Aero-Tips!

A good pilot is always learning -- how many times have you heard this old standard throughout your flying career? There is no truer statement in all of flying (well, with the possible exception of "there are no old, bold pilots.")

Aero-News has called upon the expertise of Thomas P. Turner, master CFI and all-around-good-guy, to bring our readers -- and us -- daily tips to improve our skills as aviators. Some of them, you may have heard before... but for each of us, there will also be something we might never have considered before, or something that didn't "stick" the way it should have the first time we memorized it for the practical test.

Look for our daily Aero-Tips segments, coming each day to you through the Aero-News Network.

Aero-Tips 12.01.06

Within days of publication of an Aero-Tips item on trim runaways I received an email from one of my students, owner of a 1999 Beech Bonanza in central California:

"I departed Santa Ana [California, in the Los Angeles area] into a 3500-foot ceiling via a SID [Standard Instrument Departure] procedure.  The autopilot then showed 'PT' [pitch trim] with an arrow pointing down and over the intercom came a [synthesized] voice that announced 'Pitch Trim Error-Pitch trim moving'."

The airplane's pitch trim was running toward the nose-down stops. The pilot overpowered the trim, pulled the trim system circuit breaker and manually restored control pressures -- precisely the procedure for a pitch trim runaway.

Makes a CFI proud.

Aftermath

As is often the case the emergency, however, was only the start of the scenario. My student continued:

"What was interesting and humbling was that I had to fly the entire two-hour trip by hand, in and out of IMC [instrument meteorological conditions]." Weather at his destination was "well above my personal minimums" but still required a GPS approach. "What I learned is that [pilots] should always be ready to fly any approach by hand. SPIFR [single-pilot IFR] is extremely workload-intense. Utilizing an autopilot is key to reducing workload, especially with your family on board. It is one thing flying an approach [using] the autopilot -- it is a lot less stressful. But it is something else flying in true IMC by hand with no flight director."

Aero-tip of the day: Use autopilots to reduce workload and increase situational awareness. But as I've said before, never let an autopilot take you anywhere you could not immediately take over and hand-fly yourself.

FMI: Aero-Tips