Why are Pilots Like This?

SkyHog said:
I actually think that if other professions were judged as directly as aviation you'd see more "driver erro" or "engineer error" incidents happen.

You have to practically be flying straight and level and have the airplane come from together without even touching the controls to avoid a pilot error fault. Even then, the pilots failure to correct for destructive forces would likely be the root cause.
Click to expand...
And yet as a software developer, depending on the industry/job at any given moment, screwing up software can cause the death of one person, a few people, hundreds of people or [A Really Big Number] of people. I once explained to my relatives that I categorized my job by how many people die when I screw up. Not only did they not find it funny, they were horrified at my nonchalant attitude about it.
 
I'm not sure why so many pilots don't like the fact that most accidents are characterized as pilot error. I think a pilot should be heartened by this fact. Basically, that is telling all of you that it is mostly up to you. Would you want to fly if the vast majority of accidents were blamed on maintenance or a design flaw in the aircraft? For the most part we are all masters of our own fate. Even when there is a mechanical, making the right decisions and taking the right actions can save your butt. Don't screw the pooch and you will vastly increase your odds of survivng.
 
kayoh190 said:
I've always marveled at the inevitable small penis syndrome that seems to manifest itself when a group of pilots talk online about flying for a living. PoA is actually one of the better boards when it comes to this (which is saying something!), but I've never understood what it is about this job that makes people tie their sense of self worth into where they're employed. Like somehow *my* way of going about this crazy career is the only acceptable way. And you see it from pilots that are outside the career as well - inevitably they have to jump into a thread and explain the various reasons why they don't fly for a living.
Click to expand...

Heck, forget the "for a living" part, there's plenty of SPS to go around.

I think a lot of it is that there are SO many experiences one can have in aviation, that you can't ever have them all. We've all had some experiences that cause a certain pucker factor, and we've gotten away with things that caused others to have pucker factor. So, when they explain why they'll never do one of the things in that second category, we call them wimps because it worked for us.

Thing is, there's plenty of things in aviation which you can get away with 95% or even 99% of the time. It's the 20th (or 100th) time that it'll get you, because you got complacent about it. It's just that the other guy was lucky enough to have it happen early enough to scare him into avoiding it more seriously.

murphey said:
And yet as a software developer, depending on the industry/job at any given moment, screwing up software can cause the death of one person, a few people, hundreds of people or [A Really Big Number] of people. I once explained to my relatives that I categorized my job by how many people die when I screw up. Not only did they not find it funny, they were horrified at my nonchalant attitude about it.
Click to expand...

Sounds exactly like my explanation of the levels of pilot certificates.

If you can't handle the responsibility of having those lives in your hands, you probably shouldn't! Those who would freak out over such things are not the kind we want in cockpits or behind keyboards.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Thing is, there's plenty of things in aviation which you can get away with 95% or even 99% of the time. It's the 20th (or 100th) time that it'll get you, because you got complacent about it. It's just that the other guy was lucky enough to have it happen early enough to scare him into avoiding it more seriously.
Click to expand...

"Normalization of deviance."
 
murphey said:
And yet as a software developer, depending on the industry/job at any given moment, screwing up software can cause the death of one person, a few people, hundreds of people or [A Really Big Number] of people. I once explained to my relatives that I categorized my job by how many people die when I screw up.
Click to expand...
Can relate, as to working on airliners vs. GA.
 
I started training before the internet was a thing. (or before everyone had it at least) As a noob I picked up on the macho vibes from other pilots, especially the CFIs. It surprised me and soured my outlook on aviation a little.

Fast forward to the online forums we have today and in general the aviation boards are some of the more polite ones. Yes, there are some filled with sewage, but sites like PoA and PPrune are filled with pretty good people.
 
Gerhardt said:
I started training before the internet was a thing. (or before everyone had it at least) As a noob I picked up on the macho vibes from other pilots, especially the CFIs. It surprised me and soured my outlook on aviation a little.

Fast forward to the online forums we have today and in general the aviation boards are some of the more polite ones. Yes, there are some filled with sewage, but sites like PoA and PPrune are filled with pretty good people.
Click to expand...
Yea, I agree, I was surprised that I found a forum(of any kind) that was usable, when I stumbled on POA. Most forums I had ever used previously devolved quickly to spam bot troll wastelands. The arguments here can get annoying sometimes, but at least they are people(probably).
 
spiderweb said:
Over the years I have visited other types of webboards, including a couple of which pertain to my field of expertise. Maybe I'm slow, but I've only recently realized that of all these boards, only on aviation webboards do participants seem so eager to show off, denigrate others' skills, methods, and even intelligence.

I enjoy discussions, and spirited debates (politics being a favorite), but I don't understand some of the attitude on aviation webboards. When I first joined such boards as a student, way back in 2001, I don't remember all the douchebaggery.

I'm not leaving this board (much to the chagrin of a lot of you, I'm sure)--just wondering why a considerable amount of people enjoy anonymous or near-anonymous *****-spats.

And before I finish this post, I'd like to add that some of the nicest pilots I've ever met are FAA-types.
Click to expand...

These are way worse:
Cop forums (most threads contain insults about the public, but never critical of their own)
Motorcycle forums
Musician forums (actually has gotten better over time)
Construction forums (2 posts in and they'll tell you how stupid you are)
 
kayoh190 said:
I'm curious - do IT people get like this? Programmers? Engineers?
Click to expand...

Stack Overflow isn't like this.

In my experience the big headed developers tend to be ostracized pretty quickly. I'll argue about aviation but I won't argue about programming. CODE WINS ARGUMENTS.
 
MadseasoN said:
Stack Overflow isn't like this.
Click to expand...
Usually tame, but I've seen it go sideways. Although they're never directly rude, it's much more passive "I have no idea why you would do it via method X, method Y is far superior because of..." right after someone else swore by X

Tableau has a forum and it's a steaming pile of crap. People don't post helpful responses, instead they use it as an opportunity to showcase some other project they've worked on

Maybe I haven't been here long enough but POA is a pretty tame environment.. it has just enough edge to keep it entertaining
 
Radar Contact said:
1)LOP is far superior to ROP in all types/scenarios
2)Low wings are preferred to high wings
3)Leave the props and mixture alone from cruise to clear of the runway
4)Twins are twice as likely to crash
5)SR22's have chutes because if you stall them they automatically flat spin
6)All landings are to be done at full flaps at all times
7)Experimental's are dangerous

What am I missing?
Click to expand...

8) ditching guarantees a flip
9) touch and goes are dangerous
10) 1800wxbrief trumps FF
11) airmet = sigmet
12) RGs are double to maintain and insure
 
TommyTBone said:
The version I grew up with is:

What's the difference between a Porsche and a porcupine?

A porcupine's pricks are on the outside.

Substituting any German sports car has always been appropriately acceptable.
Click to expand...

This is an aviation site...we don't care what rodent is driving a Porsche... :D
 
Tantalum said:
8) ditching guarantees a flip
9) touch and goes are dangerous
10) 1800wxbrief trumps FF
11) airmet = sigmet
12) RGs are double to maintain and insure
Click to expand...
13) paper charts should be outlawed you Luddites!
 
Tantalum said:
Usually tame, but I've seen it go sideways. Although they're never directly rude, it's much more passive "I have no idea why you would do it via method X, method Y is far superior because of..." right after someone else swore by X

Tableau has a forum and it's a steaming pile of crap. People don't post helpful responses, instead they use it as an opportunity to showcase some other project they've worked on

Maybe I haven't been here long enough but POA is a pretty tame environment.. it has just enough edge to keep it entertaining
Click to expand...

I've seen that too. I'm okay with someone confessing 'I don't know why you would do that'. It's a fair statement. I've written bad code due to circumstances beyond my control.

I had the pleasure of writing some load tests for a Tableau implementation. We have a different spelling for it which I won't post here. ;)
 
FlySince9 said:
This is an aviation site...we don't care what rodent is driving a Porsche... :D
Click to expand...

I've always loved what click-n-clack said about German cars a dozen years ago or so:

"German car owners believe three things:
1. The cars are high quality.
2. The cars will require little maintenance.
3. Their car is the only exception to rules 1 & 2."
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top