Author: David Jacobson

Non-normal checklists don’t always cover the situation

04.08.2020 , from-our-logbooks

Non-normal checklists don’t always cover the situation

Throughout an aviation career spanning 55 years and 24,500 hours, a pilot is bound to encounter some non-normal situations along the way. Licence renewal checks, conducted in the modern and very sophisticated digital flight simulators offer fantastic, accelerated learning experiences for pilots at all levels, with zero safety risk to crews and airplanes. However, unless a company flight training department – or an individual flight instructor/examiner – has some imagination, most exercises rely heavily on the manufacturer’s Quick Reference Handbook (QRH) and its unique and quite definitive Non-Normal checklists for the airplane type.

The non-normal events that I experienced, over that 55-year period, were more often than not either a combination of issues from more than one system, or an issue out of ‘left field‘, that did not match, exactly, any non-normal checklist. The ability of pilots to think ‘outside the square’ is a definite advantage.

This is the fifth article in a planned occasional series, sharing some most memorable and treasured experiences. This one is also from my own career : We do plan to feature other, highly esteemed pilot friends and colleagues, who are only too willing to share their collective aviation experience. The crucial lessons that we learned along the way are just as valid today. They contribute, in no small way, to that intangible but essential quality known in aviation as ‘airmanship’.

A great example of this is a non-normal landing I once executed at Adelaide, South Australia, in a B737-400. On approach to runway 23, flaps 1º extended perfectly normally, with correct indications for both leading and trailing edge flaps. On selection of flaps 5º, The flap gauge L & R needles ’stuck’, just as the second stage, Flaps 5º was running. The anticipated change in trim seemed to suggest that the flaps had run to 5º, but my First Officer and I couldn’t confirm this on the flap gauge. Further, the B737 flap asymmetry protection system takes its signals from the L and R flap gauge needles – and the gauge was now u/s. The leading edge devices were confirmed as fully extended by their separate LED indicators and, cross-checking attitude, airspeed and thrust setting,  we believed that we probably had trailing edge flaps at 5º. We just couldn’t confirm this, as there are no painted ‘witness’ position calibration marks presented on the flaps, as they extend.

After referring to the Non-normal checklists, we established that there wasn’t a dedicated procedure for this particular issue. On conferring with our company engineers by radio, we decided it was prudent NOT to attempt any further flap extension or retraction in the air (in case of any uncontrollable flap asymmetry), and to make the conservative assumption that the trailing edge flaps were fully ‘up’, i.e., 0º and execute a Trailing Edge Flaps-Up landing, as per the non-normal landing checklist for that condition.

At our landing weight, the Vref 40 (1.3 Vs for Flaps 40) airspeed was 136 KIAS. Adding 5kts made the VApp airspeed 141 KIAS. With the trailing edge flaps at 0º, the further additive for the higher Vs was another 40 kts, so we made our final approach at 181 KIAS! That looked pretty fast, as we crossed the threshold.

I aimed at the standard B737 aiming point, at 1000ft from the threshold and flared as the glare shield passed the 500ft point – same as for a normal Flaps 30º or 40º, utilising my own ‘Jacobson Flare’ technique. The only correction I needed to make was to position the aim point 1 LOWER in the windscreen, due the much higher nose-up body angle (8-9º, instead of the usual 2.5-3º nose-up), using the autopilot-coupled ILS to confirm both glide path and visual eye path.

We actually touched down in the pre-determined spot – aiming point 1 – same as any JF landing and I rolled through to the full length of the runway, to spare the brakes, wheels and tyres from excessive heat – and to take full advantage of the Aviation Rescue and Fire Fighting units we had requested to attend, to deal with the possible event of any tyre or brake failure or fire. When we shut down, the brakes were probably cooler than for a normal landing, when we might brake more heavily, to make a designated runway exit taxyway. On turn-around, the flap indicator gauge was replaced and the issue was resolved.

The lessons learned and offered are that:

1.    Sometimes, a non-normal event doesn’t exactly match a published non-normal procedure.

2.   The Jacobson Flare self-compensates for these non-normal flap configurations and airspeeds. Just remember that the aim point position in the windscreen might vary from its usual position for a normal landing, due to a different airplane body angle caused by the different flap configuration. The longitudinal flare fix of the Jacobson Flare also self-compensates, automatically, for uphill- and downhill-sloping runways, approach path angle variations and the classic cause of flare ‘height‘ illusions, runway widths different from those of our more familiar airports.

 

Wishing you many safe landings

 

Captain David M Jacobson FRAeS MAP

 

Would you care to experience that unsurpassed sense of accomplishment, derived from executing consistently beautiful landings, more often?

For starters, Download the FREE Jacobson Flare LITE, our no fuss/no frills introduction. Here we demonstrate, step by step, the application of the Jacobson Flare on a typical grass airstrip at Porepunkah, YPOK.

 

We invite you to browse the consistently positive comments on our Testimonials page. Many pilots, of all levels of experience, have downloaded our Apps. Read about their own experiences with the Jacobson Flare technique and the App.

Then download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare app – for iOS. You’re already possibly paying $300+/hour to hire an aeroplane: You’ll recover the cost of the app, in just ONE LESS-NEEDED CIRCUIT. Moreover, you’ll have an invaluable reference tool, throughout your entire life in aviation.

Download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare App for iOS devices now.

 

We invite you, also, to review our new, FREE companion app,

offering a convenient way of staying abreast of our latest blogs.

 

Download the Jacobson Flare NEWS App for iOS devices now.

Trust your instincts – your natural Master Warning system

26.07.2020 , from-our-logbooks

Trust your instincts – your natural Master Warning system

Nearly 30 years ago while suffering from sinusitis, I had been on a few days’ sick leave. The lessons I learned, from a premature return to my airline flight duties as a B737 Captain were well worthwhile : and well worth sharing. Sometimes, things just don’t feel quite right …

This is the fourth article in a planned occasional series, sharing some most memorable and treasured experiences. This one is also from my own career : We do plan to feature other, highly esteemed pilot friends and colleagues, who are only too willing to share their collective aviation experience. The crucial lessons that we learned along the way are just as valid today. They contribute, in no small way, to that intangible but essential quality known in aviation as ‘airmanship’.

After about 5 days off duty, I telephoned Australian Airlines’ crewing department and advised that I was fit for reserve duty ‘tomorrow’. The response, “Great, DJ, but it’s not reserve duty anymore: It’s a Melbourne-Sydney return (MEL-SYD-MEL), early tomorrow morning.”

In the middle of a course of antibiotics, I returned to our kitchen to help my wife prepare dinner and promptly sliced my thumb, instead of an onion! Four hours later, with a freshly-stitched and bandaged thumb, I rang crewing back and advised I was back on sick leave for one more day, feeling well able to commence a 2-day trip on the following morning.

Two mornings later, while I was driving out to Melbourne Airport, I realised that I’d forgotten to pack my anti-biotic tablets. ‘Oh well, it’s only a 2-day trip – bad luck‘, I thought.

After parking and making my way to the MEL terminal, I signed on and prepared to flight plan our first day’s flying: Melbourne-Adelaide-Alice Springs-Darwin (MEL-ADL-ASP-DRW). As I reached in my jacket pocket for my reading glasses, I realised that I’d left them at home, too. ‘Oh we’ll, we’re only flying 6 sectors over the 2 days and only one is at night‘, I reasoned. ‘I do have my second, tinted pair of sunglasses and my first officer can fly the last leg: I’ll just crank up my cockpit lighting!’

We completed and filed the flight plan, headed for the gate, to pre-flight our B737-300; we even managed to push back on time – a minor miracle of logistics, I always thought!

After some time after take-off, well-established in the climb, we both became aware of a somewhat disconcerting irregular and intermittent noise that seemed to emanate from outside and under the nose of the aircraft. I thought it sounded ‘mechanical‘, like the ground engineer’s access panel for the headphone socket; my FO thought it sounded more like some sort of odd electronic signal, coming from the cockpit aural warning speaker, situated on the side of the centre pedestal, between us, by his left knee. We couldn’t resolve the issue, either way. It certainly didn’t seem serious and we wrote it up in the aircraft technical log, for the engineers in ADL to assess.

After arrival and engine shut-down in ADL, my first question to the receiving engineer after he plugged in, was whether or not the access panel was open on arrival. It wasn’t, so we started exploring other possible causes of the unusual sound we had experienced. In the middle of that discussion, he asked us to confirm our fuel uplift for the next sector to Alice Springs. I gave him the figure from memory, without first confirming from our flight plan.

The penny dropped as we were completing our cockpit preparation, while our passengers were still boarding: I had given the engineer the wrong fuel figure. 8.00 tonnes, not 11.0, as planned. There were no weather considerations, but we had planned to carry Mount ISA, in Queensland, the then nearest alternate aerodrome, as Alice has just one usable runway. Many experienced pilots take this precaution, in such circumstances: it widens the options. I asked the FO to radio our company and request the refuellers back to top us up to 11.0 tonnes.

The first officer seemed reluctant to do so; I asked again. He said, “We’ll be delayed”. I replied, “I don’t care, I want the fuel“. He kept pushing: “But 8.00 tonnes is legal.” “But is it safe?”, I asked. He kept on resisting my request to call the company. We needed a circuit breaker.

I said, “Just give me a minute: I want to meditate.” “You want to WHAT?”, he asked. “I want to meditate.” I closed my eyes briefly, ignoring him and everything else, while I re-capped the day’s progress, so far. I’d left my tablets and my glasses at home, We still had the noise issue, unresolved by the engineers – and – I’d caused the wrong fuel figure to be loaded. After about 30 seconds, I opened my eyes and looked at my watch. It wasn’t even 0900 hrs.

The B737 Master Warning light would not have been any clearer than the instinctive message I had received: I turned to my FO and asked of him, “How many events does it take to create a decent incident, or even an accident?” “Oh, say 5-7?”

“That’s right”, I said, “We are already up to 4: Do you want to try for 5, or 6? I’m not enjoying today, so far. Now, are you familiar with the term, ‘Command Decision’?”  “Yes, of course”, he said.  “Well mate, this is one of them. Now please – call the company – I want that fuel.”  We had to wait ages for the tanker to return and we finally departed about 17 minutes late, self-chastened, but feeling much more comfortable. The paperwork could wait until later. (The unusual ‘noise’ issue was never actually resolved by the engineers – but neither did it re-occur on the subsequent 2 sectors.)

The leg above the Simpson Desert to Alice Springs was clear and as beautiful as ever and we commenced our descent into Alice.

This is absolutely true: As we passed through 7000 ft at about 25nm out and still at 300kts IAS, the Tower controller called us and asked, “What’s your fuel endurance (fuel remaining, expressed in minutes), right now?” My FO responded (- we had plenty of fuel to hold and/or to divert to ISA). “Oh, that’s good”, replied the controller, “Because we have a disabled aircraft on the runway, right now.”

The expression on my FO’s face was incredulous. “How did you know that was going to happen“, he asked, “Because you did know, didn’t you?” I replied, “No, I couldn’t have known that a Piper Navaho light twin was going to blow a main gear tyre on landing, but the signs were there, that something along those lines was bound to happen. They just stood out, like that Master Warning red light can.”

We had to hold above Alice Springs for about 50 minutes, so we took the opportunity to do some scenic flying around Alice and the famed McDonnell Ranges in the ‘red centre’, while engineers worked to remove the disabled Navaho from the runway, so we could land. A rival company’s B727, behind us and still well south of Alice, didn’t have any extra fuel to hold and had to return to Adelaide.

On shut-down, the company Traffic Officer boarded and she commented, “We saw the ‘delayed-departure-Captain-wanted-more-fuel’ report in the computer and wondered, ‘What’s he want more fuel for? There’s not a cloud in the sky! Then, we learned about the runway being closed. How did you know that was going to happen, because it hadn’t, at the time of your departure?”

There was nothing concrete that had warned me of that impending event.

I didn’t need it: My instincts had arced up, after I had recognised the way in which  the pattern of our day was unfolding. I was far from comfortable, so I insisted on recovering the situation with something that you can never have too much of: Fuel (- unless, of course, you are on fire!) Our original, flight-planned fuel figure was well researched, as it turned out.

The clear message is: ‘Learn to trust your instincts‘. They are an invaluable and innate Master Warning System: Something we were all born with. They cost nothing and they do work.

Sometimes, things just don’t feel quite right … it may well be that they’re not.

You can practise developing them further, by applying them as a cross-check of your more conscious thought processes, such as when ordering from a restaurant menu. (How many times have you had an initial instinctive impulse to order a dish, ignored it and then lived to regret it?)

The other great and obvious take-out for me, from this day, was ‘do not return to flying duties (or any critical work) from sick leave, until you have fully recovered‘.

 

Wishing you many safe landings

 

Captain David M Jacobson FRAeS MAP

 

Would you care to experience that unsurpassed sense of accomplishment, derived from executing consistently beautiful landings, more often?

For starters, Download the FREE Jacobson Flare LITE, our no fuss/no frills introduction. Here we demonstrate, step by step, the application of the Jacobson Flare on a typical grass airstrip at Porepunkah, YPOK.

 

We invite you to browse the consistently positive comments on our Testimonials page. Many pilots, of all levels of experience, have downloaded our Apps. Read about their own experiences with the Jacobson Flare technique and the App.

Then download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare app – for iOS. You’re already possibly paying $300+/hour to hire an aeroplane: You’ll recover the cost of the app, in just ONE LESS-NEEDED CIRCUIT. Moreover, you’ll have an invaluable reference tool, throughout your entire life in aviation.

Download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare App for iOS devices now.

 

We invite you, also, to review our new, FREE companion app,

offering a convenient way of staying abreast of our latest blogs.

 

Download the Jacobson Flare NEWS App for iOS devices now.

Uh-oh! – This runway is nothing like I imagined, at all…

21.07.2020 , captain-david-jacobson

Uh-oh! – This runway is nothing like I imagined, at all…

You’ve just learned to fly and proudly earned your PPL or CPL. Your home airfield was wide and flat : ‘Aren’t they all?’ Well, actually, not necessarily. The main runways may have been  30m, 45m or even 60m wide, sealed and painted with centreline and other markings : or, perhaps, the sealed runway(s) were narrower at 18m, or were just airstrips with gravel or grass landing surfaces.

Sooner or later, you will fly to an airfield with varying characteristics and you’ll notice some marked differences. For starters, the airfield elevation may or may not be close to Mean Sea Level, which will affect airplane performance. It may be in a closely built-up, highly populated city or it may lie in a regional area, with plenty of open space surrounding; or in a desert or high country area.

The runways (or airstrips) could differ markedly from your home airfield and may be more uphill / downhill / undulating / longer / shorter / narrower / wider / sealed / unsealed / lighter-coloured / darker-coloured than the ones you are used to. And, from my observations of many years, they can be quite confusing to deal with, for pilots at any level of experience.

These variations are a fact of life and must be accommodated, despite some very real  visual illusions that can and do occur when approaching to land – especially at night. Up-/down-sloping runways need earlier/later flare commencement points, respectively, (exactly the same issues as  approaching at too high/too low an approach path angle).

Runways that are wider/narrower than those familiar to us cause height illusions that can cause pilots to flare too early/too late, respectively.

Even landing with a lesser or greater flap angle can affect pilot judgment, due to the different  airplane body angle. In larger aircraft, this becomes significant, due to the greater change in the height relationship between the pilots’ eye position and the relatively well-aft main landing gear.

All of these issues are well-documented, but the conventional solutions are varied and widely left to pilot judgment and experience. This situation has never been good enough, because  inconsistent judgment distracts and distorts from the main task: flying a precise visual eye path approach to a defined aiming point, suitably determined to suit the airplane size.

The Jacobson Flare explains how all of these issues are geometrically self-compensated, most of them automatically, just by using our innovative longitudinal flare initiation point, rather than a conventional educated ‘guess’ of flare height. It’s that simple.

 

 

Wishing you many safe landings

 

Captain David M Jacobson FRAeS MAP

 

Would you care to experience that unsurpassed sense of accomplishment, derived from executing consistently beautiful landings, more often?

For starters, Download the FREE Jacobson Flare LITE, our no fuss/no frills introduction. Here we demonstrate, step by step, the application of the Jacobson Flare on a typical grass airstrip at Porepunkah, YPOK.

 

We invite you to browse the consistently positive comments on our Testimonials page. Many pilots, of all levels of experience, have downloaded our Apps. Read about their own experiences with the Jacobson Flare technique and the App.

Then download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare app – for iOS. You’re already possibly paying $300+/hour to hire an aeroplane: You’ll recover the cost of the app, in just ONE LESS-NEEDED CIRCUIT. Moreover, you’ll have an invaluable reference tool, throughout your entire life in aviation.

Download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare App for iOS devices now.

 

We invite you, also, to review our new, FREE companion app,

offering a convenient way of staying abreast of our latest blogs.

 

Download the Jacobson Flare NEWS App for iOS devices now.

When we don’t know something exists, we rarely search for it

11.07.2020 , we've-always-done-it-this-way

When we don’t know something exists, we rarely search for it

On December 17, 1903, Wilbur and Orville Wright made four brief flights at Kitty Hawk. The Wright brothers had invented, flown and somehow landed the world’s first successful powered aircraft. Ever since that historic event, pilots – with a wide range of aptitudes – have pursued the elusive, consistently perfect landing. Sadly, this seemingly formidable task remains elusive to too many pilots, over 100 years later : Sadly, because it is no longer elusive.

The first generation of pilots, who pioneered the next 10 years leading to World War One, virtually taught themselves and each other. By 1914-1918 through to 1987, no formal approach and landing training system had yet been developed, other than trial-and-error and individual pilot opinions. Myths, legends and misinformation were added to the mix and re-cycled, unchallenged by generations of flight instructors who claimed, collectively, that it was a matter of repetition, judgment and experience – none of which can be taught.

In 1965, as a young student pilot trying to fly an approach, I was taught to pitch the airplane to control airspeed and then use power to control the rate of descent. It made no sense to me to use the secondary effects of controls to fly the approach which, for most pilots, is the most precise manoeuvre they are required to perform; and then, ‘getting the hang‘ of the landing flare from a combination of guesswork, the ‘look’, the ‘feel’, repetition and luck – but with no universal explanation or system to use on subsequent aircraft type conversions, or executing final approaches in challenging, even critical conditions. The silence on precisely ‘HOW’ to land a plane, from flight training books, manuals and videos, is both deafening and worthless.

I went searching for better answers and solutions : and found none. Fortunately I did ‘get the hang of it’, personally but, even twenty years later in 1985 as an experienced flight instructor, I hadn’t been able to resolve the range of problems inherent in teaching landings – in both large and small aircraft – without a comprehensive, fact-based system. That became my dream – and then my dream became a reality.

My good friend and mentor, Geoff Tually, a renowned specialist in agricultural business, financial advice and farm succession planning, recently hit the nail on the head when he said, “If you don’t know that something exists, you’ll never go looking for it.”

I’ve realised that these wise words captured the essence of my work : Finally, by 1985 I knew I was looking for a solution to the circus that conventional landing training has become. By 1987, I had found it from an inspiration back in 1965 and had written my first Paper.

Today, it’s called the Jacobson Flare : and, now, you’ve found it, too.

 

Wishing you many safe landings

 

Captain David M Jacobson FRAeS MAP

 

Would you care to experience that unsurpassed sense of accomplishment, derived from executing consistently beautiful landings, more often?

For starters, Download the FREE Jacobson Flare LITE, our no fuss/no frills introduction. Here we demonstrate, step by step, the application of the Jacobson Flare on a typical grass airstrip at Porepunkah, YPOK.

 

We invite you to browse the consistently positive comments on our Testimonials page. Many pilots, of all levels of experience, have downloaded our Apps. Read about their own experiences with the Jacobson Flare technique and the App.

Then download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare app – for iOS. You’re already possibly paying $300+/hour to hire an aeroplane: You’ll recover the cost of the app, in just ONE LESS-NEEDED CIRCUIT. Moreover, you’ll have an invaluable reference tool, throughout your entire life in aviation.

Download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare App for iOS devices now.

 

We invite you, also, to review our new, FREE companion app,

offering a convenient way of staying abreast of our latest blogs.

 

Download the Jacobson Flare NEWS App for iOS devices now.

A380 landings with The Jacobson Flare

We all make mistakes. Your recovery from them is what counts

10.07.2020 , from-our-logbooks

This is the third article in a planned occasional series, sharing the most memorable and treasured experiences, not only from my own career : We plan to feature other, highly esteemed pilot friends and colleagues, who are only too willing to share their collective aviation experience.

Here, my great friend and colleague Captain Gary Gould, retired from active flying on A380s in 2015. This followed an illustrious career that began in 1969, shares the VERY SAME LESSON I LEARNED and SHARED, but in a DIFFERENT CONTEXT. *

(* See : The best advice I was ever offered : by the best pilot I ever flew with)

The crucial lessons that we learned along the way are just as valid today. They contribute, in no small way, to that intangible but essential quality known in aviation as ‘airmanship’. Here are Gary’s tales : tall and true.

“We all make mistakes. Your recovery from them is what counts

“Having spent most of my flying hours in high capacity heavy jet aircraft it is sometimes amusing to look back at things that have enriched one’s flying experience. There are many.

One that quickly comes to mind is when I checked out as a F/O on the 747 Classic. It was 1985 and my company had a consolidation policy that required four sectors within 28 days for newly checked-out pilots. Like all bureaucracies those rules sometimes slipped through the cracks.”

After 52 days, with no consolidation flying and only one complete licence renewal in a simulator, the scheduling panic button was finally pressed, and I was sent out on a multi-sector trip with the most senior Captain in the Company. Luckily for me, a man with a sense of humour. The trip went well and my landings, thankfully, did not reflect my lack of experience.

So, I found myself at ‘O’Dark:30′ flying a left base leg for a visual approach onto runway 03 in Perth WA, having done the night flight down from Singapore. No ILS on 03 in those days. A dark, cold and beautiful morning in Perth. Flying east I identified the ‘runway’ lights and continued on the current track thinking that things looked pretty good. Airspeed, altitude and configuration all good. No FMC’s in those days. Descents/speeds/crossing heights were all done by mental calculation. Flying and calculating, a novel idea these days.

After a while the Captain asked if I had the airport in sight. “Yes, but I can’t see the T-VASIS” was my answer. A few seconds later, the Captain again asked if I had the airport in sight. “Yes, but the runway lights seem a little bright”.

The Captain then tapped me on my left shoulder and pointed to the left, directly across his face and said, “What do you reckon this is?”. Looking out the Captain’s No 2 window I was horrified to see the real runway 03! We were about five miles out and flying directly across the centreline, heading east and by now, flying away from where we should have been!

What was I looking at? There is a railway marshalling yard to the immediate east of Perth airport and, on that night, it was lit with two parallel sets of lights that aligned 03/21, exactly the same as the main runway in Perth.

The shock of my error was hard to overcome. Foolishly I turned toward the runway leaving myself very little time and space to manoeuvre the 747 onto final, (whereas requesting ATC clearance for a RH 270º turn – or another circuit – might have been more appropriate … and graceful). “This will be interesting” said a laconic voice in the left hand seat. All I could think of was that I needed to rescue this error and do a good landing. By some miracle that is exactly what happened. But I really needed to concentrate.

Two days later we were in exactly the same spot, this time with the Captain flying and me doing the wireless. The marshalling yard was lit up in a completely different way. It looked just like a railway marshalling yard. The Captain said, “How anyone could mistake that for an airport is a complete mystery to me”. Talk about putting the knife in and twisting it! My reply is not on record. Runway lighting is bi-directional. Railway marshalling yard lighting (and pretty much all other lighting) is omni-directional.

 

 

Fast forward a few years. I was, by then, a 747 Classic Captain going to Seoul Kimpo in the winter. The F/O was flying, and it was to be a night landing on 14R. Manoeuvring to the north of Kimpo was always a challenge as the border with North Korea was quite close. Thus, both ATC and pilots had to take great care.

We were on a right base leg with about 8 k vis in light snow. We were cleared for final and told to change to the tower frequency. I was doing the radio and the F/O was hand flying. I looked down to change frequencies and felt a strange sensation. Looking back to the instruments we had about 40 degrees of bank on and the nose well down below the horizon, descending at about 1500 fpm. More than double what was needed. I took control of the aircraft and flew it back to where it was supposed to be. ATC were adding to the mayhem on the radio, having picked up our antics on radar. In the snow, streaming through the landing lights, the F/O had identified ‘the airport’ and started to fly towards it. It was a factory, that was well and truly away from the airport itself. He had become spatially disoriented.

Apologising profusely, he seemed OK to take over and complete the landing. I handed control back to him and we continued to the airport. His apologies continued and I simply put my finger to my mouth and said “Shhh”. The subsequent landing was a shocker and we had been told by ATC to hold short of the parallel runway because of departing traffic. As we got closer to the high-speed taxiway, I felt that the F/O was not going to stop so I took over (again) and stopped the aircraft at the holding point. A Korean Air A300 passed in front of us, climbing away.

By this time, I had decided that it was me who was going to complete the taxy to the terminal. The F/O started apologising again, and once again I put my finger to my mouth and said “Shhh”.

The debriefing was interesting. The first thing I said was that it was my fault for handing the aircraft back to the F/O after he misidentified the airport. An error on my part. BUT, had the F/O NOT gone visual so early and stuck with the instruments and the ILS, none of this would have happened. However, my biggest problem with the F/O’s actions was not his flying, but his inability to mentally overcome his errors and get back on the saddle. His bad landing was because he was still thinking of his approach error. His not hearing the “hold short” ATC command happened because he was still thinking of his bad landing. A sequence of self-induced errors that all related to each other. Two of those errors could easily have been fatal. But I did tell him about my effort in Perth.

We all make mistakes. But in aviation, you do not have the luxury of stopping to review the issue(s). You must quickly overcome your shock, self-induced or otherwise, and continue to attend to the aircraft and the path it is taking.

These things underline how something totally innocuous can have a potentially devasting effect. Here is another example, that involves snow and blue lights …

I was training a pilot on the 747 Classic and we had a night departure out of Nagoya. It had been snowing heavily and the whole airport was covered in snow except for the runway. We pushed back and the trainee started to taxy to the duty runway. All we could see was white with taxiway lighting poking through. There was no visual difference between the grass and the taxiway. There were no marks made by previous aircraft. We were the first after the storm.

As he started to move away, the trainee started to lay the tiller over to move further to the right. I said, “where are you going?” He said’ “to the taxiway centreline”. I then told him that Japanese airports had lighting similar to the USA. No green taxiway centreline lights, just blue edge lights. He was heading for the blue edge lights thinking they were the centreline lights. The beauty of this event was twofold. The very last question I was asked during my Command training years before was, “what colour are the taxiway edge lights”. One question out of hundreds. But there was purpose in the question. The other beauty was that my trainee would never repeat this error, following that night. He was, and still is, an excellent pilot.

Airline Training Sections rave on about “TEM”. Threat and error management. Mostly it involves the identifying of potential threats and how to avoid them. But not once during these discussions, have I ever heard anything about the human science of overcoming and errors ONCE THEY HAVE HAPPENED. (Review them when appropriate : in the standard post-flight de-brief.)

We all make mistakes. It’s how you recover from those mistakes that counts.”

Gary Gould – June 2020

RPT Pilot: 1969-2015

 

Wishing you many safe landings

 

Captain David M Jacobson FRAeS MAP

 

Would you care to experience that unsurpassed sense of accomplishment, derived from executing consistently beautiful landings, more often?

For starters, Download the FREE Jacobson Flare LITE, our no fuss/no frills introduction. Here we demonstrate, step by step, the application of the Jacobson Flare on a typical grass airstrip at Porepunkah, YPOK.

 

We invite you to browse the consistently positive comments on our Testimonials page. Many pilots, of all levels of experience, have downloaded our Apps. Read about their own experiences with the Jacobson Flare technique and the App.

Then download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare app – for iOS. You’re already possibly paying $300+/hour to hire an aeroplane: You’ll recover the cost of the app, in just ONE LESS-NEEDED CIRCUIT. Moreover, you’ll have an invaluable reference tool, throughout your entire life in aviation.

Download the COMPLETE Jacobson Flare App for iOS devices now.

 

We invite you, also, to review our new, FREE companion app,

offering a convenient way of staying abreast of our latest blogs.

 

Download the Jacobson Flare NEWS App for iOS devices now.