Human beings have a curious and not altogether beneficial trait that tends to make us believe we know things that just aren’t true. Worse, we often entrench ourselves so deeply in our erroneous beliefs we actively resist learning lessons that would put us on more solid ground.
Consider this example.
A few decades back I was instructing at a field in the Northeast. One fine Spring day a fellow came out to the airport, loaded his family into an airplane that had been sitting outside over the winter, fired it up, and did his level best to fly it. As you might imagine, things didn’t work out all that well.
With very little activity on the field that day, the flight school crew watched the goings on from the FBO. If there was a pre-flight inspection done, it was quick and superficial. After a handful of attempts the engine started and the aircraft taxied to the hold short line.
If the pilot did a run-up, I didn’t see it or hear it. Within seconds the aircraft was accelerating down the runway.
At about the midpoint the aircraft lurched with the application of brakes, but the engine continued producing full power. Quickly, the brakes were released and the power was reduced. The airplane continued using up runway at a prodigious pace. This odd sequence of events repeated itself once or twice until the runway was nearly gone and the pilot forced the aircraft into ground effect.
The terrain fell away, dropping a considerable distance from the level of the runway. So did the aircraft. Not far beyond the runway’s end the aircraft hit the ground hard. The gear tore away and the fuel bladders ruptured. Near the bottom of the hill the aircraft came to rest.
The FBO crew was out the door in a flash, running to the damaged aircraft in an effort to aid those involved. As the first lineman approached at a dead run, he yelled to the pilot, “Kill the Master. Kill the Master.” A pilot himself, the lineman knew the strobe lights, which were still flashing, indicated the airplane’s electrical system was energized. With fuel spilling from the torn tanks, the risk of fire was evident.
The pilot pulled himself from the wreck, his family still inside. He turned to the line service workers running toward him and yelled back, “Shut up. I know what I’m doing.”
Thankfully nobody was seriously hurt in the accident. But that pilot’s outburst became a punchline we used often for some time after.
We all make mistakes. There’s no way to avoid the occasional faux pas. We’re human. It’s okay. But it behooves any of us to continuously make attempts to improve our body of knowledge and our performance, both on the job and in our daily lives.
To achieve that goal it’s important that we consider how we know what we believe to be true. Did we research the topic or did we just hear something through the grapevine and accept it as fact?
Passing along factual information to others is helpful. Passing along untruths we’ve never verified can be detrimental. Sometimes, profoundly so.
And then there’s just plain old miscommunication. Once upon a time, a controller told me to turn left from 50° to 180° when I went missed on the approach. So I did. The controller was displeased with my turn and voiced his aggravation on the radio. Then he checked the tower tapes. He verified the mistake was his and apologized on my next attempt. I appreciated that.
Misinformation and miscommunication doesn’t necessarily suggest malice. Sometimes — maybe most of the time — it’s just a side effect of being an error-prone human being.
One of the teenagers I work with on a regular basis decided late in her high school career that she’d like to attend the US Air Force Academy and serve in the military. She’s smart and capable. She has leadership experience in Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC), as well as with the flying club she’s a member of. She also works part-time at a local grocery store.
In a word, she’s impressive.
Unfortunately, she voiced her desire to a high school guidance counselor who quickly took the opportunity to squash my young friend’s dream. The counselor told her she’d started the process too late. Military academies were not available to her.
That’s not true, by the way. But my young friend didn’t know that, so she gave up on her efforts to attend her dream school, because someone in a position of authority told her she couldn’t.
But wait, there may still be a happy ending to this story. After being encouraged to reconsider the goal, she’s been meeting folks with actual knowledge and experience who can guide her. People who know of what they speak. She’s found she can potentially reach her goal, provided she is willing to work hard, commit to the dream, and make her acceptance into the US Air Force Academy her primary short-term goal.
Knowing the truth makes all the difference. In the end, whether she makes it to Colorado Springs or not, she’s learned an important lesson that will serve her well in life.
Verify. Don’t take “no” for an answer just because someone you believe to be knowledgeable utters the word. Network, study, research, find your own answers. The truth is available to any one of us on almost any topic we might choose to delve into. We just have to look for it.
Whether it’s college admissions, the recommended method of entering the traffic pattern at a non-towered airport, the direction of turns for a hold, personal finance, or anything else we might find ourselves questioning, there is an approved or a recommended process we should be aware of. There is information — real information — just waiting for us to discover and accept it. Not rumors, not a third-party story passed down from the cousin of this guy I know who used to be a big deal somewhere. That’s not likely to be helpful information.
What do you believe? And when you answer that question, consider how sure are you the answer you give is based on a truth rather than an opinion. You can keep that answer to yourself, but be aware, that’s the question that really matters.
Not taking any side here … But this relates to news coming out of Washington D.C. these days
Great advice (is this self-contradictory?) Don’t you wonder about all these aviation forums on FaceBook with earnest people soliciting and giving advice? Most is contradictory (or wrong). It is no wonder people spend so much learning to fly these days (or quit). A maze of contradictory opinions! I compare it to a food buffet where half the entrés are poisonous? Good luck!
I think you just described most of the forums on the web!!
An old friend had a poster on his office wall with another quote…
“Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” — Hanlon’s Razor
Which he re-worded for his colleagues [like me], thus….
“Do not assume malice for what stupidity or carelessness or laziness or ignorance can explain.” –******** Engineer
NOTE. What appears to be contradictory or wrong… may be simply ‘a corner-of-the-envelop’ situation/perspective… that is ill-defined or fervently believed without broad experience and insight.
“If you done it, it ain’t bragging.” –Walt Whitman
“Sharing knowledge [truth] is the way to immortality.” — The Dalai Lama
“Sharing fables or ‘no-shit’ stories or falsehoods or baseless rumors is the way to infamy.” -Me
As a young aero enginerd in 1983[or 84] I was introduce to the world of USAF mishap investigation the hard way… I was sent along with a seasoned engineer for a T-37B crash investigation out of Vance AFB. It was terribly confusing and I had no idea how the pieces fit together… But I was hooked. When it came time I fought to attend a 2-week USAF mishap investigation course… and the fuzzy/narrow images I had of bit-n-pieces… flying and engineering… coalesced into a coherent/broad image of this amazing field of human endeavor.
Over the next several years and different mishaps and engineering experiences I was humbled-to-my knees when i realized how little I truly understood of the many facets involved… and the massive degree that human factors and foibles and misinformation ‘out-there’ had to be factored-in, and often set-aside, until facts had been gathered and analyzed.
Knowledge and experience and insight must be carefully combined to make sense of the discontinuous-messy world we exist in.
In the midst of ‘growth’ I started collecting related quotes and ‘wisdom-of-experience’. Here are a few related directly to this topic.
“We believe to be true what we prefer to be true.” –Unknown
“For those who believe, no proof is required; for those who cannot believe, no proof is possible.” –[variation, Stuart Chase]
“Unfortunately, in science what You ‘believe’ is irrelevant. –“Orion”, Homebuiltairplanes.com forum
“Over the years, many people have asked me how I run the Naval Reactors Program, so that they might find some benefit for their own work. I am always chagrined at the tendency of people to expect that I have a simple, easy gimmick that makes my program function. Any successful program functions as an integrated whole of many factors. Trying to select one aspect as the key one will not work. Each element depends on all the others.” –Hyman Rickover, Admiral, USN
“It is necessary for us to learn from others’ mistakes. You will not live long enough to make them all yourself.” — Hyman Rickover, American admiral
“Experience is a cruel teacher. First she gives you the test; then she teaches you the lesson.” – often cited version of Vern Law’s quote
“Experience is a brutal teacher, but you learn. My God, do you learn.” –C.S. Lewis
“…insight comes thru experience…” –Fr Kenneth, SVDP Catholic Church, Andover KS, Homily on 9 July 2017
“You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” –Samuel Clemons [Mark Twain], writer and humorist
“Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.” –Samuel Clemmons [Mark Twain], writer and humorist
“What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know, it’s what we know for sure.” –Samuel Clemens, AKA “Mark Twain”
“Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” –Dwight D. Eisenhower
And the classic ‘ego-cult quote’…
“We the untrained, have been doing so much with so little for so long, that we are now willing to attempt the impossible with absolutely nothing. –Unknown – military variation
Check out the short article starting on page 110 of the August 2017 AOPA Pilot magazine. Your example here is exactly the issue the AOPA article tried to address. Old wives tales, mistaken assumptions, and just plain wrong information can any of us hurt doing this thing we love, known as aviation.
“Shut up, I know what I am doing!” I’ll be chuckling to myself over that one for the rest of the day!
Thanks, Jamie
Ahhh the stories that go with this one…. At the very least I fired up the computer a bit early this morning to help my wife with FAA Regs/FACTS about whether or not her chain of command needed to do a ‘determination’ for a crane they would be responsible for near a military helo op area and in fact, not far from our local International Airport. A couple of her chain opined that “there were things taller in the area” and “nahh, it’ll be OK”…. I easily pulled 14CFR77 and printed both that and a quick MapQuest map showing that they were outside the 100:1 for KEYW and clear of the 25:1 for both the local seaplane (ooops…no one had thought about that little used space) and the mil helo op area and hangar. With FACTS they are in spec…WITH FACTS..
When I taught in a major A&P program I developed a catch phrase that applied initially to all FAA exams, RTFQ…Read The… Question. It caught on and many the student came back to tell me that it had made a difference in their score. In almost every exam the CORRECT answer lies in READING CORRECTLY…the question. The old tale of going to St Ives applies. Look it up… The answer, the FACTS are in the question…RTFQ…. Facts provide better answers than “I know what I’m doing..”
Reminds me of this quote.
Doubt is an uncomfortable condition, but certainty is a ridiculous one.
Voltaire
PS- I really like the last paragraph of the article.
There’s a lot of misinformation in aviation. Which is an unfortunate side effect of an otherwise really great desire to share information. As pilots, most of us understand that the more we know, the better, and safer pilot we are. If we see an opportunity to help another pilot become better or safer, we usually share what we know. It’s one of the things I think is great about flying in general. We’re a pretty open and friendly bunch, as a rule.
While hanger flying is often very enjoyable, and sometimes even educational, we have to remember that even the grey-beards sitting in the pilots lounge might not be right on everything they ‘know’.
Simply ask a group of pilots about flying over square for example. A lot of them will immediately state that one should never fly over square – it’ll destroy the engine. A quick check of several POH will show that about 30% of the power settings the manufacturer recommends are “Over Square”, which is in fact, an efficient mode of operation at some cruise settings. Another favorite for the Pilot Lounge crowd – the use of Mystery Oil, some will assure it will save you thousands in overhaul costs, while another will not even use it to lubricate the door hinges. Fact is, no engine or airframe manufacturer recommends it for anything, and no research shows that it does much, except pull a few dollars out of your wallet.
I suppose the lesson here is, to quote a former President, “Trust, but verify”.
Some years back I visited the local community college wondering if they had any courses which might be useful to me in my various businesses. I was sent to a counselor who said “Call me coach”.
Coach asked me what I was doing with my life, and I told him. He then asked if I was making any money. Yes, my annual net is just under six figures. He advised me that I should close my “silly little business” and come back to school to become an English teacher.
Coach was wearing a $10 plastic watch, I was wearing a watch with a comma in the price tag. I excused myself and left. A few days later I saw “Coach” driving around in a rusty AMC Gremlin mostly held together with “Save the Whales” bumper stickers. I don’t think he saw me wave from the 280SL I was driving at the time.
Moral: Never take financial advice from somebody named “Coach”.
I learned early on not to take everything at face value as a kid in a hospital. (I don’t know how many doctors I trained: No I don’t bend that way) My usual response to surprise that something worked or went right is: There’s method to my madness, or Just because I am paranoid it doesn’t mean they are not out to get me. Though now I am partial to Never give up, Never surrender!
As an aside when one crashes a plane it is probably not good to say “I know what I am doing”. I think from a legal prospective that indicate intent. Just saying.