The Washington Post published an article on Tuesday about the plane crash in Maryland that had as its base premise that one of the reasons small planes crash so much is because they are flown by "amateur pilots, who don’t have to log as many flight hours to be certified". What an astonishingly stupid thing to write.
This crash in Maryland is a sad and tragic situation no matter how you look at it. But to say that general aviation pilots are some how amateur or have to work less for the certification is just lazy reporting. It would be no different to write that during a car crash if the driver wasn't a bus driver or semi driver, that they were an "amateur driver and don't have to log as many training hours to get their license".
It's not difficult to look up the rules that people have to follow to become pilots. There's passing a verbal exam, a written test, spending at least 50 hours in the air meeting various requirements and being able to demonstrate various maneuvers, similar to a drivers test. And that's just for the basic Private Pilot license without an instrument rating. It would have been even better to talk to a flight instructor to understand how the rules are applied and training works. But that would have destroyed the narrative.
In addition, unlike drivers, pilots have to "stay current". Every 2 to 5 years, depending on age, you have to have a physical to make sure its still ok for you to operate an aircraft. Every 2 years you have to demonstrate to an instructor that you are still proficient. If you haven't flown in certain conditions or in a particular type of aircraft in the last 90 days, you have to fly, at minimum, 3 take offs and landings in that craft in those conditions before you are allowed to take passengers. Every pilot, regardless of their license type, has to follow these rules.
Could you imagine how many people would lose their license if every two years you had to go in for a road test and if you weren't found proficient that you would need to take additional training? How many less distracted driver incidents would there be? How many mistakes that people make would be cleared up?
The author also says "Small planes also land at small airports that may not even have paved runways". Nothing else about it, just that they land at airports without paved runways. Great! I hear some people take cars and drive them on roads that aren't even paved! There is an insinuation in there that because the airstrip isn't paved obviously the pilots that fly out of there are nothing more than wild cowboys without a care for anyone.
It's a shame that this was able to be written and published without any interaction with somebody in the aviation community. General aviation pilots are dedicated people who love their hobby and want to make sure it is as safe as possible. Just like any human though, pilots can make mistakes and accidents do happen. But we all do share the same goal: we all want to make sure that we and our passengers arrive safely at the end of our trip.
No comments:
Post a Comment