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R.I.P. |
Canada decision to put the penny out of everyone's misery today just so happened to COINcide (see what I did there) with a press release from the RCAF stating that
pilot training hours will now be split favouring more time in the simulator.
Now, this seems like a reasonable decision. Flight simulator hours are much cheaper than actual aircraft flight hours. To me this seems more like a case of "penny wise and pound foolish". Sure, simulators don't require fuel or hours of maintenance between flights, and are a great way for pilots to practice procedures and keep their skills sharp without all the usual cost involved.
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Super Hornet simulator. Just as good as the "real thing"? |
The trouble is, flight simulator hours are not a substitute for actual flight hours. There is a huge difference between knowing what buttons to push in a simulated environment, and pushing those same buttons pulling 9g's and feeling your eyeballs getting pulled back into the back of your skull. There is also the proverbial "seat of the pants" feeling that comes only with experience doing the real thing. It's the same way a race car driver knows his tires are about to lose grip. Sometimes you just have to feel what's happening rather than depending on all those blinking lights and gauges.
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What happens when you cut pilot training. |
Consider this. In 2006, a Cormorant search-and-rescue helicopter crashed in Nova Scotia. Conditions were well within the Cormorants design specs and there was no hardware malfunction. The crash was fount to have been caused by pilot error. That pilot error was brought about by flight hours being cut due to poor aircraft availability.
So which is the better bargain? Saving a few dollars by restricting flight time? Or saving multi-million dollar aircraft and the aircrews' lives by allowing them to train and practice in the real thing?
If the RCAF bought an aircraft that was so expensive to maintain and fly that is has to cut flying hours, then it simply bought the wrong aircraft. I'd rather see pilots getting real flight time by flying Defence Ministers from fishing trips than sitting at glorified XBox. The F-35 would be an example of an aircraft
too expensive to actually fly, along with also being a case of "in for a penny, in for a pound".