Delivery is a reason. Your comment brings us right back to the beginning; opinion Vs factual data.
Tear the wings off, put it in a box and ship it. Reassemble it on the other side. There's your delivery.
Many think it idiotic and to be avoided...yet there are all those flights which are relatively uneventful and feature a successful arrival at the intended destination. Somebody should tell those ferry pilots.
Thousands of people do recreational drugs every day and don't get HIV from the needles. Does that mean it's a good idea? Someone should tell those crack addicts.
If a pilot decides not to make a flight because of the perceived risk, fine. But that same pilot should not project his feelings onto other pilots.
Why? That's how you learn. I'd rather learn from other people's experiences (loss of vacuum power, engine, electrical, fires, etc.) than my own mistakes that I only get to make once.
It is exactly the crap I get about night flights over mtn terrain in a SE.
Which, IMO, isn't the greatest idea. Though I'd rather do that than fly a single over water day OR night beyond power off gliding distance.
I suppose I could add single pilot IFR to that too because I have been the recepient of many unsolicited comments questioning my descions to make such a flight.
Single pilot IFR can be safer than a two person crew if the single pilot knows what he or she is doing. There are plenty of pilots that have turned the wrong way in IMC and slam into mountains because they were discussing the procedure with their co-pilot rather than just flying the aircraft.
I think the single pilot IFR vs. two pilot IFR debate needs to be based on aircraft type too. Yeah, you can get just as dead in a 172 or a single pilot jet, but how much faster are things happening in that single pilot jet than your 172? Three? Four times as fast? Two and a half at the very least? Things can get out of hand very quickly and a second set of
trained eyes/hands might be a better idea in that case.
It's one thing to say something such as, Hey, have you checked the weather? It's quite another thing to say, You're an idiot for making this flight.
Yes, it is. They both have different meanings. There's no reason to fly a plane like a 172 across the north atlantic...none. It just isn't that important.
Why do people feel it not just okay but their duty to inform me of their perceptions that I am an idiot for doing that which they would not?
Because we probably know people that have had problems in these situations and we don't want to see you have the same bad situation happen. In the end, I don't much care to be honest. You can go fly a Cirrus from NY to EGLL if you want. I won't lose sleep over it, but don't expect me to give you a pat on the back and tell you I think it was the finest piece of judgment and decision making I've ever seen.
"Hey, Wayne Handley. You're an idiot for flying like that!" Oh, he's proficient and properly equipped to meet the risk associated with that type of flight? So it goes for SE over water.
Just how proficient can one be at ditching in the middle of the north atlantic, surving impact, egressing, successfully getting to the surface and not swimming DOWN, climbing into your floatation device, active your ELT and survive hypothermia until you're fished out of the waters? How often does one get to practice that?
You're going to have to provide a little more definition here.
Okay. How much clearer can I make it? When it comes to defending a nation, sometimes there are things that the military just "has to do". Things like flying a single engine fighter over the N. Atlantic, flying tight formations or refueling with the lights out, flying through a warzone and dodging anti-aircraft attack to complete the mission come to mind but I'm sure there are more.
Would you do those things if it wasn't to defend the nation? Probably not. I can't think of a good reason. Yes..."practice" or "training" counts as part of that "defending the nation" thing.
Military aviators operate by guidelines that are in most cases just as restrictive as the FAA. Outside of the legal realm, the very same types of ORM decisions are made by military flyers as their civilian counterparts. In fact, in my experience there is more attention paid to risk management and safety in military flying than there is in any type of professional civil aviation that I've seen.
No doubt. I don't mean to imply that there are no "rules" in the literal sense for military. Just that, sometimes you have to do what you have to do when it comes to protecting the USA. Flying a 172 across the N. Atlantic is not incidental to protecting the nation.
In terms of the law, sometimes there are mission requirements that allow military aircraft to do things that aren't allowed in 14 CFR, but that is a Grand Canyon's worth of difference from "the rules get thrown out".
Yeah, I know it wasn't the greatest way to phrase it, but hopefully you know what I was referring to now.
If your (and ppragman)'s points were that there's no reason for a general aviation pilot to fly a single engine general aviation aircraft over large bodies of water, then that's what you should have said.
That isn't what I meant though. I don't think there's a reason to fly a piston twin across the N. Atlantic either. Same with some turboprops and even jets.
-mini
