Plane Conversations

Knowledge is power.  It’s not what you know, but what you do with what you know that matters. 

Enter social media, web 2.0, wikinomics, the digital age, the Google era-whatever you would like to call it.  The power of this enormous infrastructure and way of life, the power of social media is the sharing of knowledge by wise leaders. 

Let me briefly explain–Google shares information, but it certainly isn’t wisdom.  On the other hand, your friend, who has been listening to a podcast about a certain subject for a year now, knows you are looking for a new job in a related industry.  He knows that the host of the podcast is great friends with a guy in that industry.  A tweet is sent with a link to the podcast… Knowledge has been applied.  Wisdom has been shared.  Now connections have been made.

Enter video.  YouTube is probably the most widely known video social media channel, but there are many.  Here is an example:

What did you see? Probably a lot of things.  Did you see an acrobatic flight from the “bird’s eye” view of the pilot? A pilot getting his first lesson could learn a lot about the cross check…looking outside at the wingtips to maintain attitude, back and forth, now forward at airspeed.  These are the kinds of things that can only be learned in real time.  It’s challenging, even for an experienced flight instructor to explain this inverted.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, what is video worth?

Did you see Johnny’s house in the early frames of the video, just to the far side of the brown field off the nose? How cool would it be for Johnny to see his house from that angle?! Even more exciting would be real time streaming video integrated into the flying video game on his HD TV.

Imagine a student pilot getting ready to go on his first cross-country flight.  The weather between here and the destination is forecasted to be VFR, but there is a slight chance it could deteriorate.  So he types in the web address for a new, video-based “Sky Maps” website, and sees that another pilot has just flown along that route.  By clicking on the airplane symbol on the “Sky Map,” a video is cued.  Student Pilot can now see the weather for himself, adding some knowledge to his decision-making process, painting a picture to supplement the weather forecast.

Did you see the weather off to the east in the video? Scientists could tap into a wealth of data to update meteorological models, validate predictions, understand these complex (and still quite mysterious) phenomena even better.

Did you see the turbulent airflow off of the upper wing? I didn’t either, but it won’t be long until a high-tech lens attachment the size of a dime gives Schleren photography capability to this portable video cameras.  In fact, the future holds a camera that looks wherever the pilot points it and captures images at any bandwidth in the spectrum of light.

One last application for the test pilots among us - the pilot was moving his head, large movements, and a lot of them, in other words, high frequency and high amplitude.  This data would certainly contribute to an understanding of the workload during this phase of flight.  At this point in the evolution of the technology, we don’t need six sigma certainty that it’s high workload.  We have a definitive qualitative understanding that it is.  The technology will mature, and the way we use it to collect quantitative measures of what has been previously subjectively evaluated should mature as well.

That’s what the future looks like…in HD.

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As I said yesterday, both the Phenom 100 and the 300 are single pilot certified and are designed to be flown by professional pilots, as well as owner pilots. The latter present a challenge as they are generally a group with little or no pure turbojet time.  Many have flown complex turbo prop aircraft but most owner pilots have spent little time in “fast movers” and lack a complete understanding of their roles and responsibilities in the ATC system. The solution lies in training and competent mentoring.  Embraer includes two “entitlement” training slots for pilots with the purchase of an Executive Jet. The training at ECTS is a thorough introduction into the Phenom and an accurate assessment of acquired skills and knowledge.   The problem is that training ends with the check-ride and subsequent type rating.   And, in any sphere, knowledge without wisdom is incomplete.

A typical type-rating oral exam consists of knowing aircraft systems and limitations along with the immediate action items associated with specific emergency procedures.  A more thorough oral drills deeper with questions involving the working relationships of systems and an understanding of why things work the way they do. The rating-ride is a carefully choreographed series of events that test specific learned procedures such as the loss of an engine on takeoff, the“V-1 Cut”, as well as single-engine approaches and landings.  The entire check ride is given within the confines of a single airport and is an accurate assessment of skills and accomplishment. The FAA oral and rating-ride are excellent tests of pilot preparedness for the unexpected problems that seldom (thankfully) occur in real life.  What a rating-ride can’t do is impart experience and judgment to a first-time jet pilot.  With experience comes wisdom and the safest way for the first-time jet pilot to get that wisdom is with the assistance of a mentor.

Slow down, you move too fast.
You got to make the morning last.
Just kicking down the cobble stones.
Looking for fun and feelin’ groovy.

 (59th St. Bridge Song by Simon and Garfunkel)

Up until recently, Air Traffic Controllers could logically assume that everyone in a jet “kicking down the cobble stones” was a pro-pilot or at least performed like one.  The advent of the personal jet has changed that.  Now anyone with a million dollars, or even less with financing, can buy a jet to look for fun and feel groovy hanging out with the big boys.  Herein lies the problem. The old instructor adage of “slow down and make yourself time for the approach” only works at the cabbage patch, but these personal jet aircraft aren’t staying in the cabbage patch.

A gap has developed between those who understand ATC and fly accordingly and those who feel as if ATC will accommodate their lack of skills and judgment. The saner parties have been the insurance companies who have insisted upon some level of supervision for low time aviators. Insurance companies, at a loss for how gauge skills and judgment, have resorted to insisting on a certain number of hours (usually 25) of supervised flying.  Typically those hours are flown in the course of business for the newly minted personal jet aviator.

Perhaps a better way to ensure the safety and success of the owner-flown community would be to adopt the commercial aviation technique of mentor flying for newly type-rated jet pilots by creating a private IOE (initial operating experience) process. Airlines have long recognized that meaningful mentor programs consist of more than the supervised “drilling of holes” in the sky.  A truly effective mentor program imparts a higher level understanding and competence to the new pilot.

With training fresh in the mind of the newly typed pilot, the mentor reinforces good technique and emphasizes the “real world” application the newly learned skills.  And it takes both training and experience to protect your Phenom investment.

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A business aircraft is a productivity tool. It is no different than any other tool we use in business to become more productive. It has a cost and it brings, or should bring, value. The value has to exceed the cost. If it does then we get a positive rate of return on the investment. If the value does not exceed cost then it is not a good investment.

All of the mainstream and social media conversations about the “extravagance” or “corporate excess” associated with the business jet play well with the anti big business crowds and populist politicians, but they lack substance. So far, these conversations have had nothing to do with the reality of what a business aircraft does to enhance the productivity of a company and its most valuable assets – its people.

The discussion about the value of business aircraft should be all about productivity. If using business aircraft increases the productivity of an organization, and the measured gain in productivity exceeds the cost, then it makes sense. Bottom line!

I just purchased an iPad. I can use this device to increase my productivity in internet research and communications or I can play games on it. How I choose to use it doesn’t make it inherently good or bad. How I use it does determine its value in my personal and business productivity.

In that way, a business jet is no different than an iPad.

Those of us in business aviation need to do a better job of first understanding, and then selling the value proposition of business aircraft as a tool to enhance productivity.

Billions of dollars have been spent in research and development of new high technology aircraft that will take us higher, faster and further on less fuel.  All the while, business aviation has invested very little in the technology to truly measure the enhancement of productivity gained by flying in a private aircraft. It is not just the time saved that we need to measure and quantify. What about the social and physiological experience of travel and its effects on human productivity and creativity?

Additionally, we should invest in the technology to learn how to better utilize the business aircraft to bring the costs down. How do we cut the inefficiencies of business aviation without reducing the experience?

An industry-wide increase in the efficient use of the business aircraft coupled with a measurable understanding of the value would do more than just silence the naysayers. More importantly, it would grow the industry that supports business aviation and bring an innovative increase in the productivity of our economy.

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