Here is something I wrote a while back for some people where I learned to fly. They are just my personal observations and they repeat some of what has been written above. I consider myself moderately experienced in the airsickness & airsickness prevention department. :buck:
There are people who can do spins and aerobatics longer than their fuel supply can let them and they won’t get sick. To those of you who fit into this category, move to the next article! But for every person that will never get sick, there is one that very easily will. The types of motion problems can be broken down into two basic categories: spatial disorientation and airsickness. The first can lead to the second but being airsick does not necessarily come from being spatially disoriented. Sometimes you are oriented perfectly but get sick anyway.
The FAA defines spatial disorientation as the lack of orientation with regard to the position, attitude, or movement of the airplane in space. This article won’t be about how to keep that orientation; that’s what the instrument rating is for. Trusting the instruments and being able to interpret them accurately is the main idea there. Airsickness, however, can happen to some people on a clear day and having more experience with this than many of my pilot friends combined, I deem myself relatively qualified to give some basic tips on avoiding airsickness because I’ve tried them all. They work for me.
Rest. Showing up to fly on five hours of sleep is asking for problems. Besides the decreased alertness and judgment one would expect when flying fatigued, airsickness occurs more readily. It’s easy to rationalize the night before flying that a sugary breakfast and caffeine will get you through a quick one hour flight lesson after staying up late, but it usually starts to feel like a bad decision as you stagger around in the dark trying to wake up. Get enough sleep and you’re less likely experience nausea.
Eat. Before you start thinking “I ought to eat something that tastes just as good coming back up as it does going down” (bananas), you should know that while flying on an empty stomach might eliminate the problem of an upset stomach, it makes the condition of nausea set in even faster. I’ve found that a typical full-size meal three to five hours before the flight is the best time to eat. Greasy food or anything else that is difficult to digest should be avoided. Hydration is at least as important as eating well and drinking water during the hours before a flight is crucial. Water is digested fast anyway so anything short of chugging a quart during the run-up is probably going to be just fine. There is also the strategy of drinking water just before a flight so as having to relieve oneself very much during the flight which is planned to be fairly short. The idea here is that holding it will distract you from even thinking about getting airsick. Don’t even bother trying this one – it’s worthless! Plus, you need more than one bag.
No milk. This is just a really bad thing to have in your stomach before you fly and shake it all around. Got Milk? Save it for the debrief! "Milk was a bad choice."
Don’t exercise. Once I did an experiment. I thought if I got my body doing some physical activity before aerobatics, it’d handle it better since it wouldn’t be going from being still to being tossed around. So I went on a vigorous bike-ride and then did 6Gs in an aerobatic plane. Exercise before G-force: worst idea EVER.
Look outside. Mostly common sense, but still worth being on the list. If you’re doing unusual attitude recovery with those cute lookin’ foggles on, you’re gonna get sick faster than if you’re doing the same thing looking outside. If it’s one of those days where even the airline pilots are submitting PIREPs with the remark WHITE CAPS IN MY COFFEE, stare outside at the horizon as much as possible so your eyes can tell your brain you really are right-side up.
Chew gum. This one is preventative. Chewing gum helps digest food by keeping the rate of saliva secretion high, as it was while you were eating. Put a baseball player sized amount in your mouth after a meal and maybe it’ll digest in time for that flight. And keep chewing while flying! There is one thing you should do if you get in the habit of chewing gum before or during flights, though. Change the type of gum once in a while. The reason for the variety is so that you do not begin to associate the taste of that familiar gum with being airsick. I’ve had that happen and you feel like you should be doing a preflight whenever you put that flavor in your mouth.
Attitude. Your attitude going into a flight had better be one that does not include getting sick – otherwise, you’re just counting down until that moment from the time you shut the doors and strap in until the time you hand the plane over to the instructor who is already tuning the ATIS as you reach for the bag. Oh, and that bag…you brought it, didn’t you?
That’s what I’ve got for you. The good news is, if you get airsick occasionally, it does go away. The more often you fly and the more you induce nausea and recover, the tougher it’ll be for you to have problems up there.
Good luck. We’re all counting on you. Especially the one who has the plane after you.
