Reece

Why, Oh Why?

Okay, I haven’t got a thousand hours on Mirages, or Tornados, or even Macchis. Nor am I a 20,000 plus hour veteran 747 captain or a Boscombe Down test pilot instructor. However, as a part of my job I do sit and read crash reports from the world’s leading aviation safety bodies day in and day out. I read them and often look into space for minutes on end just trying to link the psychological key as to why that particular pilot literally flew him or herself into a situation that would guarantee their final desperate actions ending up on my desk. In 17 years of reading these reports I have never been able to clearly come to any sane conclusion as to why some of the most professional, obviously highly skilled and experienced pilots fly themselves into situations that in retrospect are perhaps unnecessarily dangerous.

Years ago when I was doing my flight training it was drummed into me that one of the most useless things any pilot had was the air above him. Two others were runway behind you, and fuel in the bowser. That first cliche haunts me every time I watch an unnecessarily steep departure and regrettably it also comes back to me these days in far too many accident reports. “Aircraft impacted with ground due to insufficient height to regain full control”. Why, oh why, oh why?

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