Was reading about the loss of control airplane crashes, 2 737 and one airbus, that killed about 500 people and destroyed 3 good airplanes. All were tied to the failure of some new and supposedly unfailing electronic control system which failed when it lost an input, and the aircrews failure to figure out what was wrong before they impacted with the surface. In the process I read an account of a C-130 that had slight problems in a normal flight and recovered. In the course of the "incident" per final report it had Rolled inverted twice Lost 9,000 feet of altitude Exceeded 3+ and 2- G Airspeed touched 485 Knots Aircraft at times was out of pilots control Just to make things interesting they were in clouds with no visual references, crew reported fire, one engine was over speeding, and when they recovered control, they were still in the clouds at 5,000 feet. Here is the story "OH SHxx, NEEDLE BALL & AIRSPEED" - Topic They are alive to write the story as Mr. Harvey used to put it, because the author went back to the things that they used in the 1920's and every student pilot in the old tail draggers was taught. Needle, ball, airspeed. He followed the old tools, center needle, center ball, get airspeed under control, and reestablish normal flight. Now the "new" airplanes and jet pilots don't have or need those obsolete instruments and as a result of their dependency on technology, many hundreds have died in aircraft crashes. If everything does fail, no fuel, no electricity, no money, sickness, civil unrest, choose which emergency you wish, some of the old basics might be just as important as the needle, ball, airspeed , as backups. I can ride a bike as far in a day, even out of shape as I am, in 8 hours as I can walk in several days, and if I ride the bike as the event is happening and before things collapse further, I may be able to do it in relative safety. Garden, fire wood, hand tools, storage food, good LED lights, short range radio's, God help us if needed radiation meters, medical supplies, etc, all are available now at a relatively low cost and we have time to learn how to use them. 20,000 rounds of ammo will do no good if you have no water for 4 days or die of some water born disease because you didn't have a filter or some other purification method. Lesson from the story above, he noticed the old time instruments in time, aircraft totally out of control, and knew enough to react at once, using the old time responses and without really thinking, to save himself and the aircraft. Most of our new generation of planes and pilots have neither the training nor the instruments to do so. The basic do count and their purpose is not to be the best of all solutions, but the one to keep you alive until you can figure out a better way to do it.
And Big Brother has decided that the machinery should decide if you need to apply brakes and/or steer your car. There just ain't no substitute for going back and practicing the basics just in case. Automatic transmissions are going to lead to the atrophy of the left legs.
The aircraft builder used cheap labor with no avionics experience from India instead of the people they should have used. A software issue is what I hear is the problem. So they saved a few bucks but killed a bunch of people. I watched a program where people did what the GPS said to do and drove their car down dirt roads until they got stuck in the snow and died. Common sense is in short supply out there.
Instead of a new clean design, they cludged new more powerful, more fuel efficient engines onto a 50 + year old design and ended up with a airplane that under some flight situations is unstable and doing the normal thing will cause a crash. They then used computer cludge to make the pilots think that their actions were correct and the computer would change the inputs to make it work on the aircraft. Mistake was not training the pilots to handle the situation if the computer screwed it up and actually made it worse. Engineers do not build aircraft, they follow the orders of management and in this case, competition with Airbus, cost and time of designing a new aircraft from scratch, the clearance of the wing from the ground due to the landing gear, the diameter of the engine, all lead to an engine placement that under some power settings and angles of attack, would cause a crash. The software fix works if it gets the right data and the aircraft is still in its parameters, but in some situations and without the right inputs it will crash and at some points in takeoff and landing, there might not be time or the physical ability for the pilots to regain effective control of the aircraft before it impacts with the ground, so far often at a high speed and in a dive, and that tends to not be survivable. One comment on Boeing now. How Boeing’s Bean-Counters Courted the 737 MAX Disaster
I argued with a woman for five minutes because she couldn't find the bridge to Mackinac Island. I kept telling her there is not a bridge to that island, no matter what her GPS says. A bunch of tourists came looking for that bridge. I think someone working at the company decided to have some fun.
Whenever possible, plan and equip for the worst possible scenario. If you're driving in a desert, PRESUME that you will (somehow) wind up off the road, miles off course, frame deep in the dirt with a fuel pump that has turned it's toes up. And a broken leg. That makes it only reasonable to gear up with redundant communications, a ten-day supply of water, plus food, clothing, medical supplies, hand tools, and a friend. You can't even get to the fuel pump on most modern cars, but you can make one run without a fuel pump--if you know how. I've done it on three different occasions. People routinely take charter flights over snow without packing a set of furs. Hey--the aircraft has a heater. What more could a person ever want? People have died in the desert after getting lost and stuck in the sand--mostly because they failed to have a shovel in the trunk. And they packed zero water. It all boils down to accepting complete responsibility for the safety and survival of yourself and your party. You can't abdicate that responsibility to a GPS, or four rubber tires, or vague directions given by a stranger. Staying alive is one of those things you have to do for yourself. No one else can be blindly trusted to do it for you, including and especially Mother Nature and her main squeeze Murphy. Everybody knows Murphy: He's a lawyer.
I have flown so much during my career that - well - I probably got more hours than some professional pilots and I always felt that sooner or later those hours would catch up to me - meaning - the odds would catch up to me to have an air accident of some sort, especially considering the locations I was flying in, out and around in, war or hazardous zones. So, now, I try my best not to fly - ever. Honestly, I won't fly unless I am forced to do so. When I first started my career, I remember that when we flew we would never see another aircraft in the sky but now you will always see 2, 3, 4... Also, for what it is worth, if I had any choice in the matter, I would always fly on a C-130 - ALWAYS! I figured it gave me the best odds of survival. It's slower and noisy but it will get you there and back safely. Give me the old C-130 every time... EDIT: One last thing, I always wear my seat belt ALL the time. I never unbuckle.
TO date, I have limped away from 2 Airplane crashes, and 3 Helo crashes ( One I actually had to be carried ) so I know the value of Old School Mechanical Flight Controls and Good Piloting! (None were with me at the controls BTW), but I have had many close calls on my own, almost daily, which makes me a much better pilot! LOL That said, when they took the neutral stability out of airplanes and handed control "Authority" to a computer, problems were gonna happen, and unless a Human is able to wrest control back, your doomed! My Super Cub is an extreme example of simplicity, I can get into all sorts of trouble with it, and simply let go of the flight controls and it will eventually sort it's self out as long as you are high enough off the ground, up into the 60's, that was pretty much how all airplanes were built, but when they started playing with computer control, it all went to hell!
WATER I have covered in spades. I have said many times I live in the Florida sand hills. Sand and porous limerock is an excellent filter. Without a nonporous liner I cannot have a pond on my property. The water from the rains just filters through. No clay. I have 5400 square foot of metal roof and can catch rain if I have to. Not likely however. 2 wells on 20 acres, both metal cased 4 inch. Generators at both wells. Manual and 12vdc capable water pumping at one of the 2 wells. Have a ready spare submersible and cable to replace either 240vac should they go out. Surrounded by lakes, ponds, rivers, and swampy areas, plus gulf of Mexico less than 60 miles I get regular ocean effect rains to replenish the aquafer. I recognized early on WATER was #1 on the list for survival.
Recently, like this summer, I've had some folks stop and ask for directions, 'cause their GPS wasn't within a country mile... Continuous laughter ensued, them and me.
I am a very firm believer in the KISS principle. Keep It Simple Stupid! Murphy doesn't take time off either.
US Topo: Maps for America Paper maps Compass No batteries needed, no 'system failure' problems...... Old school, sure. But at least I'll know right where I'm lost.....
Last I read USAF no longer teaches celestial navigation or loran for navigation and many aircraft, missiles, even cannon shells and bombs, are totally dependent on GPS. That is kind of putting all of your eggs in one very high tech basket. The success or failure of the USA if there is a WW3 may be decided in space in a few minutes at the beginning of the war. Commsats control the drones used world wide with control sometimes 1,000's of miles away as well as most military and civilian long distance communications, military and civilian aviation, shipping, a lot of cars and trucks, missiles, drones, etc all depend on GPS, then there are all the spy, sensor, weather, mapping and other satellites. Given the nature of the modern electronics in the small radios, $50 will buy capabilities that did not even exist in 1940, any transmission will be monitored and DFed in seconds. Been with ham's playing fox and hounds and DFing does work. The infrastructure of a cell phone, dial a local number and connect with your neighbor while he is on vacation 3,000 miles away with no delay, and of the internet, look up a reference on an article in the Monkey from 10 years ago in real time or check on a house security system in Australia in real time, require both massive server farms, protection from hackers, and the willingness of the government to continue to allow you access. All factors that would seem to encourage you to get your basics in order, and if possible become a second order Amish and at least have the ability to cut your connections with the outside world and continue to live and hopefully prosper.
Celestial nav is too slow for modern aircraft, in terms of the time the pilot (or navigator) has to spend taking star shots and plot out the position. So far as Loran goes, I've heard nothing recently, but about 20 years ago, there were a lot of towers being taken out of service. Geosat nav is pretty much the standard these days, and I think that GPS is NOT the basic means to track position. Dead reckoning on land, sea, and air is still taught, as it should be, but you can bet flying will be VFR.
GPS in the .Mil is mostly used as a backup to Inertial Guidance Systems in .Mil Aircraft... It validates, and updates, any corrections to the local IG Systems....
Report on fatal WC-130 crash reveals troubling maintenance, morale, discipline lapses in Puerto Rico Air Guard wing And now for a lesson in what not to do...
