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Thread: [IAC] Learning from others mistakes
Message: Re: [IAC] Learning from others mistakes
Follow-Up To: ACRO Email list (for List Members only)
From: Rob Dorsey - SkyDancer Aviation <Rob at SkyDancerAviation.com>
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 18:44:20 UTC
Dick, As you may see I have kicked the hornets nest a bit with my hard and, in many eyes, insensitive approach to the tragic and untimely death of Miles Merritt. I only wanted to snap a few of us back to reality. Perhaps I have a more objective perspective in that I did not know him. He, therefore, exists only to me as an abstract and that allows me to think about it abstractly. I held and hold the position that, excepting a hidden machanical failure, you don't die in this sport unless you, or someone else, makes a mistake. Even a mechanical failure is most times traceable to a human failure. There are no "acts of God" at work in a tragedy like this, only the old physical properties of mass and inertia. We can learn from and understand most of these dreadful accidents. Some, like the incredible loss and disappearance of Art Scholl, will never be completely solved and we are left to speculate with no hope of ever knowing for sure. Not a week passes that I do not think of Charlie Hilliard, whom I knew from my early flying days in Texas. We met at Frank Price's Tiger Club in '67 and I was fortunate enough to count him as a friend. Charlie did everything right, from business to aviation to life. I remember flying an airshow with him the spring before the Sun&Fun accident and his excitement at the prospect of operating the Fury. You see, Charlie saw the Fury as a sort of retirement gig in which he slid around the country with speed and good radios and flew easy and smooth for the crowd. I cannot imagine Charlie making a mistake. I, and many others will always miss him. We must dispassionately and coldly study and pick apart each accident to find the flaw, always seeking to eliminate them, one by one. This is potentially dangerous flying, it always has been and will be I guess. When we stopped using modified antique airplanes and availed ourselves of modern, purpose-built machines one would think that it would have gotten much safer. But, alas, we're human and we just pushed the envelope more and more to the new limits of the equipment. Twenty years ago, no one would have conceived of pulling 12 G or pushing 8. People now routinely do that in Advanced. Harming our bodies with G was never an issue, now it is. Advanced today is what Unlimited was in the late seventies. Take a look at some old sequences. It is startling to see how the figures have increased in complexity and strenuousness. The result is that perhaps we have not become more safe, only more capable. When we chose to play at the limits we must accept the consequences of exceeding them. Sincerely, Rob RIHNAIRCO wrote: > To all: > I couldn't agree more with Rick Thomson. We have begun with the development > of the Aerobatic Mishap Review Committee chaired by Bruce Johnson. A careful > review of the statistics and articles printed in issues of Sport Aerobatics > since this committee got into the business will convince you that we are on > the right track. With time we will mature further in the correct direction. > Where possible we are also implementing the investigations performed by NTSB. > At the moment this effort has been funded by the generosity and intense > personal interest of our committee members. We owe them more than just > thanks. If the IAC wants more of its funds expended in this direction this is > the time to start deciding, before the 1999 budget is formed in late year. > Make your wishes known to your area Director. > > Dick Rihn, President, IAC
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