Thursday, February 6, 2014

Think Outside the Box

When I was 18 I remember my first instructor giving me a paper, front and back, with emergency procedures that I needed to memorize.  During flight training he would give me random emergencies, but always ones that were from that sheet of paper.  Of course it was good to memorize all those checklists and know them like the back of my hand, but what I hadn't done was think outside the box.  What if something happened that wasn't on that checklist?

Shortly after I began flight instructing such an event occurred.  I was with a student, flying in a Piper Arrow, maneuvering about 15 miles away from the Provo airport.  I don't remember the exact maneuver we were doing, but I know we had a reduced power setting.  When we went to add power back in to recover from the maneuver, nothing happened!  We had the amount of power one would use on short final; we were coming down, but not as fast as if we'd had a complete power loss.  I thought to run through the engine failure checklist, but this wasn't a total engine failure.  We tried moving the mixture and RPM levers but nothing happened.  Weird. This was not something I'd even thought would happen, so which checklist was I supposed to use? Up to this point, I had only practiced the emergency procedures with required memory items; for example, engine failure, engine fire, runuway trim, etc.

Something must've come loose?  But that's not an emergency that we're taught so it shouldn't happen, right!?  Wrong!  By some miracle, and with the attitude that girls have of "things will just fix themselves" (haha), we somehow regained control of the throttle, RPM, and mixture.  We both decided not to chance it, even though everything was back to normal, and immediately headed back to the airport.

On downwind, everything was still normal, so we ran through our landing checklist and began lowering the gear and flaps as needed.  We had discussed previously that we would only reduce the power, just incase it got stuck again, when we absolutely knew we had the runway made with whatever power setting we had.  Thankfully we did that, because when we reduced to the final approach power setting, it got stuck again.  Yes, we came in a bit faster than normal; Yes, we came in a bit higher than normal; Yes, we landed on the runway, safely.  But we had no use of the throttle, RPM, or mixture.  We had to use considerable braking after we touched down, and then had to taxi back to the hanger riding the brakes (which were smoking by the time we got back in- I always wondered what would happen if the brakes were used too much).

We were lucky!  The rod that connects to the controls somehow got disconnected, which was why we had no use.  Who knows why it began working so we could make it back to the field, but it did. Had it not, we would have been forced to do an off-field landing.  Point of the story?  It is good to have all the required emergency procedures memorized, but there are emergenices that could happen that are not on that list.  The memorized emergency procedures can help prepare you for whatever happens, but know that the possibilites are endless when it comes to something going wrong.  There are so many moving parts on an aircraft, so if you have to think outside the box, then do it!

Once I began doing stage checks for students, I decided to give them emergency procedures that were not part of the required emergency memory items. I would not fail them if they didn't perform perfectly, but I wanted to see them think outside the box. I wanted them to realize that there were more emergencies than an engine failure.

Most of the time I gave the students this scenario- reduced power setting, but not a complete power loss. Many students froze when I told them that their power was stuck at 1500rpm. But as I walked them through the situation they realized that it could be treated as an engine failure, and they could run through the ABCDs (Airspeed, Best place to land, Checklists, Declare an emergency). Hopefully I was able to help some students realize the importance of thinking when an emergency situation occurs.

So if you find yourself in an abnormal situation, think about what's happening, then use the checklist that most closely resembles your situation. Remember, not every emergency situation has an associated checklist. If you have to, Think Outside The Box!

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