ISTOCK/-MASSMEDIA-


ACCIDENT RECOVERY


By David Jack Kenny


Lessons Not Learned


Why do pilots continue to press on into instrument conditions while flying by visual references?


I


F IT’S NOT A PUZZLE AS OLD AS AVIATION itself, it’s at least as old as the introduction of gyroscopic attitude instruments to light civilian air-


craft: Why do pilots continue to press on into instru- ment meteorological conditions (IMC) while flying by visual references? And why do pilots who’ve learned how to fly by instrument references continue to suc- cumb to spatial disorientation once they lose sight of the ground?


The Flight At about 8:10 pm local time on Thursday, Apr. 22, 2021—13 minutes after sunset—a Robinson R44 lifted off from the Queen City Municipal Airport (KXLL) in Allentown, Pennsylvania. The pilot requested flight fol- lowing to the Bradford County Airport in Towanda, Pennsylvania, a straight-line distance of 82 nautical


54 ROTOR SEPTEMBER 2023


miles (nm) to the northwest, at a cruising altitude of 3,000 ft. He did not contact Leidos Flight Service for a weather briefing or consult ForeFlight weather soft- ware, and there is no record of him checking weather information from any other source. The route was a familiar one, as he had been using the helicopter to commute to work since buying it the previous summer. According to his wife, his departure that evening was later than usual, but “flying at night was not an issue” for him. Conditions were dark, with the moon obscured by a higher overcast layer. At 8:28 pm, five minutes after the end of evening


civil twilight, the air traffic control (ATC) tower at KXLL handed him off to ATC at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport (KAPV). Thirty-five minutes later, radar tracking data showed that the helicopter began an initially gradual right turn that tightened into a


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