What constitues a bad/poor pilot?

Nark

Nark

Macho Superpilot
Recent events up here got me thinking.

In my not so humble opinion a bad pilot is one who makes poor decisions. this is obvious, however I need to elaborate.

There are a few airports that we regularly fly into in which half way down the runway a headwind shears to a tail wind. Not terribly common, but it happens often enough.

While all pilots should strive for a smooth touch down, there is a point in which you just need to get down and stopped. I'm not talking about 10,000' runways.

VFR speaking, on a great day (sever clear) you shouldn't have to be told to go direct to your destination, instead of the slightly longer regular route. (keep in mind, this is 135 flying where $$$ counts)

Parking the airplane on the ramp with 10' spacing from the tips, instead of 2-3'.

While none of these decisions are dangerous, they are, again in my opinion, an examples of a bad pilot.

For you aspiring commercial pilots there is a lot more to flying commercially than simply flying the airplane. You have to look at the big picture after you've made a decision to fly.

Carry on and or flame away...
 
Pilots that think they are constantly getting away with something. For example they look at how to break or bend the rules instead of looking at the rules are there for a reason.

Pilots who sell illegal charters or who go along with helping an aircraft owner sell time illegaly on an aircraft.

Pilots who do not look at training as an opportunity to learn or to improve but as a hurdle that is in the way of having fun.

Pilots who get a warning of how bad of a job they are doing and do not do anything to address the warning. They continue on as usual and in fact look at the warning as incorrect.
 
dhc2tacksby said:
VFR speaking, on a great day (sever clear) you shouldn't have to be told to go direct to your destination, instead of the slightly longer regular route. (keep in mind, this is 135 flying where $$$ counts)
Click to expand...

Keep in mind some people can't go direct because it will put them at their destination over MLW.
 
I'd say a bad pilot is one who:

1. deliberately breaks the rules or doesn't follow procedure.
2. takes off or lands into the face of a thunderstorm.
3. doesn't carefully fuel plan their flight.
4. has limited/no situational awareness.
5. doesn't deliberately break the rules, but is too incompetent to learn them.
 
(Completely full CTAF Freq, dozen aircraft in the pattern)

"Yarrrr, ehh ____ traffic Skyhawk 12345 im errr, enterin' a uh seven mile straight in approach to runway 18, any traffic in the pattern please advise"

--"Skyhawk 12345 be advised you have multiple aircraft in the pattern"


"Urrrr, yeag roger that, Skyhawk 12345 well just keep makin our straight in approach, were uhhh, 6.5 from the field now down through 1.5, we'll just slide in between planes thar."

:rolleyes:

And then on the way out, the same aircraft will pull onto the runway for departure while a jet is on a 1/2 mile final.
 
dhc2tacksby said:
In my not so humble opinion a bad pilot is one who makes poor decisions. this is obvious, however I need to elaborate.
Click to expand...

This is how I view the question as well. Of course my background is military and I'm only looking at the fleet in terms of good or bad pilot, not the training command. The majority of pilots who make it to the fleet can fly the aircraft they are assigned to. The tactical guys might see it a bit differently being they have to employ their aircraft as a weapon system. As for my community, some guys were definitely better ball flyers at the boat than others but overall, most guys finished in the top half of flight school, did well at the FRS and made it to the fleet. Of course there was always an instructor there to help them along and decision making was usually left up to the IP. So in the fleet, most guys could fly the aircrat but it was the poor decision making that made the difference between good and bad pilot. The few pilots I saw either lose their wings or forced out of the community had stick and rudder skills, they just used poor headwork and judgement.
 
I dont get this one...

VFR speaking, on a great day (sever clear) you shouldn't have to be told to go direct to your destination, instead of the slightly longer regular route. (keep in mind, this is 135 flying where $$$ counts)


Please elaborate.


But in speaking about this, I would say 20 percent of my job is flying, the other 80 is customer satisfaction. Even though I may be in the airplane flying, generally it boils down to having everything ready for the client and making sure the trip goes smooth for them, not just the flying part.
 
I'll take the opposite end of the spectrum and repeat an old definition of a superior pilot:

A superior pilot is one
who uses his superior judgment
to avoid situations that require him
to demonstrate his superior skills.
 
Crockrocket94 said:
Please elaborate.
Click to expand...


There are numerous mountains in the area. A normal flight from A to B might look like a hockey stick, in order to avoid the clouds at the mountain tops. When the cloud are no longer there, (99% of the time) there is nothing holding you back from going direct.
1. it saves time
2 the scenery is much much better, which leads to tips.

3. doesn't carefully fuel plan their flight.
4. has limited/no situational awareness.
5. doesn't deliberately break the rules, but is too incompetent to learn them.
Click to expand...
Those three should be obvious, but sadly aren't.
I want to add to number 3. a good pilot plans for extra fuel for the kids. However a bad pilot plans for so much extra fuel that it cuts into useful load.

And number 5: the difference between a bad pilot and a ****** pilot is one that runs and cries wolf, when they don't know the rules themselves.
 
It basically boils down to one thing you are quite familiar with:

Those who refuse to improvise, adapt, and over come. It's much easier to talk a good game than to get in the muck and "do work" as one of my friends used to say.
 
Who cares? I like to spend my time on things that make me happy, thinking up ways other people are bad (pilots, drivers, parents, animal husbandists, etc) ain't it!
 
SpiraMirabilis said:
Who cares? I like to spend my time on things that make me happy, thinking up ways other people are bad (pilots, drivers, parents, animal husbandists, etc) ain't it!
Click to expand...

Customers generally care. Some people call them passengers, others call them shippers.

But they care. They provide my paycheck nowadays, ergo, I care now.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top