ISTOCK/VM


WORK SAFE By Zac Noble


Tools Secure? Double-Check


to Be Sure Don’t assume you left nothing behind after working on an aircraft.


W 62 ROTOR JUNE 2024


HEN RESTORERS OF CHARLES Lindbergh’s Spirit of St. Louis found a pair of pliers in the belly of his airplane, they


thought the tool had been left behind during one of the aircraft’s restorations. After some careful investigation, as I cite in a 2022 Spotlight on Safety article, it was determined the pliers had been left by Lindbergh him- self on his famous 1927 transatlantic flight. While this may not be the first instance of a tool


having been lost in an aircraft, it’s likely the most well- known early example. Lindbergh had many fuel valves he had to manipulate during the course of his 34-hour trip from New York to France. The single-engine airplane was laden with fuel, and pliers would have made mov- ing the fuel selector valves much easier on his hands and fingers.


A Job Well Done The Internet is loaded with examples of aviation acci- dents related to poor tool control. Of course, a lost or misplaced tool doesn’t always lead to an accident, but it happens frequently enough that tool control has become a top priority over the past couple decades, to the point that aviation tool companies now sell tool- boxes with tool shadowing already in place. Recently while performing some maintenance in the area of the rudder pedals and flight controls, I went down into my aircraft’s “bowels of misery,” contorting my body for hours while entering and exiting the fuselage. For those of us who’ve been there, you know what


I’m talking about. Machines are often built around a sin- gle widget where it seems like someone held up an


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