Berchmans
Well Known Member
I have been building my RV8 for 2.5 years now and one thing that I have noticed is folks are really loading up their panels with lots of really neat stuff. I, like everyone else think this is really cool but as fliers we need to step back a bit and examine what is really important about flying.
Last summer here in Alaska we had several mid air collisions, some with tragic results. In every case neither pilot saw the other aircraft.
All the neat screens, readouts, GPS information is wonderful stuff but remember the best instrument in the plane is the Mark 1 eyeball attached to the computer between your ears. Look outside the airplane more. Watch for others. The scenery out there is better too.
When was the last time you turned off all the gee whiz stuff and flew without anything working at all? Give it a try. Turn it off, cover it up?fly for 10 minutes, do some turns. Can you hold altitude? Your thoughts?
Last summer here in Alaska we had several mid air collisions, some with tragic results. In every case neither pilot saw the other aircraft.
All the neat screens, readouts, GPS information is wonderful stuff but remember the best instrument in the plane is the Mark 1 eyeball attached to the computer between your ears. Look outside the airplane more. Watch for others. The scenery out there is better too.
When was the last time you turned off all the gee whiz stuff and flew without anything working at all? Give it a try. Turn it off, cover it up?fly for 10 minutes, do some turns. Can you hold altitude? Your thoughts?