AT SYSTEMS PHOTO
KEEPING UP By Terry Palmer
Training for IIMC Is Crucial Practicing your instrument skills could save your life.
industry safety meetings, these weather-related acci- dents still occur at an alarming rate. So let’s go back to basics and discuss some potential solutions to this vex- ing problem.
D
ESPITE THE FACT that inadvertent entry into instrument meteorological conditions (IIMC) continues to be a topic at many helicopter
significant risk or landing the helicopter as soon as poor conditions become imminent. Preflight risk assess- ments are very helpful in making a no-go decision. Training for inadvertent IMC can be a little more com-
plex and is sometimes viewed as an expensive option, but it’s a crucial one. Instrument skills are perishable: their expiration date varies by the pilot’s level of experi- ence and ratings. Regardless of their documented expi- ration date, however, every pilot’s instrument skills will expire if he or she fails to practice them. If you don’t practice often, your skills will weaken, at
best. Weak skills combined with an unplanned encoun- ter can be fatal. Now that we’ve established that practicing your
instrument skills is crucial, how often you should do so depends on your comfort level with flying by instru- ments. If you have an instrument rating and are profi- cient with the aircraft model, mission, and environment, practicing once or twice a year may be enough. If you don’t have an instrument rating or you’re flying a new aircraft model or in an unfamiliar area, regular practice makes more sense. And it’s important to take that train- ing seriously. Let’s look at how to train for IMC encounters. There
are several ways to practice, all with varying degrees of effectiveness.
One good method is using a simulator that enables AT Systems’s
helmet-mounted ATS Device lets students experience both
simulated visibility and the sensations
the body feels during forward flight.
Poor visibility or instrument flight rules (IFR) condi- tions mostly means we can’t see outside the aircraft. We may not realize just how much we rely on visual cues from outside, but we find out very quickly when those cues are no longer there and spatial disorientation sets in. The “inadvertent” part makes IIMC even worse because we weren’t expecting the lack of visibility. As a result, we may not be prepared to respond to the situa- tion—a very dangerous condition that leads to accidents. The two most obvious solutions are to avoid the con- ditions and to hone your instrument skills. Avoiding the conditions may mean canceling the flight if there’s a
76 ROTOR WINTER 2020
you to practice to all levels of instrument conditions with little or no risk to person or aircraft. Many pilots tell me that training in a simulator can be very humbling because it can show us we’re often not as proficient as we thought we were. This is especially true for IIMC. In other emergencies, such as power loss or hydraulic fail- ure, pilots respond almost by muscle memory, because of their repeated use of the same checklist of response procedures during training. In the case of IIMC, how- ever, muscle memory seems to fade as we lose our sight. The sudden realization that you can’t see can lead to the feeling that you suddenly don’t know what to do because you can’t see the results of what you’re doing. Are you climbing … descending … banking? Fortunately, with concentrated practice some muscle memory can be learned during IIMC training in a
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