Take Your Pick - What's More Important? Exceptional Judgment Or Exceptional Skill?

Imagine I asked you the following question during your next fl ight review: If you had the choice, would you rather fl y directly through a line of embedded thunderstorms along your planned route of fl ight or use datalink radar imagery on your iPad to deviate around the weather system?

- Bret Koebbe

You’d probably take a curious look at me, think it was some kind of trick question and, of course, choose the option to go around the weather. Flying through the storms would add unnecessary risk, and it would take refined flying skills along with a lot of luck to keep the airplane upright and intact on the other side.

Put another way, would you rather choose to exercise sound aviation judgment or rely on heroic flying skills to get from point A to point B in this scenario? This is a bit exaggerated, but it’s a great example of how our approach to flying has evolved over the past 50 years thanks to ever-evolving technology that provides a better understanding and awareness of the environment around us. In previous eras, the “best” pilots were those who could will the airplane through any circumstance, planned or unplanned. Anything less was a sign of weakness. Today, better judgment wins every time.

Richard Collins recently wrote about his experiences in the 1950s instructing cadets in the Air Force, where the official training manual taught the procedures for flying through a thunderstorm if there were no alternate routes available to carry out the mission for the day. The training process required pilots to develop the necessary flying skills to handle an intentional thunderstorm penetration, prevent aircraft structural failure and emerge unscathed with the blue sky up.

The focus today is appropriately on prevention, and developing pilot decision-making and judgment skills to keep you out of situations that require extraordinary flying skills.