It’s time for another Q&A session. I started this series a few years ago, when a reader asked me if there was a way to ask aviation questions outside of specific posts. I’d love to see this become a more regular feature, but for that I need more questions!
The format is simple: post your question in the comments of any post. If you know the answer to someone else’s question, please respond in the comment. You don’t have to be a pilot or work in aviation to answer, but stick to what you really know rather than giving a best guess.
We’ll start with me this week. In A Bunch of Angry Hornets I complained that the NTSB made no recommendations to flight schools to protect their students from poor instruction. In blue sky, inclined2flywho has worked for both the NTSB and the FAA, explained the situation to me.
That was the frustrating part about the NTSB. All I could do was write a report and a recommendation, but neither would make a difference. General Aviation was not a priority.
Nothing the FAA can do unless it is an approved school.
If the NTSB made a recommendation, the FAA could not implement it without changing Part 61. At the FAA, I had no authority over Part 61 schools, only over individual certificate holders. Part 141 is a different story. In my opinion, other countries do it better (EU, Canada, Australia are a few).
In the United States, a person can obtain a CFI certificate and teach from day one without supervision. They do not have to be employees of a flight school. The only time the FAA would review them is for a complaint, incident/accident. Part 141 schools must be approved by the FAA, so there is some oversight. Part 61 has none.
The bottom line is that a wrongful death lawsuit is really the only way to achieve meaningful change for these types of systemic problems in American flight schools. I hadn’t understood the interactions (and I can believe that working at the NTSB can be extremely frustrating if you want to make a significant change).
In the same article, Peter asked:
Did this instructor have a reasonable number of flight hours? For non-fliers 447 and 20 don’t seem like many hours of experience before using that experience to teach others.
Based on inclined2fly’s comments, I think it makes sense to know how many hours a flight instructor has before you go out with him or her. Personally, I would like someone who was patient and enjoyed teaching, rather than just trying to rush through hours so they can move on to the next thing. But how much is enough?
AB has a question he’s never thought about.
Why would the fuselage of a B-52 wave, but not that of a commercial airliner?
He has a guess, but I’d love to hear from any of you about the logic behind it!
This is from my mother and I was surprised not to know the answer:
Why do you say that a pilot who is a passenger is “dead”?
Specifically, you’re interested in where the term comes from.
Georgina wants to know more about Russian GPS jamming:
I’m curious about the GPS interference that occurs at airports in Northern Europe. How does that actually work and how do airports and airlines deal with it?
And finally from JD:
Why do heavier aircraft have greater speed limitations?
This is the maneuvering speed, which should not be exceeded due to the risk of damaging the aircraft structure. I didn’t know that the heaviest planes did They allow higher maneuvering speeds and I have never been good at aerodynamics1so I’m definitely not the person to answer this question.
[1] I no longer believe that airplanes are held by fairies, but when it comes to helicopters I’m still not sure.
Do you have an answer? Or another question? Leave it in the comments!
