could sail any where ya wanted to provided you never went in water deeper than your shoulders and never lost sight of land.

 

They have a "just say no to cloud" policy. I can understand the rationale behind it, but i'd like to, and encourage other instructors, particularly those with IFR experience, to offer some tools for copeing with the problem should it happen to you.

 

I have a personal view that casa's line on the problem could actually make the problem worse. eg, you inadvertently get yourself into some cloud, you try to remember what your instructor said to do in this situation but you cant get that dam casa video and the doom and gloom voice out of your head saying "you have 178 seconds to live". Any human being in a situation where they are SURE they are going to die in 178 seconds is going to get ...somewhat stressed. As stress goes up performance goes down inversely proportional, right at a time where you need probably your best performance, you are a blabbering mess.

 

A quik example of this phenomena.

 

On a flight one day near YGLB, I heard a student on a solo XC exercise, who had become lost.

 

We could tell by the tone and manner of his calls to melbourne center that he was well stressed. He had waited a very long time, flying around and around, before calling up for assistance.

 

All radio ettiquette was gone, his calls were more like a kid who found his dads cb radio.

 

The controller asked him to sqwak ident. He was so stressed out that he couldn't operate the transponder. He couldn't find the IDT button. A very simple task was impossible for him due to stress. Now imagine a guy that stressed out trying to carry out a forced landing when his fuel ran out?..not a hope...

 

Anyway, lets have a look at some anatomy.

 

Humans have 5 senses (unless your a kid in a bruce willis movie and you have 6).

 

*sight

 

*sound

 

*smell

 

*touch

 

*taste

 

well thats what you grade 8 science teacher told you anyway. But we actually have more. We can also sense temperature, but more importantly we have a sense of balance (equilibrioception) and a sense for acceleration (kinesthesioception).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The three senses that are important to us as pilots are obviously sight, balance and acceleration.(and sometimes sound or rather the lack of sound when the fan stops, but thats another story)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Humans rely heavily on sight. It is the sense that the brain dedicates alot of its space, and is our primary means for perceiving the world. Its no different for pilots, we use visual ques for evrything we do. Where is the horizen in the windscreen, what is my airspeed etc. Over the course of your training your brain develops cognitive responses to what is perceiving through your eyes. when the wings are not level you correct with your hand, when the fence dissapears beneath the nose you begin the flare etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All of your training and flying is done in this way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can also perceive acceleration. Any change in the aircrafts direction, speed, attitude etc can be felt right??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WRONG....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is the combination of what your seeing and what your FEELING that gives your brain the overall picture of whats happening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Evolution has provided us with a magnificent brain for perceiving the world around us, it is estimated that the brain recives input somewhere in the neighbour hood of a couple of megabytes of info every second. Now we cant possibly process all this info consciously. The brain takes the usefull stuff and feeds it to you and then dumps all the other stuff.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So can you feel the wings banking? can you feel the nose pitching?..Yes you can to a degree, but your brain needs more info then that to get the full picture, ie, it needs to SEE.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The instrument that the brain uses to sense accelration and balance is the ear, or more precisly the inner ear, or the vestibular apparatus (you never knew i was a scientist did you)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The vestibular apparatus has a pretty snazzy setup. there are 3 circular tubes orrientated about the three axis, ie pitch, roll and yaw. Im not joking, your ear has a version of an AH.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These tubes are filled with fluid and tiny tiny hairs. Any movement of your head (body, aeroplane) cause this fluid to move, which moves the hairs and sends info to your brain, basically telling it you have pitched, rolled or yawed, or any combination of the above. Pretty cool hey.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is a problem. This fluid like any other fluid has inertia. If you move in the same direction for an amount of time the fluid becomes stationary. It can no longer give the brain info about the movement in that direction. No problem because the eyes can still see the wings banked or the nose pitching, remember the brain dumping useless info?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, your mate flies IFR. He has an instrument rating, he's a pretty cool guy, he flies all the time in IMC conditions. HOW?? whats the difference between his brain and mine?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He has done the training, the learning, or more importantly the teaching of his brain to rely on that little gizmo called the artificial horizen, to give his brain the "visual" info it needs to give him a true picture of his orientation in space. He has trained his brain to ignore the info coming from his vestibular apparatus (seat of his pants) because this is unreliable info.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So does this still mean that i am certain to die if i go into cloud??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No, it doesn't.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It means you can not fly the way you normally do, because the brain is lacking the info.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What should i do if im caught in cloud.?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is where I would like some input from you experienced instructors. Lets develop some clear tools so pilots can overide the "im going to die in 178 seconds" mentality.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have some instrument flying experience, but am not instrument rated. On an instrument approach into ric one day with my chief, I was looking down at the approach chart (in IMC) for some info. It seemed like only seconds had passed and the chief was on the controls recovering from the incipient stage of a spiral dive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had no idea the aircraft had started a roll and a pitch down. This leads me to rule number 1.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. Dont move your head, keep looking forward and stay focussed on the AH. Think of it in its essence, it is a visual representation of where the horizen is. Dont struggle to see the ground through the soup.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. Don't play with gadgets in the cockpit, dont fiddle with the radio, the gps, nothing. Spend some time concentrating on keeping the wings level and TRIM.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember that in straight and level flight the pilot doesnt need to do alot on the controls. Its the same here,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3.If it aint broke, dont fix it..Leave the controls alone. Dont fight the turbulence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, what next??....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little help??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[farri]

Goodonya Motz!!!....................That`s how it is, guys and Gals!!!

 

Frank.

 

 

[facthunter]

In RAAus, recovery from SPIRALS is not recommended to be demonstrated. In IMC without training and currency and GOOD instruments , it is the spiral dive that will most likely get you. The spin scenario is a very secondary possibility which is so remote as the initial source of the problem, that it's more of a distraction to focus on it.

 

You've covered the senses that we have to measure turns and accelerations in the inner ear. They only register CHANGES in the state you are in, so a slow entry to a turn is not very perceptible, as is a slow recovery. Once you are in a steady state , you sense nothing. ( inner ear wise.)

 

Even trained and experienced pilots have to be aware of the ILLUSION of acceleration/ pitch-up that occurrs after take-off if there is no external visual reference.

 

Airline pilots who are fatigued after a long tour perform pretty badly doing hand manipulated approaches, because it has a requirement for precise scanning and response, as you get closer to the ground. Most of them would be done on the autopilot ( which doesn't know it's in cloud and doesn't fly by the seat of the pants). Auto lands use 2 autopilots. IF they don't agree you don't get the autoland.

 

The digression is to highlight the difficulty and you might say, I ONLY need to be able to do gentle turns and I am a very good pilot so those things are for other people. OK I have heard harrowing (direct NOT second hand) accounts of losing it in cloud even though proficient and trained in IF and falling out of the bottom of a cloud upside down and only living because there was a bit of clear sky between the cloud base and the ground. A bloke who I was a goood friend of and one of the most careful pilots I ever knew of hit the side of a mountain in cloud. You can't understand IF in IMC without doing it. Plenty of pilots think a pendulum in the cockpit will always point straight down, ( to the earth) It doesn't!!!. A simulator with motion goes part of the way, to giving you the feel, but IF you haven't flown recently (where you use the seat of the pants feel unconsciously in all your flying), you can often fly the simulator better. You have to rely ABSOLUTELY on your instruments and IGNORE the middle ear inputs. IF you are flying under the hood with an instructor THAT is not the same . You don't have the pressure on you. You know that the instructor will take over and not allow you to muck up to the stage that it is dangerous. IF it is ONLY you and your performance and you say " that turn needle is WRONG..... I KNOW I'm not turning. It's all over..Nev

 

 

[farri]

This just came to mind......Off topic,but relevent.

 

Over the years,I`ve been lucky enough to have right hand seat in a King Air, with a very experienced, long time and hours commercial pilot.

 

While we were sitting there on one flight, he told me of the time that while flying in the middle of a very dark night, the AC was on auto pilot and he had his cup of coffee sitting beside him, suddenly, he looked down to see that the coffee was higher up one side of the cup than the other.....The auto pilot had droped out and the AC was starting to go into a spiral dive.

 

Even with the amount of experience that this pilot had, he hadn`t felt what was happening.

 

What chance of survival would a recreational pilot,without any instruments or IMC training have, after loosing all reference to an horizon ?????????????

 

The answer is realy,realy easy...........................Not much!!!

 

Frank.

 

 

[dazza 38]

Hi Nev, in my RAA (1997) test I had not only had a spiral dive shown to me in training, but i had to do it for the test, in a LSA 55 Jabby.It being a slippery AC, VNE came up realy quick.

 

Also-just throwing the ball around, people I think get a false sence of security,because people fly computor sims, sitting flat on the ground in their house without the fluids coursing the brain to conflict with there senses.If / when it happens in realy life, they are up a creek without a paddle.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uF7-AxleI_0

[facthunter]

Dazza 38. I taught it too, as it is important and a very critical manoeuver. You will quickly get a high rate of descent and high airspeed and high "G" loading. Aircraft structural overload is likely. Take off bank and close throttle and pull out of the dive carefully. In IMC it would be all over once you get to that stage, (generally), because it's fairly critical in VMC even... Nev

 

 

[dazza 38]

Dazza 38. I taught it too, as it is important and a very critical manoeuver. You will quickly get a high rate of descent and high airspeed and high "G" loading. Aircraft structural overload is likely. Take off bank and close throttle and pull out of the dive carefully. In IMC it would be all over once you get to that stage, (generally), because it's fairly critical in VMC even... Nev

I agree Nev, You can call me Daryl if you like or Dazza no need for formalities here.:wink:I was just pointing out that some of us have been taught that.I didnt mean for it to be taken the wrong way or anything.Which im sure you havent.Its a interesting subject, Who havent been shown this?By that i mean spiral dive?

 

 

[Bubbleboy]

Great topic! I know the under the hood IFR I did with my PPL license scared the hell out of me! I was up over the Central Coast with the hood on and my instructor did the usual manipulation of the controls and I had to get out of it. I did manage but I swore I was sitting on a 45 degree angle yet the plane was in straight and level flight. It is the most un-natural feeling I have ever experienced and I will always remember it.

 

Scotty

 

 

[facthunter]

I recollect reading in some RAAus associated material that an ACTUAL demonstration is not recommended. I would be inclined to agree with the general thrust of that recommendation seeing as aerobatics are not permitted in RAAus aircraft. You have to balance this with the value of the actual demonstration. (subsequent to a thorough prior briefing). Plenty of aircraft border on spiral instability anf it would not be difficult to enter one inadvertantly if looking behind. The recovery has to be executed quickly, or trouble happens quickly.

 

I have the general view that we are undertrained. ( That is why I recommend EM training . In a stronger aircraft). Nev

 

 

[motzartmerv]

All great stuff. Although my attempts to draw some "what to do if" scenarios out of guys in the know has failed .

 

When I did my PPL the BIF comprised of hood time, recovery from unusal attitudes, and the 180 deg turn.

 

I guess this is where im trying to aim the discussion.

 

The typical scenario taught is the pilot is flying along on a nice day, somehow finds himself flying into a fair weather cumulous. Goes onto instruments and performs a 180 deg, level turn and flies himself out of the could.

 

GA instructors correct me if im wrong, but thats what I was taught. In the time spent flying since then Ive come to realize that this is not a very realistic scenario. The scenario on the CASA doom and gloom video is much more realistic IMHO. Its a slow degradation of vis, a slow over time or distance reduction in cloud base, that seems to be the one that will get you.

 

How likely are you to die if you go into cloud.?

 

In the 5year study put out by the ATSB, there were a total of 180 VMC into IMC cases reported. Out of these there were 17 accidents. Based just on the numbers above supplied by the ATSB the chances that you will prang should you go into IMC are around 10%.

 

(Now before you all start jumping up and down, I realise that theres no seperation between RAA and GA in these stats, and the unreported cases can't be shown.)

 

However, the odds of this prang being fatal are 100%.

 

100% probablility that you will die if you prang, thats not a good number to have in your mind should the soup suck you in.

 

This leads to what Nev said earlier.

 

What is likely to happen, now that we know whats happening inside our bodies when the terrain dissapears.?

 

Stalling and spinning is not likely, sure its possible but its not the killer in this situation.

 

When learning to turn, we all learn quickly that its the lift force angled sideways that turns the aircraft. Also, when the lift foirce is tilted sideways (actinf perpundicular the the span of the wings) it looses some of the vertical component that its providing the aircraft. ie, the steeper the turn, the more back pressure required to maintain your altitude.

 

Beyond a certain angle of bank, say 30 deg's for argument sake, should the nose drop (ie insufficient back pressure) it can't just be raised by applying more back pressure, you MUST roll off some bank, raise the nose, and roll the bank back on. All sounding familiar?

 

As Nev said earlier, the vestibular apparatus can only give limited info.

 

Our pilot feels something going on, looks at the AH, and realises the wings are banked but more allarmingly, they are banked alot and the nose is down.

 

THE NOSE IS DOWN!!!!!!..strewth, i better get that up before i hit the ground, so he instinctively comes back on the stick, which instead of getting the nose up just tightens the turn, increasing the G loading. The VSI is hard against the down stop, the engine is screaming. Why wont the nose come up?

 

Im right back on the stick?

 

The reason is, because the bank angle is too great.The aircraft is in a spiral dive.Airspeed is increasing rapidly, altitude is winding off like a fan and the controls become very very responsive.

 

The correct recovery is to level the wings with aileron, and then raise the nose with elevator. You simply can't do both at the same time.

 

It is the benign entry into a slow turn, un perceived by the pilot that develops into a spiral dive. And this is the reason why surviving a prang in IMC is not an option.

 

Controlled flight into terrain is a separate issue and assumes the pilot is under complete control but for some reason has lost SA and flown into the hills.This aspect is probably more of an IFR issue.

 

So, should you end up in the soup, if you keep the wings level, you have half the battle won and have just increased you odds of survival dramatically.

 

This is why I am at odds with the CASA stance, the just say no to cloud mentality.

 

Where are the tools, the procedures to follow should it happen to you?..Clearly something is possible as the statistics dont point to the incident requiring a crash at the end.

 

 

[facthunter]

Your evaluation of it is pretty much on the ball. I won't go down the road of recommending what to do if you get into the soup. You don't suddenly get there though things can happen quickly.near the ocean with very damp air. You generally have to let your self go where the way back is not available. This is situational awareness stuff part of what comes with experience. ( unfortunately) Under the hood training will help greatly and practice as well. The quickest way out of cloud with a definate base is to drop altitude and get out of it straight away. I mean STRAIGHT away, while you are certain of where the ground is. You must already be NEAR the base and just strayed up into it.

 

Prevention is better than cure here, and is the way the authority presents it. They can not do much else really..

 

I know people who have entered cloud and (wisely) used the autopilot to do a 180 degree turn. This is good procedure if there is no great big cliff in the way. When you fly up a valley make sure that you leave enough room to do a turn if you are under cloud.

 

If you have to enter cloud to get out of a predicament, ( return track not clear of weather) consider a precautionary outlanding ahead of a sojourn into cloud. Better to damage the plane and walk away than press on and IF you do lose control of the plane, in cloud, and I would generally see the 10% as too low a figure for losing control. I don't believe many untrained pilots would keep control of the aircraft in IMC, the outcome is going to be fatal in just about every case, if they don't.

 

Anytime you get into a bad situation a cool approach and manage the plane and your resources optimally will give better results than panicking, but many would. Getting on to ATC is a good move but only you can FLY the plane. They can tell you where to point it to a better outcome for clear air and things like that, but talking to them is a possible distraction. Just say "stand by" if you are busy, and keep those wings level. Nev

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Yes, thankyou nev.

 

Ive often speculated that a quick descent would be the quickest and easiest way out in alot of situations.

 

On thinking about the dangers, apart from the obvious descending into the hill problem, i would add that the descent be done with the minnimum amount of config change as possible. Ie, not a huge power reduction, snapping back to idle etc. Should you attempt the descent and it doesnt get you clear i fear that forgetting to push power back up could cause real issues (its happend). As well, the pitching yawing moments when power is suddenly applied may be the instigator in a spiral or other unwanted direction change.

 

But I agree that if you find yourself just slipping up into the soup, a descent straight away would be an option.

 

cheers

 

 

[motzartmerv]

No need for embarrassment David. It happens.

 

Like most things in aviation there is no hard and fast rule or technique to learn that will fit all possible scenarios.

 

Often the soup is difficult to judge, what height is the base?, how thick is it? But here's a couple of things i believe can help.

 

1. By far, in the lower altitudes we fly at, the cloud type which features most prominently in IMC excursions is strata form. Nimbo stratus (rain bearing stratus) is that smooth blanket type cloud that often covers large areas with little or no gaps, and often seems to just descend with or without rain, onto or near the ground. If you see ST or SC (strata cumulus) on the area forcast with a base thats less than 1000 ft higher than your planned altitude, then you won't be legally VMC for this flight, above 3000 (or any other cloud type for that matter). But I like to pay particular attention to ST cloud.

 

2. If the predicted temperature on the forcast has sharp drops over a given time, then expect cloud to form, particularly ST cloud. Any function that causes air to reduce temp and or pressure, can be the catalyst for cloud formation. Warm air can "hang onto' dissolved water vapour much better than cold air. Once the air temp drops, it can't contain its moisture anymore and the water vapour is forced out, forming cloud. (its a bit more complex than that, but basically thats what happens)

 

3. From the cockpit, if you can see the horizon beneath the cloud base then the cloud is higher than you. This may sound obvious, but it works no matter how far you are from the cloud.

 

4. A layer of cloud close to your height can block out your view of whats behind it, ie, you may be flying towards a bank of cloud and not know whats on the other side . Is it clear or is it clagged?. A simple tip is, look at the ground ahead and beyond the cloud, if theres lots of shadows, theres lots of cloud.. Lots of sunshine, means little cloud. simple.

 

 

[turboplanner]

Descent?

 

Most of the accident reports indicate that the aircraft continued the flight under cloud and were caught out by rising terrain or lowering cloud. Many witness reports indicate a very low flying aircraft.

 

Take the case I saw yesterday with low cloud in the SE Melbourne area a Cherokee came tripping out from Moorabbin into the training area.

 

Heading east he was looking side on to a huge cloud gradient descending to the ground on the right and ascending to higher altitude and relatively clear skies to the left.

 

He seemed to realise conditions were too bad for a 40 minute practice session, and immdiately started gentle 180 turn to the RIGHT.

 

My heart was in my mouth because I could see him spearing through wisps of cloud, then one second he was clearly visible and the next second totally invisible in cloud, and that's the last I saw of him.

 

He was too far away to hear the bang, but I was sure I'd hear about it on the news. Perhaps the vision vertically downwards was good enough for him to retain stability because there was no report.

 

I suspect that as he entered the training area he was hit by panic, and because he had always re-entered the Moorabbin Zone via Carrum (to thew right), that's where he was going regardless of the weather, when he could have entered via one of the other entry points by aviating to the clear sky then getting on the radio and asking for help.

 

I would estimate his height when he entered the cloud at about 400 to 500 feet, but he had turned towards the Carrum Downs/Frankston Hills, so his ground clearance was about

 

200 to 300 feet.

 

If the cloud had been more dense, descending in this case could have actually caused a crash.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Yes, like we said, some cases it may be an option.

 

 

[Guest rocketdriver]

Great thread ... And yes, its happened to me too ... In formation flying between two cloud layers. suddenly its misty, then the lead ship disappears ......

 

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is cockpit resource management, I think its called. If you have a passenger, especially one who is also a pilot, you can delegate some tasks to them, making it clear, as pilot in command, who is to do what.

 

For example ..... "I have control. David, please watch the turn and slip and the asi and let me know if you see the angle of bank go beyond 15 deg or the speed changing up or down by more than 5 knots." "I am going to make a 180 deg turn on the compass at no more than 15 deg bank, slip ball centred, maintaining altitude and with airspeed as it is."

 

This patter or something like it briefs the passenger as to what is gioing on, and also ( sounds silly), I believe it also briefs you as to what to do as PIC, so you should probably make the second half of the briefing out loud to yourself if flying solo.

 

cheers

 

RD

 

 

[Ultralights]

i find it interesting not much has been said about the precautionary search and landing..

 

in the PPL training, i was taught the rate 1 turn 180 deg under the hood, but also, if you are just in the bottom of the cloud, and you know there is some clear air below, then just relax on the controls, and reduce power to approx 50% and let the aircraft slowly descend while trimmed straight and level.

 

but if i was in an area, cloud forming everywhere, and it can form quickly when fronts and such arrive, find myself under a lowering base, valley walls on 3 or more sides, rather than consider climbing through it, i would start looking for somewhere to perform a Prec search and landing.. road, paddock, driveway, golf course (much easier in a Savvy) and with a perfectly sevicable aircraft, you have time to find a suitable landing place. i would rather bend a wing hitting something while performing a prec searhc and landing on a golf course, than have ATSB investigator pick my teeth out of whats left of an aircraft in a smouldering crater.

 

 

[Guest rocketdriver]

Also a further thought. If anyone has access to a link trainer, these are excellent at introducing you to the disorienting effect of being on instruments and the need to develop a scan. They mostly rotate and pitch but can't reproduce yaw and I don't recall that they can heave ...... (perhaps they leave that up to the student pilot! LOL). Even with this limited motion, it is amazing how difficult it is to persuade your self that, after several 360s, you have straightened up on the chosen heading no matter what the compass or DG tells you .....

 

 

[poteroo]

A timely subject Merv,

 

Prevention is better than cure.....no question this is true, but it comes back to instructors instilling some respect for VFR tolerances. Being able to recognise your height above/below cloud, to recognise distance from rain or cloud, and distance from obstacles when in rain is essential in the prevention business. We need to take our more advanced students out into the 'bad wx world' more often, and point out the hazards. Allow them to fly near, and into the edge of, light dzl or rain showers so they can appreciate an indistinct horizon, or a loss of horizon for part of the turn.

 

I've always held that it's easier to escape impending IMC when you are already under the cloud base, perhaps in lowering visibility though. In this scenario - the 180 turn will work, and I always try to do them to the right because there's less chance of a spiral resulting. I also teach spiral recovery - particularly to the left. But before you get to this necessity - configure for slower flight, eg 70-75 kts in a J-160, which means you don't travel so far into the murk, and the radius of turn is less than at full cruise - (really important in something like a C210, B36, RV etc). Trim carefully, set your reciprocal on the heading bug, use carby heat before you get to the murk, and have your GPS or ADF on a location back along your track. As Merv has already noted - minimise distractions, just fly the aircraft very carefully.

 

My GA IF training did involve lots of spiral recoveries under the hood, some full and some limited panel. Much less emphasis on stalling if I recall. My CFI was ex WW2 and was pretty hot on the IF work. We didn't have any navaids, so your attention wasn't diverted by the magic magenta line.

 

happy days,

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Yea Rob, the prec search and landing would be a way of avoiding the problem in the first place for sure.

 

Remember that a properly executed pre search and landing can take up to 20 minutes to perform. Still a better option than going IMC, like you said (quite eloquently) better to damage the plane than end up arriving vertically.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Good point potts.

 

I teach visual spiral recovery in the jabiru's. Mainly because ive noticed so many 'pilots' get lazy and just steer with their feet, using the secondary effects.

 

I like to demonstrate (at altitude) how this could be a deadly mistake when turning final.

 

The scenario is the pilot over shoots his turn onto final, says no problem ill just steepen the turn and gives it a boot full of rudder. The jabs have incredibly strong secondary effects once they pass a certain point, the things just seem to snap over at low speed ie approach speed.

 

Its nothing to go from 3000 to less then 2500 in only 1/4 of a turn. Obviously at 500 feet this would be deadly.

 

Every single person who has had no spiral recovery training does the same thing, they just yank back on the stick, tightening the turn and increasing the descent rate. And its a pretty simple procedure to recover, level the wings FIRST with aileron and rudder, and then raise the nose.

 

 

[Spin]

I'd probably put it out here first David, at least the context of the discussion has been established. This is one of those topics that has people shooting from the hip and flaming people on the basis of conventional wisdom - ie. go into cloud and you're gonna die! I look forward to reading your contribution.

 

Good topic Motz, unfortunately the "rules" of aviation all to often represent what instructors teach students to keep them from killing themselves in the first few hours. Eg max 45 deg turn either side if EFATO, 178 seconds to die, etc when in fact these are good general advice to live by, rather than something akin to Newton's laws of motion.

 

I was a reluctant convert with a relatively new PPL and a ready collection of "rules" to apply to aviation, when an instructor friend challenged me to start thinking instead of just spouting. I flew quite a few night box runs with him and was told to "fly the %$#@ plane" when I wanted to hand over one moonlit night at the sight of an approaching cloud bank. Much to my surprise the aircraft continued flying as it had before and I was able to climb to our assigned level, level off, retrim and keep right on trucking, all in zero viz. We had many discussions about the what ifs and how to's on those late flights and whilst I would never equate my simple flight profile to instrument flight, which is an exacting and often high pressure environment when combined with precision navigation etc, the experience did mean that I was much less likely to panic if very bad luck or poor decision making on my part, placed me in cloud. My instructor friend cited the case of a fairly experienced PPL with his own well equipped Bonanza, that splattered himself all over a rocky ridge, rather than climb into a mist layer that had boxed him in. As he pointed out the auto pilot could quite happily have taken him up to clear air even if he couldn't manage the task himself - once there he could either have flown clear or 'fessed up and sought help. My mate's correctly pointed out that Wiley Post, Lindbergh and others mostly had no formal training in instrument flight and had to learn as they went along. Quite a few didn't survive the process, but many did and often with less instrument help than we have.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

David, would love to hear about it, and agree with spin that some may feel the need to flame, but if posted not boasted, we can all learn from it.and given the thread topic, it would be an invaluable contribution.

 

Spin. I couldn't agree more, and your story illustrates exactly what I've been trying to get at. To date the only thing akin to a procedure for us to go to has been basically "don't worry, it will be over in 178 seconds". Surely we can do better than that. I take your point re aviation 'rules'.

 

Cheers

 

 

[jerrajerra]

I received a bundle of CASA goodies yesturday and part of the my selection of free dvd's comprised of flying through cloud. My interpretation from watching that particular instructional DVD was - yep, you're gonna die if you fly through cloud and it'll happen within 178 seconds. It has not deterred me from wanting to obtain a particular rating to enable me to fly within these conditions but just wished that CASA would emphasise more to the point that it's not dangerous if you are rated.