NTSB recommendation on failed checkrides

[skiddriver]

Interesting NTSB recommendation for the FAA on the use of failed checkrides in the 121 / 135 hiring process.

http://www.ntsb.gov/recs/letters/2005/A05_01_02.pdf

 

[GEUAviator]

Could Have Some Merit

Very interesting.

I knew a CFI who, in my opinion, should have never been allowed to exercise those privileges. Multiple checkride failures, termination from one flight school, etc. He was an absolutely horrible CFI and pilot. It was "just a matter of time" before he had an accident and/or incident.

Well, one day he and a student crashed a Cessna in the desert. Luckily, both survived. I have it on a good source that he had his CFI revoked. Not sure about his commercial privileges. Thank God!

This recommendation by the NTSB will be met with some resistance (probably from AOPA and the like), but in the case of the fellow above, it could prevent a possible disaster. A trend of checkride failures has to imply something.

Any thoughts?

 

[FN FAL]

Very interesting.

Any thoughts?

Yea...I think they should be able to go back and yank the certificates of any instructors that signed those guys off for check rides and then go back one level further and yank the certificates of the instructors that signed them off as well. Should nip the problem right in the bud.

Basically the rule could read something like this...

Student gets a fail on a check ride, he gets additional training and then a re-ride. Student then fails the re-ride and then sits out for 30 days. Student gets retrained then fails the third ride...so then his CFI gets his tickets pulled, along with whoever signed him off for his rides, as well as the examiner that did the questionable rides for both CFI's.

I can live with that type of set up. It would definitely cull the herd down a bit, plus there would be an incentive to give good training.

 

[FJP3]

I do agree that taking a checkride for a cert of rating multiple times is not the best senario. But there are other factors as well.

Who you are taking it from. Any checkpilot can fail anyone for anything on any given day. Some Checkpilots have an attitude like they are god...especially in the Embry-Riddle System.

Are you a good test taker. Do you get nervous, stressed, let problems snowball.

Environmental factors...for my CFI checkride the airport was using the common use runway, with a tailwind...try sticking a shortfield landing on a point with a tailwind...its harder than you think. I ended up getting them to let me turn around and use the opposite runway which I passed.

 

[TIGV]

Wtf ?

Are you a good test taker. Do you get nervous, stressed, let problems snowball.

Errm, well seeing as we will be doing this stuff every 6 months or so for the rest of our flying, one had better get used to it and not let stuff snowball yah ???

 

[mattpilot]

Do you get nervous, stressed, let problems snowball.

I'd hope that a pilot better be able to excercise good judgement under such conditions, bucause those are exactly the conditions you will be finding yourself under in an emergency.

 

[FR8mastr]

That could be a real slippery slope. Yes it will weed out the idiots, but what airline will hire somebody that failed a checkride 15 years ago for whatever reason when there are others out that did not have that one bad day. Or better yet the others were not even flying 15 years ago.

 

[apcooper]

Mattpilot hit the nail right on the head. You'd better be able to deal with and overcome the nervousness associated with checkrides because if you ever have to deal with an engine failure over hostile terrain at night in a single (or even a twin) you'd better not panic and know what to do. If you are faced with this, nervousness from a checkride will seem like a complete blessing!!

About six months ago I took a very good looking girl from work up while I got some dual in a 172 under the hood. Up until about an hour before takeoff I was SO WORRIED that I would fly like mush because a lot was at stake. This was at least as nerve-wracking than any checkride too. As it turns out, I was as calm as could be the entire flight. 3 days before, this was inconcievable. Everything went perfectly except Providence App was very busy, as much as ORD or JFK and almost had to turn down our request for a VFR practice app! The lesson learned is things almost always are expected to be worse than they usually are.

 

[FJP3]

Exactly the point...but Shiat happens on a daily basis...to not pass a checkride or rating on the 2nd try is just pathetic...there should be no excuse.

 

[FN FAL]

Exactly the point...but Shiat happens on a daily basis...to not pass a checkride or rating on the 2nd try is just pathetic...there should be no excuse.

You are correct...and the CFI's that signed these people off should put on a rail and run out of town, and so should the CFI's that signed them off.

To tell you the truth, CFI's should have to have a minimum of 2,500 hours and at least an associate degree of any kind. This industry is ass backwards.

The fact that low time pilots build time teaching other future pilots is a farce of the system and this should be rectified...it amounts to the blind leading the blind and that is why there is fail rates and people busting rides.

 

[FN FAL]

Mattpilot hit the nail right on the head. You'd better be able to deal with and overcome the nervousness associated with checkrides because if you ever have to deal with an engine failure over hostile terrain at night in a single (or even a twin) you'd better not panic and know what to do.

Actually, these are two different things. Lots of people pass check rides and fail at the moment of truth...the NTSB files are full of this.

Lots of other people are nervous at checkrides and fly the plane very well.

You're talking apples and oranges and yes, I have been on both sides of that fence.

 

[mattpilot]

To tell you the truth, CFI's should have to have a minimum of 2,500 hours and at least an associate degree of any kind. This industry is ass backwards.

But how would one build time to get a job then? ARe you promoting PFT?

 

[FN FAL]

But how would one build time to get a job then? ARe you promoting PFT?

Negative...since when do you have to be a CFI to build time. It's like you are saying, "hey, I got 250 hours...I am a skygod, I think I'll teach people how to fly!"

If you want to build time and in that process of building time you sign people off for checkrides they shouldn't be going to, you should be sued untill your parents have to sell their Beemers to buy a Ford Focus.

Build time however you want...but realize the reason people are failing check ride after check ride, is because some dim wit keeps signing them off.

 

[PCL_128]

To tell you the truth, CFI's should have to have a minimum of 2,500 hours and at least an associate degree of any kind. This industry is ass backwards.

Well, I don't know about the degree since I happen to agree with pilotyip about that, but you're dead on about needing more experience to be an instructor. The idea that the pilots with the LEAST experience are teaching people how to fly is utterly ridiculous. How can we expect pilots that have barely flown actual IMC to teach instrument students? That's how things work now, and it makes no sense. Time building should be done by flying checks in the middle of the night in bad weather in an old Cessna 210. Using instructing to build time is a major fault in our system.

 

[FN FAL]

Well, I don't know about the degree since I happen to agree with pilotyip about that, but you're dead on about needing more experience to be an instructor. The idea that the pilots with the LEAST experience are teaching people how to fly is utterly ridiculous. How can we expect pilots that have barely flown actual IMC to teach instrument students? That's how things work now, and it makes no sense. Time building should be done by flying checks in the middle of the night in bad weather in an old Cessna 210. Using instructing to build time is a major fault in our system.

My posts are not meant to be a stint against instructors...belive me, I was thrown from the frying pan, into the fire myself. With 500 hours and my CFII, I was teaching at a 10 day instrument place and I had to be called into the office by the owner. Guess what he told me..."We are not training 'Brain Surgeons' here!"

I couldn't freaking believe it.

I never had a fail at that place, but my roomate had to duck the toss of the FAR/AIM once, during a "confrence". Seems that my roomie kept telling him things were coming along, but at the end of ten days they weren't. My roomie refused to sign the guy off, that resulted in conference between him, the owner and the student. Next thing you know, the student is throwing an FAR/AIM at him.

That's kind of funny, because I had a 10 day instrument student brandish a pistol on me...I gave him the owner's personal home phone number and told him to take it over there.

Let's take a poll, how many people here on the board who have CFI tickets, ever had a student brandish a pistol on them?

 

[PropsForward]

Yea...I think they should be able to go back and yank the certificates of any instructors that signed those guys off for check rides and then go back one level further and yank the certificates of the instructors that signed them off as well. Should nip the problem right in the bud.

Basically the rule could read something like this...

Student gets a fail on a check ride, he gets additional training and then a re-ride. Student then fails the re-ride and then sits out for 30 days. Student gets retrained then fails the third ride...so then his CFI gets his tickets pulled, along with whoever signed him off for his rides, as well as the examiner that did the questionable rides for both CFI's.

I can live with that type of set up. It would definitely cull the herd down a bit, plus there would be an incentive to give good training.

The South Carolina FSDO has this policy. If your student fails twice, it is an automatic 709 ride for the CFI. The problem is that everybody knows this so if a student fails, the instructor quits. The student finds another CFI and fails, that CFI quits. See the trend. You either got a student jumping around to different CFI's for his rating, or you have a student that makes a bonehead screwup, and is denied his second chance because the CFI does not want to take the risk of a 709 ride.

In the end everybody looses because you have bad CFI's dodging the bullet, and you have good students not getting a return on their invesment over a simple mistake. And a whole lot of grey in between.

 

[FJP3]

Never had a pistol brandished...I was one of those young flight instructors...I had my CFI at 250 and my II at 260.

I have made mistakes, have failed a few checkrides. Everyone does. That was like the owner/chief pilot at the FBO I work, who (had never had a student fail) well that streak ended because he didnt know he had a copy of an airworthiness cert in a plane. But, another examiner passed 3-4 PPL applicants in the same plane.

Simply said, some folks understand characteristics of flying. I have a degree that I can honestly use on a day to day basis...but I also make mistakes too. But the minute I became responsible for someone else, how they learn, and what they take with them...250 hours or 500...that didnt make a difference

Saying a CFI should have more time is a good arguement...but I think if you were gonna make the arguement it should be for the Commercial rating requirements higher

my .02

 

[mattpilot]

I agree with you FN FAL that instructors should be required to have more experience (edit: i myself suffered from it), but my point is, how would all these airline pilot wannabe's build time if they can't instruct? I'll pull a number out of my arse and say 80% of time building is via instructing for the low-time pilot. There are only so much night-freight jobs that will hire you with 250 hours, don't ya think?

 

[PropsForward]

The other problem is that this information is intended to root out severe offenders at the employers discretion. I have heard some employers not hire a person based on the number of traffic tickets he has. Could you imagine what an employer would do with this information. It would turn the industry into a one-strike and you're out. Not cool.

 

[FN FAL]

The other problem is that this information is intended to root out severe offenders at the employers discretion. I have heard some employers not hire a person based on the number of traffic tickets he has. Could you imagine what an employer would do with this information. It would turn the industry into a one-strike and you're out. Not cool.

I think you are close to hitting the nail on the head.

 

[tom1178]

I agree with you FN FAL that instructors should be required to have more experience (edit: i myself suffered from it), but my point is, how would all these airline pilot wannabe's build time if they can't instruct? I'll pull a number out of my arse and say 80% of time building is via instructing for the low-time pilot. There are only so much night-freight jobs that will hire you with 250 hours, don't ya think?

That's why it will never happen, in a perfect world instructor's would all be the most experienced pilots with 2,000 plus hours but it is the way it is for a reason. (although I don't know what the reason is) I haven't even been instructing for a year but I would personally say that I have gotten better at my job every month i fly. It used to bug the heck out of me my first few months of instructing, everytime i finished a flight all I could think about was how or what i could have done differently to better help my students....it still bothers me actually. All you can do is keep improving the product you are offering. I've sent 3 up for their ppl and they all passed their first time so I must be doing something right. It would make me nervous if their was a rule at my local FSDO like there is in SC but the rule is in place for a reason....you never really should sign somebody off until they are truly ready, I've failed one ride before and I was a little disappointed in my instructor because I failed an item that was in the PTS that we never went over but I took most of the blame myself. If a student fails a ride multiple times they may have realized early on in their training that their instructor wasn't very good but a lot of times students aren't going to stand up and blame their instructor for their faults because they'll feel that people will just assume they are using somebody but themselves as an excuse.

 

[Axel]

Let's take a poll, how many people here on the board who have CFI tickets, ever had a student brandish a pistol on them?

I have.

C-210 checkout. Rolling out from a full stop, guy pulls a .45 auto.Left me on the taxiway and disappeared with the plane towards theMexican border. Found the plane 3 weeks later crashed in the CA desertwith new paint and seeds/stems in the carpet.

Not fun, but coulda turned out much worse.

 

[HMR]

To tell you the truth, CFI's should have to have a minimum of 2,500 hours...

Good idea. However, I worked at a large flight school and the best instructors were all the guys and gals with 500-1500hrs. THE ABSOLUTE WORST guys were the ones with 2500hrs+. I've yet to meet a "senior" instructor at a flight school that doesn't have some social disorder that's kept him/her from advancing in their career.

C-210 checkout. Rolling out from a full stop, guy pulls a .45 auto.Left me on the taxiway and disappeared with the plane towards theMexican border.

I was going to come back. Why didn't you tell me you have to switch fuel tanks in the 210?

 

[VFR on Top]

Why aren't CFIs the most experienced teachers possible? Because nobody's willing to pay $80/hr for an instructor. The pilots willing to work for what CFIs are paid don't really have any other options when it comes to flying jobs. Too many people have whored themselves out flying traffic watch for free and whatnot.

 

[nosehair]

That's why it will never happen,

Maybe it will, finally. If the FAA implements this NTSB recommendation, along with the TSA's rules making individual CFI's have to "register" and be "accountable", I think we *may* be working towards a more structured school style.
Inexperienced 250 hour CFI's can indeed be good instructors under the proper SUPERVISION. No young, inexperienced instructor should be out there doin' it on his own. That's the problem. And even at some major flight schools - the new instructor does not get enough supervision and guidance.
"Here! Here's 13 students in various stages of disarray - fly 'em."

Of course it will be more costly. It will promote PROFESSIONALISIM.

 

[apcooper]

2 pilots go to a cocktail party and meet two different cute girls. One girl asks "what to you do for a living?" and guy #1 with 300 hrs says "I'm a pilot." Girl then says "wow, what kind of pilot" he responds "I'm a flight instructor" she says "wow you actually teach people to fly!" Meanwhile, guy #2 with 12,000 hrs, an ATP and a 747 type rating meets the other cutie and she askes "what to you do for a living?" He responds "I'm a pilot." She askes "Wow, what kind of pilot?" He says "I fly freight" She responds "Oh, OK, thats interesting" and then dissappears into the crowd never to be seen again!! How fu#ked up and crazy is that!!

 

[TonyC]

The other problem is that this information is intended to root out severe offenders at the employers discretion. I have heard some employers not hire a person based on the number of traffic tickets he has. Could you imagine what an employer would do with this information. It would turn the industry into a one-strike and you're out. Not cool.

If I'm not mistaken, this information is already available to the employer, and employers may be using it already. There is no information to be gained from this Notice of Diapproval that should not already be on the pilot's application under the question, "Have you ever failed a Checkride?" Remember, we've already discussed THAT question many times. If the applicant omits something that is found in the records check, that would constitute falsification and would be grounds for rejection (pre-hire) or termination (post-hire).

What the proposed rule would do is REQUIRE that the employer obtain any Notices of Disapproval for flight checks for certificates and ratings and to evaluate this information before making a decision about hiring. I think a Part 121 or 135 carrier would be foolish to not do so already. I would think the Insurance Carriers would demand it.


The scary part of this recommendation is the possibilty of establishing a limit on the number of flight checks that an indivual can fail. There are far too many variables in the process to establish a single number beyond which noone may go. One pilot may have had a particularly colored beginning from which he gained valuable lessons and maturity, and is now an outstanding pilot, but only one flight check, one bad day away from the end of his professional career. Another pilot may have been fortunate enough to slide by easy checkrides on his best days and has many checkrides to bust before he's canned. That doesn't make him more fit to hold the job. The two should be looked at individually by the potential employer, without the arbitrary constraint of a number.

 

[Lindy]

Arbitrary & Capricious

Tony C hit the IMPORTANTissue of the NTSB recommendation.

The FAA has been given a *recommendation* by the NTSB to deliver a number of failed checkrides that will prohibit a pilot candidate from being hired by a 14 CFR Part 121 and/or 135 Operator.

This is VERY SERIOUS!!

My question, will the FAA put a clock on the issue? For example, a candidate cannot be considered for employment if the applicant has failed [insert number] of checkrides in the last [insert number] of years. Or will it be once someone has failed X number of checkrides, then that person can never be employed by either a 121 or 135 Operator.

Should the FAA have the power to mandate this hiring practice to private companies? The FAA has the power to designate specific flight time requirements, training requirements, and medical requirements. It would NOT be a stretch to implement this information for failed checkrides and an applicant becoming "un-hireable."

This needs to be discussed.

 

[GogglesPisano]

This is scary stuff, alright. Two pilots apply for a job. One is an intern or someone with an "in" at the hiring dept and is low time. He's only taken 6 or 7 checkrides in his whole career. The other is a seasoned veteran who climbed the ladder the hard way and has 10,000 hours and 20 checkrides under his belt -- but he's failed two.

Any new system has to account for the laws of averages and how many tmes you've been exposed to the checkride process.

Let's not forget that a checkride can be a very subjective process (even though it's not designed to be that way.) And some airlines have a "reputation" for higher bust rates.

 

[nosehair]

This is scary stuff,
Let's not forget that a checkride can be a very subjective process (even though it's not designed to be that way.)

True. Another major "glitch" in our system, along with the newly minted instructors doing the teaching.

However, this may help to clean-up that whole area, too. If a checkride bust has the effect of ruining a career, then student/pilot applicants will demand (via the legal system) a more "objective" evaluation.

This can be done. Just like we need to revise our way of using brand-new instructors without supervision, we need to get rid of those old "do-it-my-way" DE's.