Why I follow check lists every time

A very well written and thought provoking article. Especially apposite as I have minutes ago finished watching a documentary about Challenger. How can it really be 30 years ago...?

Thanks for the link.

Mark.

 

I wonder how many know how the check list was born. Go back to one of the first flights of Boeing Model 299 that crashed because the external elevator gust locks were still in place, locking the elevators . The airplane took off with no elevator control and soon crashed. I can't recall the name of the aviator right now who initiated the check list but since the crash of the B-17 prototype it has been a part of the aviators regimen...most of the time.

 

Cannot believe someone was doing that with landing gear in that bad shape.

In the F-111 there was some complicated procedure for raising the gear if it did not come up normally. When it happened to our F-111F, I told the aircraft commander no way we were going to do that, because it might not come down on return. We stooged around in the pattern and landed. Some things just make no sense.

 

Great article, thanks for posting.

 

Thanks, remember reading (on here, I think) about the Gulfstream taking off with gust locks on. Horrifying.

The "new normal" can be death.

 

Good article. My Dad added a sort check item on his sundowner. Check gas! The drawback to having two planes, one gets flown more then the other. His Saratoga, well when tank gets low, it automatically switches tanks. You can also manually over ride this. But he got complacent and let the plane do it. He ended up taking a friend up. The friend wanted to look at a few properties from above. The Sundowner was a better plane for this mission. Now my brother flew it often. My Dad hadn't flown it in a year. Few hours of flying and they ran out of gas. No biggie my Dad instantly switched tanks and all was well. His friend now will never fly in a small plane again. My Dad now reminds himself of all little things. Its forgetting the little things that kills people who fly small planes!

 

...as well as kills those who fly large or expensive planes!

 

True. But in bigger expensive jets, usually two pilots prevent it.

 

Oh, okay...

 

I frequently flew with Ernest Gann, an old airline pilot, in his C-310. He had a Dymo label check list adhered to the side window post. On the downwind he started referring to it, touching each item on the list and repeating the motion on the panel. You DID NOT TALK during this process. You were allowed to speak after shutdown. He had umpteen thousand hours, starting from the early thirties and then through the war and into the 50's and survived it. Funny thing, when flying his Pietenpol in the San Juans, he clipped a power line when landing on his property. He survived that, too.