ERAU takes a position to reduce safety

I like how he thinks someone with a Commercial and 200 hours can just show up at some farm and hop in a crop duster.
 
BobDDuck said:
Almost all of the training I did included a landing at an airport that was 50.6 miles away from our departure. During the time headed there I would teach stalls, steep turns, slow flight, emergency descents, VMC demos. And that was just for non instrument students. Throw in tracking, intercepting, holding, and just plain flying the plane while under the hood it was hardly a waste of anybody's time.
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bdhill1979 said:
I'm there to teach them how to safely operate in the IFR system.

Transitioning from departure to enroute to approach to missed to enroute to alternate approach is what IFR is.

If you were being taught to do the same 3 approaches you would be doing on the checkride over and over again you did get cheated.
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I am not trying to argue, it is just my personal opinion on the matter. I dont need to fly 50 miles away to get to another airport, there are 15-20 within 30 miles of me, mostly all having 1 or more IAP and all with varying terrain and airport layout.

A few times fine, but to do it consistently does not make sense to me. Especially for a primary student who cant even log the XC time as PIC. IFR is a bit different as the time can be logged, however I still feel like going that far away is a waste of time. I can fly many routes via VOR, GPS or vectors to number of airports all with approaches of almost all types, in the city or in the country both towered and non and never go 30 nm from my home airport. All while doing stalls, steep turns and any other air work that needs to be done in between.
 
Matt13C said:
I am not trying to argue, it is just my personal opinion on the matter. I dont need to fly 50 miles away to get to another airport, there are 15-20 within 30 miles of me, mostly all having 1 or more IAP and all with varying terrain and airport layout.

A few times fine, but to do it consistently does not make sense to me. Especially for a primary student who cant even log the XC time as PIC. IFR is a bit different as the time can be logged, however I still feel like going that far away is a waste of time. I can fly many routes via VOR, GPS or vectors to number of airports all with approaches of almost all types, in the city or in the country both towered and non and never go 30 nm from my home airport. All while doing stalls, steep turns and any other air work that needs to be done in between.
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Gotcha

We dont have close airports so that is why we have to go past 50 to get approaches other than home.
 
Can someone enlighten me on why crop dusting is so stinken complex? As long as your engine doesn't die, you can fly by looking outside and not at your instruments, and you avoid power lines in the area I don't see the difficulty of level flight 50' off the ground...:dunno:
 
shdw said:
Can someone enlighten me on why crop dusting is so stinken complex? As long as your engine doesn't die, you can fly by looking outside and not at your instruments, and you avoid power lines in the area I don't see the difficulty of level flight 50' off the ground...:dunno:
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Are you serious?
 
shdw said:
Can someone enlighten me on why crop dusting is so stinken complex? As long as your engine doesn't die, you can fly by looking outside and not at your instruments, and you avoid power lines in the area I don't see the difficulty of level flight 50' off the ground...:dunno:
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Dude...have you ever seen crop dusting? I mean like actually watched it in person, and not just seen a video. If you have and don't recognize the danger and complexity involved in that kind of flying then I believe a top gun quote is in order. Something about egos and checks being cashed.

That doesn't even touch on what i would imagine you would need to know about agriculture in order to be good at it
 
shdw said:
Can someone enlighten me on why crop dusting is so stinken complex? As long as your engine doesn't die, you can fly by looking outside and not at your instruments, and you avoid power lines in the area I don't see the difficulty of level flight 50' off the ground...:dunno:
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:eek:


Send me a PM.


FYI... at 50 feet, ag pilots suffer from high altitude nose bleeds! :D
 
sdhw, now that you've been throughly slapped down, just know there is a heck of a lot to aerial application. Budd Riggs has some e-books online. Free to read.
 
PM sent. I was only referring to the flying aspect poser, I am sure there are other things to know. Yes, I am serious, doesn't seem to crazy to me I would love it if it weren't for the chemical carrying aspect. I would imagine the stick and rudder skills aren't there with most though, they were not with me upon graduation.

But since graduation I have retaught myself and would now prefer if my plane had zero instruments and a hand held radio I don't think it seems overly complex. During this reteach I found it much easier to learn stick and rudder skills through visual flying, I can't imagine it taking more than 10-15 hours with any recent graduate to catch them up to speed if it was done right. However, I am certainly a noobie in this field so maybe I am just crazy. :)
 
RICHARD5 said:
sdhw, now that you've been throughly slapped down, just know there is a heck of a lot to aerial application. Budd Riggs has some e-books online. Free to read.
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Haha, I wasn't saying it isn't hard, just doesn't seem hard to me which is why I asked for an explanation. That being said, I really want to do this now just cause it sounds fun and challenging. I am near PA, where do I go to do some of this stuff, and how safe is it chemical wise? I was always told by instructors at school to avoid it cause the chemicals are horrible on your body.
 
shdw said:
PM sent. I was only referring to the flying aspect poser, I am sure there are other things to know. Yes, I am serious, doesn't seem to crazy to me I would love it if it weren't for the chemical carrying aspect. I would imagine the stick and rudder skills aren't there with most though, they were not with me upon graduation.

But since graduation I have retaught myself and would now prefer if my plane had zero instruments and a hand held radio I don't think it seems overly complex. During this reteach I found it much easier to learn stick and rudder skills through visual flying, I can't imagine it taking more than 10-15 hours with any recent graduate to catch them up to speed if it was done right. However, I am certainly a noobie in this field so maybe I am just crazy. :)
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so you think you can handle an a/c that carries nearly 5000lbs of chemical and has a max gross wt of 16,000 with maybe 250hrs (graduation + your extra 10-15)??? flying a few feet of the fields, and then dang near aerobatics when making the turns at 200ft agl? not to mention they are tailwheel so a whole different animal, and you need to know about wind drift, which fields, etc etc?
 
Blip16 said:
so you think you can handle an a/c that carries nearly 5000lbs of chemical and has a max gross wt of 16,000 with maybe 250hrs (graduation + your extra 10-15)??? flying a few feet of the fields, and then dang near aerobatics when making the turns at 200ft agl? not to mention they are tailwheel so a whole different animal, and you need to know about wind drift, which fields, etc etc?
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Well no I have about 500 now, but I mean with the right training course and with one who already has a tailwheel rating. I actually never got the rating and only have about 15 hours tailwheel, just never asked for the sign off. But as for the steep pull, I have aerobatic training that wouldn't worry me as much as trying to hit the release switch at the right time.

Like I said though, I don't really know as I haven't done it but it sounds like fun tbh. I would love to go buzz around and give it a shot, maybe that is arrogant I don't know. But nobody has really explained it yet.


Edit: Just got ctabs explanation, I think you should put that here bud that is really cool. It just made me want to try more though. How much does this kind of thing pay? What hour requirements do I need? Are there jobs like this around the PA/NJ area? Finally, what is the true danger to the pilot with regards to the chemicals?
 
shdw said:
But since graduation I have retaught myself and would now prefer if my plane had zero instruments and a hand held radio I don't think it seems overly complex. During this reteach I found it much easier to learn stick and rudder skills through visual flying, I can't imagine it taking more than 10-15 hours with any recent graduate to catch them up to speed if it was done right. However, I am certainly a noobie in this field so maybe I am just crazy. :)
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I had 10 to 15 hours of simulated ag flying in a Citabria before I ever sat in an Air Tractor for the first time. FYI... I grew up in a Citabira and at that time I had 90% of my time in tailwheel airplanes. Now, I will admit, the first 5 hours or so was the training... the rest was just fun, mostly spent getting a feel for some of the fields I would be flying the next week.

shdw said:
...and how safe is it chemical wise? I was always told by instructors at school to avoid it cause the chemicals are horrible on your body.
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Depends on the operation. There are some operators now where the pilot is never in contact with the chemicals at all.
 
Pay varies, but usually it pays very well. My biggest fear with air application would be putting it on the wrong field, that stuff aint cheap.
 
shdw said:
Well no I have about 500 now, but I mean with the right training course and with one who already has a tailwheel rating. I actually never got the rating and only have about 15 hours tailwheel, just never asked for the sign off. But as for the steep pull, I have aerobatic training that wouldn't worry me as much as trying to hit the release switch at the right time.

Like I said though, I don't really know as I haven't done it but it sounds like fun tbh. I would love to go buzz around and give it a shot, maybe that is arrogant I don't know. But nobody has really explained it yet.
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For what it is worth shdw... I had about 650 hours when I made my first application in an Air Tractor. BUT... I had been flying as PIC doing night applications for mosquito control for about 2 years before I ever flew the Air Tractor in an actual spay situation. It is just like everything else in aviation... sometimes you need a lot more experience beyond the classroom and training environment before you just jump in and do something.


FYI... I have had pilots similar to your situation ride with me before when the Air Tractor was broke and we were using an Aztec instead (Aztec doesn't have the visibility of the Air Tractor, so I needed extra eyes). A couple of pilots didn't make it past the second or third turn before they were "green in the gills" and wanting to land. :)
 
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