No tech people were called out, and yes, thinking back on it, I had a horseshoe up my ass.
There can a be a LOT of unofficial encouragement to just get it done. Ever wonder why all the problems magically happen halfway home on the last leg of the day when the plane is going back to base anyway vs. the first leg of the day when it would cost money 
- not hugely different from 1001 ships sinking over the centuries because an owner needed it at X port on Y date or else.
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No wonder at all. Been there,done that.
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As the old saying goes. The captain decides if the ship sails but the owner decides who is the captain. Money rules.
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Nicely stated.
‘Get home-itis’ is a common cause of many general aviation accidents. John F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife were famous victims of this syndrome: Allowing a personal commitment/appointment to take precedence over safety, in his case, inadvertently flying into instrument conditions without the proper training.
https://www.skybrary.aero/index.php/Press-on-itis_(OGHFA_BN)
Get home-itis is responsible for a bit of damage in the maritime industry as well. Gotta make that flight or crew change, weather be damned.
Thus Thanksgiving usually collects the most wrecked planes of any week of the year - can’t disappoint Grandma, even if we arrive through the roof.
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I used to have a Part 135 operation out of St. Maries, Idaho. Just north of there the interstate highway (I-90) wound through the mountains on the border of Montana and Idaho. It was a trap for non instrument rated pilots taking the family to or from granny’s place every major holiday. They would follow the highway into rising terrain and lowering ceilings until crashing onto the ski slope or the highway. with nearly always fatal results. Thanksgiving and Christmas were almost guaranteed to claim someone.
I had a friend who lost a loved one in that area while I was doing the same thing out of Burbank, out to the desert, delivering bank cargo. There was no saying no without getting fired. Cherokee Sixes and Beech 18s with no deicing. It sounded so romantic when de St. Exupery wrote about mail deliveries in his open cockpit biplanes. He never mentioned trying to sleep in cheap desert motels with rubber curtains to block out the harsh desert sun and flying before sunup and after sundown through squall lines to suit the bank schedules.
My hat is off to all you fellows who sailed AND flew . Just didn’t have the stomach to do both. Counted my blessings of survival in the first tense. Good for you. Most respect sirs.
Sailing was a lark compared to that.
Sorry about the squirrels Lee Shore.
Culture and training are both about probabilities. If there is a good safety culture and training it doesn’t eliminate the chances the crew will make the wrong move but it does increase the odds the crew make the right move.
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all my flying mates tell me safe flying more an attitude then a skill
can you think, what if, lets just suppose this happens etc
any logic skills?
This is wrt running a simulator scenario:
The scenario involved a routine departure from New York’s Kennedy Airport on a transatlantic flight, during which various difficulties would arise, forcing a return.
Lauber told me that at Pan Am some of the operations managers believed the scenario was too easy. “They said, ‘Look, these guys have been trained. You’re not going to see much of interest.’ Well, we saw a lot that was of interest. And it had not so much to do with the pilots’ physical ability to fly—their stick-and-rudder skills—or their mastery of emergency procedures. Instead, it had everything to do with their management of the workload and internal communication.
It all depended on the captains. A few were natural team leaders—and their crews acquitted themselves well. Most, however, were Clipper Skippers, whose crews fell into disarray under pressure and made dangerous mistakes. Ruffell Smith published the results in January 1979, in a seminal paper, “NASA Technical Memorandum 78482.” The gist of it was that teamwork matters far more than individual piloting skill. This ran counter to long tradition in aviation but corresponded closely with the findings of another NASA group, which made a careful study of recent accidents and concluded that in almost all cases poor communication in the cockpit was to blame.
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Thanks for the memories. My very first commercial flying was hauling checks from all over central Washington to Spokane in Cessna singles including a 150 on one particular run. Later did Missoula, Helena, Butte then down to Salt Lake City on a night run hauling checks to the Fed Reserve Bank. Overnight in SLC then back in the morning.That run was in a Baron 58TC so it was not all that uncomfortable. We also did a Wall Street Journal run from SEA to MSO, GPI, then hop over the hills to HLN (worst turbulence on the planet) and BIL, MSO. Later did the MSO-HLN-BIL mail run in a C-45. That was another night run, magnificent in mid winter when the arctic high settled in except for OATs in the -50 range. Change of seasons was a bitch with 100 knot winds aloft, thunderstorms or blizzards. Worst ice on the planet. Gawd, that was awesome flying! Finally got a job with Horizon and thought I landed in heaven until the reality of it set in and when the Gulf war came along had an opportunity to take a leave of absence and take a RRF ship to Gulf. Never looked back, made more money in a month sailing than I did in 6 months flying. No scrambled eggs on the hat - no hat but absolutely zero regrets except when I had to buy airline tickets, still miss jump seating around the world. Still have the hat though …
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I remember a flight in air so cold the INSIDE of the airplane barely got above freezing! I recall flying with one hand, put the other one in my jacket, and switch every 10 minutes or so.
Well it’s both. The typical progression is a new guy is too scared to attempt much. Then you get more experience and confidence and learn a lot. Your new confidence gets you into some situations where your new skills save you - or not. Assuming you don’t become an “or not”, you eventually learn to avoid situations that require superior skills. Thus the old saying “My superior airmanship keeps me from having to use my superior airmanship”. Another similar saying is you start flying with a full bag of luck and an empty bag of experience. You need to get the second bag full before the first one runs out.
- I wouldn’t trade my experiences back in the day flying crap overloaded airplanes in horrible weather for minimal pay, but I wouldn’t do it again if you put a gun to my head
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well said
years in the right hand seat helps