High Time vs. Low Time?

[Illya Kuryakin]

Ah yes, the age old question. Are high time pilots necessarily safer than low time pilots? Within obvious parameters (a 10,000 hour guy is probably a little less likely to come to grief than a 250 hour guy) I don't think its a given.
Take as an example, the MNR requirement for a fire detection pilot to have 1000 hours TT and 100 hours MPIC. Would a pilot with half these totals be any less "safe"? I think not. If anything the lower time guy might have a little more "fear factor" to help him do it right.
I've seen some higher time guys (I use "guys" in a non gender form...some guys are girls) pull some real bone headed moves, while I've seen some lower time folks do the same. No difference.
I ponder this in light of the rapid growth of some of our regional operations, pulling some experienced pilots from the industry into their cockpits.
Companies might be having difficulties meeting inflated expectations of third parties like Contrails. A perfect example of the "more is better" moronic mentality that has plagued our industry since the Wright brothers (personal friends of mine BTW) and nobody seems to get it?
With proper training, mentoring and line indoctrination, there is NO reason for the belief that "more is better"
Thoughts?
Illya

[seasonaldriver]

My thoughts are that probably the high time guys(girls) can use their experience to avoid or get out bad places better that low time guys(girls) however there is a lot of potential variation in individuals. Some low time people are better that some high time people but probably will not be considered for a job just because they are low time,unless the hirer knows them personally.
It does bring to mind a pet peeve of mine. Why this obsession with MPIC? You'd think that a high time person even with low MPIC would be able to operate a multi safely. They are not that much more complex to fly. really.

[FISH-FLY]

Like any career, there are ways for one's knowledge/capability/productivity to eventually plateau with their experience. For auto workers, it's 2 weeks on the assembly line to max productivity/capability, yet 30 years of raises/benefit increases/bitching about work increases. A wonder that it ended up being unsustainable. Sorry, bad side rant.

It is type of time, natural progression of experience, and continuing to do new things that keeps TT counting towards capability in a linear fashion. The "lines in the sand" provided by things like contrails are difficult if not impossible to get around. I think this is unfortunate because any Chief Pilots I've met has been very capable of evaluating a candidate in all aspects. For example, they could decide that 300 MPIC in a real commercial environment combined with other experience may make a very
capable medevac captain despite not having 500 MPIC as required by the province.

[PilotDAR]

I opine that as you gain experience (which may be somewhat related to your total flying time), your "horizon" moves out - you see more ahead of you. Your accumulated experience will allow you to anticipate more, and the little things find their "not right now" place in your flight, when things begin to go wrong. The result can be a pilot who does not allow meaningless distractions to take they attention away from flying the plane - and they have the experience to actually fly the plane.

Yeah, there sure comes a "time" when pilots can take too seriously the value of their perceived skills, and then complacency becomes a threat. When a pilot feels that happening, it's time for more training - a rating, or other license. For me, years back, getting my helicopter license really humbled me, when I was getting complacent as a fixed wing pilot.

But experience as a number of hours? Maybe, maybe not so much. As said many times, you can have an thousand hours, or an hour a thousand times. If I am to select a pilot, what the paper says about them, is of much less importance to me, then how I perceive their flying skills and judgement by direct observation....

[Illya Kuryakin]

Another thought.
Why is a guy with 2000 MPIC a better candidate for a job than a guy with 2000 hours on, say a PC12.......IF the guy with 2000 MPIC Has never had an engine failure? With both turning (which they usually do, being modern turbines and all) they're the same.....are they not?
I've got as much MPIC as anybody on this board, and I've never had a "modern" turbine give up on me.
Illya

[iflyforpie]

I started fire detection with half of those times.... in a much more challenging part of the world to fly than Ontario in the summer... and I made it through just fine. I didn't start flying the 337 until I had 1000 hours, but I only had 50MPIC.

One thing I noticed from personal experience though.. is I had a lot more of a git-r-dun drive when I first started. It was 100% internal, no pressure from Forestry... no pressure from the company--not even in the form of wage earnings (I get the same whether I fly or not). Now.... I have a more of a 'fcuk it... they're only trees' drive.

Having the guy I replaced pile a 337 into a mountain a year and a half ago with many more hours and years of experience than I did was really sobering... but it was also 100% preventable.

And I said this a while ago about MPIC and got ridiculed about it.... we operate a twin with both engines running, we do training once or twice a year with simulated engine out, and we hope to never have an engine failure in real life.

Really, to differentiate the experience, the pilot should log every time they have an engine failure, and the more engine failures--the more experience you have. Of course, reductio ad absurdum... a guy who had an engine failure every single flight would be the most experienced of all...

Would you want to hire that guy?

[Meatservo]

When I started flying commercially in the early 90s everybody wanted you to have 1000 hours in order to fly a 185. I thought that was basically a tactic on the part of the insurance companies to make sure they weren't having to insure anybody who was flying for their first season. Of course eventually I got hired anyway but I heard that 1000 hour thing a lot. By the time I ACTUALLY had 1000 hours, I was flying an Otter.

I think there are a couple of benchmarks that sort of serve as an indicator of your "maturity" as a pilot if I can put it that way. I have seen very large variations in skill level at just about every level, but there is a certain amount of truth in the idea that if you've gotten to say 10,000 hours without hurting yourself or giving up, you should have seen enough at that point not to be caught by surprise too much anymore.

Considering the very wide variety of experience you can have in aviation, it's true that there are some people who just aren't very good at flying, and some people who are brilliant at it. It's really hard to tell the difference between some of these guys when they are doing the kind of job where pretty-near the same thing happens every day and there are lots and lots of rote-learned procedures to insulate you from ever having to make a tough call. There are other jobs where certain guys just seem like magicians to the lower-time pilots because nobody is sure how they got to be that good at everything: the only explanation seems to be their experience level!

I think it's mostly personal: someone with 5000 hours is probably a much better pilot than he himself was with 500 hours. And he will be much better than that when he gets to 10,000 hours. (again it's just awkward to switch gender pronouns all the time; obviously I mean "she" and "herself" just the same) Other than broadly representing the level of competence you can be expected to have, it doesn't say as much about your inherent skill level as some people would like to think.

I'm way better at flying overall than I was at 200 or 1000 or 5000 hours. I'm not sure I am any better than I was at 10,000 hours. I think I might have about 14 000 or so in the "logbook" now, except I got lazy about filling it out after 10,000. I think I might have "plateaued" at some point. I think I would have to get a new job in order to experience any change in my skill level at this point. Anyway my point is, I'm way better than I was back then, but I have no idea how I stack up compared to you!

[timel]

Ah yes, the age old question. Are high time pilots necessarily safer than low time pilots? Within obvious parameters (a 10,000 hour guy is probably a little less likely to come to grief than a 250 hour guy) I don't think its a given.

Difficult question.

I might not sound conventional, I think if you are young pilot vs an older pilot with the same hours, the young pilot will be safer. I believe that there is a certain age limit to get involved.
The more you grow old, the slowest you get and the biggest your ego is.

A young pilot with 2000 hours will be much more eager to learn, also most lower time pilots are very serious with SOPs and safety due to their lack of experience. The lack of hours will definitely make them much less operational than 5000-10000 hours pilots. Less good? Maybe, but not always.


When it comes to dealing with emergencies or difficulties, more experienced pilots will probably deal much better due to their vast experience, an older pilot will also deal better with public relations.

I think an old wise pilot with a lot of experience will be much safer, only if he is able to constantly challenge himself and decide of what limits he chooses to obbey.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Nice post Meat. I imagine as far as "skill" we all plateaued at some point. I do know, as the years and hours mount, I've become more comfortable at knowing when to say when. Although, this doesn't make one a more skilled driver, but it can enhance the safety aspect of the game.
Illya

[Rookie50]

Good post and food for thought. I am at the other end of the spectrum, the classic non - professional, low timer with 700TT, although pretty active in relation to my peer group.

I am just getting comfortable with attempting not just to steer this amazing machine through the sky -- but to attempt being a competent aviator, and understanding what that means -- and am far from it. I study weather a lot, even when I don't fly due to it. I say no, often still, and for the volunteer stuff I do like Hope Air, that puts other out sometimes. I've gotten more comfortable at that -- putting the needs of pax in a box -- that doesn't compete with safety.

Being low time; I am still fearful in some areas, especially of monsters like ice - laden clouds that lurk in the Ontario great lakes skies in November.

Will I still say 'no" and be appropriately fearful at 2000 hrs and beyond? I hope so!

[schnitzel2k3]

> Maturity
> Common sense
> Discipline
> Personality
> Hands and feet** Thanks Cat

Usually correlated, they are the only things that matter in the cockpit.

Beyond that - the hours are only a measure of the time you've either exercised the above, or in a two crew environment, someone else has.

And as expressed, what the hell is this obsession with MPIC? Like a couple hundred hours in 'Ho is more important than actual experience on type, even if it's in the right seat. I think PIC in general is important but to differentiate between the two like night and day is unnecessary.

S.

[Cat Driver]

> Maturity
> Common sense
> Discipline
> Personality

Usually correlated, they are the only things that matter in the cockpit.

What about aircraft handling skills?

Without aircraft handling skills everything else is useless if you can not fly the thing.

If I had a pilot flying my airplane give me one that can land the thing when the winds and weather goes all to hell unexpectedly, a great personality will not pay for a wrecked airplane.

[Illya Kuryakin]

Cat, of course aircraft handling skills are important, but I'd rather have a guy who knows, and abides by his limitations, than a talented hands and feet guy who allows himself to get in over his head.
Illya

[iflyforpie]

But that would be decision making skills.... not necessarily the same as maturity and 'common' sense and certainly not the same as personality.

[Cat Driver]

I guess I am just too old school and stuck in the mind set that flying an airplane requires an understanding of how to make the machine go where you want it to, and the hands and feet skills to insure you are flying it.....not it flying you.

And please, pretty please don't get started on CRM, PDM, and all the other acronyms used in multi crew operations, I was flying them from the 1960's until I retired in 2005.

[Illya Kuryakin]

I guess I am just too old school and stuck in the mind set that flying an airplane requires an understanding of how to make the machine go where you want it to, and the hands and feet skills to insure you are flying it.....not it flying you.

Of course, but you also need to know when not to make the airplane go where you want, but to make it go where it's safe to take it.
A man's got to know his limitations.
Even old birds like you and I!
Illya

[Illya Kuryakin]

But that would be decision making skills.... not necessarily the same as maturity and 'common' sense and certainly not the same as personality.

I equate common sense to decision making skills.
Illya

[Cat Driver]

Of course, but you also need to know when not to make the airplane go where you want, but to make it go where it's safe to take it.
A man's got to know his limitations.
Even old birds like you and I!
Illya

For sure.....

[Meatservo]

Cat Driver is correct, flying skill is pretty important. It's more important in some types of flying than it is in others. It's also the hardest thing to teach!

One thing I've noticed is that I think the "mid"-time pilots make the best instructors. Maybe at about four to eight thousand hours. The reason I think this is that I have noticed recently that there are some things I do that are now so instinctive and built-in, I can no longer remember how I learned to do them in the first place. Stuff like flying a taildragger, or hand-flying an instrument approach, or landing a seaplane. Stuff that requires a detailed explanation, I am starting to have trouble figuring out what the new pilots need to hear in order to catch on. I think the "mid" time pilots are getting good at doing this stuff, but can still remember when they learned it too. Being able to remember the learning process makes teaching so much easier. Truly great teachers, in my opinion, are the ones who can combine loads of experience with the ability to understand the learning process. Everyone else I think passes through a phase where they are good at teaching, and then grow out of it.

I actually feel compelled to add that I think time in the logbook is pretty important. Like I said before, I think it's a very personal benchmark, and there will be guys who take more time to get to a certain level of competence. I disagree with Timel that older fellows have the worst egos, I feel like I have noticed the opposite. I think that generally people get better at things with experience.

[Cat Driver]

One night we were sixty miles N.E. of Resolute Bay in a DC3 with the village lights in sight when the Air Radio dude called us to let us know the wind was increasing rapidly and the snow was starting to blow and the vis was getting bad real fast.

By the time we were a couple of miles final with the approach lights and runway light dimly visable the Radio dude gave us the wind and visibility on the ground...it was zero zero in blowing snow and the wind was 90 degrees off the runway at fifty knots.

Thankfully my flying skills were as good as my personality and we landed safely.....but had a hell of a time trying to see to taxi to the ramp.