AOPA Pilot Magazine - November 2011 - 32

LICENSETOLEARN

BY ROD MACHADO

Predict the future for pleasure

viation is an enterprise whose front end is loaded with warnings, caveats, regulation, and a dizzying supply of do’s and don’ts (mostly don’ts).

their logbooks thicken, understand that they are not meteorologists. They’re pilots, and they leave the weather forecasting to those who’ve spent years in school hunched over wet-pseudo-adiabatic-lapserate charts contemplating cloud convection and scoliosis remedies. A pilot certificate doesn’t make you a meteorologist, nor does it make you a scheduled airline. But some pilots act like it does, at least in terms of how they worry about their flight planning. So if you’re a Not even a Houdini can escape this saturation of safety-conscious pilot who wants to enjoy more of safety information. Don’t get me wrong. Safety inforthe pleasures that flying has to offer while diminAviation speaker mation is good, but too much good can be bad. ishing your burden of excessive worry, here’s what and CFI Rod How many times do you think pilots can hear I suggest you do: Learn to predict the future. Machado has a how stalling on final might flatten them out before In regard to the weather, you decide beforehand black belt in tae they stop thinking about the message and focus the conditions in which you will fly. Not anyone else, kwon do. on the flattening? It’s not long before every turn to just you. If you have those conditions, you fly; if you final (or every thought about turning final) has pilots don’t, you won’t. While you can’t predict the weather wondering if they’ll end up as a floor mat in Flatland. with any certainty, you can now predict your behavior with Do all pilots worry this much? No. But those who do typi- 100-percent certainty. Why is this important? As you probably cally are safety conscious. They worry that they might not be remember from basic psychology, one of the greatest sources able to fly as safely as they’d like to. Inasmuch as it’s hard to of stress is an unresolved relationship. That can be a relationenjoy something while simultaneously worrying about it, it’s ship with another person, with the environment, or even with no wonder that some pilots find flying less pleasurable than yourself. If you decide beforehand that you won’t fly unless you they once did. Their aviation safety education has ruined their have certain minimum cloud-base height, visibility, convective buzz. The razz outweighs the pizzazz. index, and so on, then you’ve eliminated a major component You can see how this plays out when pilots prepare for a creating your weather anxiety. Think about it this way: If you cross-country flight. Some begin obsessing about the weather could predict the weather precisely, then you’d know that a parseveral days in advance of a trip. Will I be able to fly with suf- ticular flight would have the safety margins that would make ficient VFR margins? Will there be icing and thunderstorms you relaxed and happy. Since you can’t predict much beyond during this IFR flight? your own behavior, knowing that you won’t fly without these There’s nothing wrong with attempting to understand same safety margins should make you equally relaxed and weather trends. Worrying about Mother Nature’s behavior a happy. As far as your mind is concerned, it’s the same thing. If you have an overactive worry gland (called a brain) that’s few days in advance of a trip, however, has absolutely no influence on what she actually does on departure day. When pilots keeping you from having as much fun as you deserve in an airfinally arrive at the airport to fly, whatever reserves of pleasure plane, then use this strategy for nearly everything you worry they had accumulated in anticipation of the trip are deflated, about. If you’re concerned about the mechanical condition of diminished, and depleted. What a buzz killer. an airplane on departure day, then predict how you’ll behave on An unfortunate byproduct of being a safety-conscious pilot is that day. Decide beforehand the minimum acceptable condithat someone might become a worry-burdened pilot. Of course, tion for the airplane you’ll fly. For example, commit to not flying not all worry is bad. If you’re flying your amateur-built, Experi- an airplane if 5 percent of the panel consists of instruments mental Weevil at night while low on fuel over a place with a and the other 95 percent is inoperative labels. If you’re worried scary name such as Death Valley, then worry is good. It’s good about crosswinds, commit to not flying that day if the crosswind because your worry might compel you to act sensibly by man- component is more than your maximum. Catch my drift? This technique is a one-size-fits-all formula for helping you ning up and gassing up—although I’ve flown over that area and it’s possible you might end up flying through the valley of death worry less about the things you can’t control (clouds, crosswhere you shall fuel no Weevil. winds, and maintenance) while allowing you to manage those Most of the time, however, worrying is bad. It accomplishes things within your power to predict and control (how you’ll very little while increasing our anxiety. While your aviation behave on departure day). So maximize your buzz thrill and safety training might compel you to worry, it’s your accumu- avoid the buzz kill. lated wisdom that tells you whether or not worrying actually matters. That’s why experienced pilots, who’ve grown wise as Visit the author’s blog (www.rodmachado.com). 32 • NOVEMBER
2011

AOPA PILOT •

http://www.rodmachado.com

AOPA Pilot Magazine - November 2011

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