Dan Langhout
Well Known Member
They say confession is good for the soul - so I am going to try to do mine some good. A mistake (failure) on my part yesterday could have caused a serious, possibly fatal accident. Luckily, there was no incident.
Yesterday morning I flew to a nearby, uncontrolled airport to pick up a friend who had dropped off his C-170 for some avionics work. This was his first flight in an RV of any type, so we were chatting about all the expected stuff on the taxi out to the departure end of the runway. I pulled up my “Before Take Off” checklist on the Dynon, ran through it, took a look up at the final approach course, announced “RV 528DP DEPARTING 5” on the CTAF and pulled onto the runway - pushing up the throttle. I had no more pushed the throttle to full and raised the tail up when I heard “SKYHAWK 123XYZ GOING AROUND” on the CTAF. Shocked, I looked around and saw a Skyhawk well off to my right side and a couple of hundred feet above me! Clearly I had just screwed up royally. I continued the takeoff and turned out to the left. Shaken a bit, I apologized to the Skyhawk pilot on the radio and then flew back to Moontown.
After we got back, I sat down to really think about how bad this could have been and where I had become slack or come up short in my processes that would let me completely miss an approaching aircraft on a pretty short final.. I really think I have become a bit complacent in some areas - probably a result of flying a lot these days. Here’s what I came up with:
Definitely going to fix these things. As a reminder, perhaps an addition to the “Before Takeoff” checklist to consciously scan each sector of the pattern?
Thanks for hearing my confession - flames accepted. I feel better now.
Yesterday morning I flew to a nearby, uncontrolled airport to pick up a friend who had dropped off his C-170 for some avionics work. This was his first flight in an RV of any type, so we were chatting about all the expected stuff on the taxi out to the departure end of the runway. I pulled up my “Before Take Off” checklist on the Dynon, ran through it, took a look up at the final approach course, announced “RV 528DP DEPARTING 5” on the CTAF and pulled onto the runway - pushing up the throttle. I had no more pushed the throttle to full and raised the tail up when I heard “SKYHAWK 123XYZ GOING AROUND” on the CTAF. Shocked, I looked around and saw a Skyhawk well off to my right side and a couple of hundred feet above me! Clearly I had just screwed up royally. I continued the takeoff and turned out to the left. Shaken a bit, I apologized to the Skyhawk pilot on the radio and then flew back to Moontown.
After we got back, I sat down to really think about how bad this could have been and where I had become slack or come up short in my processes that would let me completely miss an approaching aircraft on a pretty short final.. I really think I have become a bit complacent in some areas - probably a result of flying a lot these days. Here’s what I came up with:
- Expectation of other pilot’s pattern position announcements for traffic “Heads Up”.
My passenger and I agreed that we did not hear any position announcements from the Skyhawk pilot in the pattern. Did he really not make any or did we just not hear him? Doesn't matter - he is not actually REQUIRED to make any. It’s my responsibility to make sure the coast is clear. In thinking back through all of this, I believe I have fallen into the (bad) habit of expecting some position announcements from pilots in the pattern. This leads to a bit of “Expectation Bias” that segues into the next point.
- Cursory glance up at the final approach course rather than careful scrutiny.
When I was working on my PPL back in the dark ages, my instructor taught me to completely clear the traffic pattern before taking the active runway. He would literally have me stand on the left brake while we slowly pivoted around 360 degrees scanning upwind, crosswind, downwind, base, and then final to get a clear picture of what might be in the pattern and where. Maybe that was a bit too much(?) - but it was a definite conscious act to really look for traffic. Admittedly, over the years, I have abandoned this thorough approach and now typically just look up the final approach course for traffic. Obviously sometimes that look isn’t as careful as it should be - particularly if I’m not expecting anything to be there.
- Lack of Sterile Cockpit.
Probably like most of you, the vast majority of my flying is solo - so a sterile cockpit at critical times isn’t normally a problem. In this instance, I had a passenger - and while we weren’t actually talking during the time in question, we had been and I didn’t go through the sort of mental gear shift into “sterile mode”.
Definitely going to fix these things. As a reminder, perhaps an addition to the “Before Takeoff” checklist to consciously scan each sector of the pattern?
Thanks for hearing my confession - flames accepted. I feel better now.