New Documentary on JFK Jr. Accident

With the hood on, my guy would make me look down and then it was like a rollercoaster ride, tossing the plane (and me) all about, then having me look up and recover on instruments.
Which instruments? And what indications drive which actions?

As for the rollercoaster ride...well okay, on the other hand the one "g" stuff can be very deceptive.
 
I can imagine once the aircraft enters an unusual attitude the instrument readings must be very difficult to understand.

For me, unusual attitude training each year has never gotten me disoriented to the point of misunderstanding the instruments.

I think spatial D to occur happens on a unique set of conditions. In my case, it was a descending right turn and a rapid head movement up and left. I was so confused, I wasn't sure what to do with the controls to make the AI and DG do what I wanted them to do. Don't know if I fell back on my training by "delay intuitive action" but I just let go of the controls for maybe 10 secs. My head was spinning so bad that I thought any input I might do would probably make matters worse anyway. After about 30 secs, I got back into the game and realized I was indeed in a right 15 degree descending turn. Then began to piece together specifics about headings, altitudes, freq change, MAP, etc. Debilitating for sure.

We always hear "trust the instruments" but if it were as simple as trusting the instruments, we'd never have any spatial D accidents at all. It's more about proper interpretation than a basic trust.
 
I can imagine once the aircraft enters an unusual attitude the instrument readings must be very difficult to understand.
It doesn't seem so to me as long as the instruments are all working. If there's something wrong with one or more of the instruments so that they disagree with each other, then it gets dicey, and there are protocols that are taught for the purpose of determining which instruments are working and which have failed.

Partial panel unusual attitude recovery is challenging, and has a protocol as well. What I was taught for recovery when the attitude indicator has failed is that if the airspeed is higher than normal, you're nose low and you need to stop the turn (and pull back on the throttle) before raising the nose. If the airspeed is lower than normal, then you need to lower the nose before stopping the turn.
 
In my case, I had gotten into the unusual attitude while fiddling with the avionics. When I looked up, I saw a cloud bank at a crazy angle, and a highway with a line of headlights that my mind insisted on (incorrectly) interpreting as the horizon. The solution was to force myself to ignore what I saw outside and rely on the attitude indicator.
 
Somewhere up above someone mentioned the the AP disconnect and the PTT switches are close and it is possible he turned off the AP trying to use the PTT. I fly a 1980 Saratoga that other than being fixed gear is the same plane he was in. Yes the switches are close. I have over 100 hours in my Toga and still occasionally look down and have to think about which switch I want. I have certainly kicked off the AP a few times over the hours trying to key the mic.

That being said you can generally feel a pretty decent "wiggle" in the plane when you do it. I have a hard time believing it would go unnoticed.
 
I'm one of those instructors who used to use wild maneuvers to disorient a hooded student. No relation to any real-life situation, of course. When I got older and wiser I just let the student fly with the hood on while performing normal maneuvers such as climbs, descents, and turns, using his/her bodily senses for orientation. Result was the same...loss of control in a very short time...but the lesson was learned.

Bob
 
I'm one of those instructors who used to use wild maneuvers to disorient a hooded student. No relation to any real-life situation, of course. When I got older and wiser I just let the student fly with the hood on while performing normal maneuvers such as climbs, descents, and turns, using his/her bodily senses for orientation. Result was the same...loss of control in a very short time...but the lesson was learned.

I absolutely hate it when an instructor wants me to fly myself into an unusual attitude. With the Lightspeed headset I can keep an aircraft relatively level by listening to wind, engine, and prop noise. Can't hold heading... oh well. Anyway we can fly a long time and accomplish nothing. As a result when an instructor sez close your eyes or look down and fly the plane I just pull up into an unusual attitude then recover. The instructor is left fuming and I just say that I don't like that particular exercise. It almost never goes over well.
 
I can imagine once the aircraft enters an unusual attitude the instrument readings must be very difficult to understand.
But the ability to do so is something that should be developed during instrument training. I believe that unusual attitude recovery under the hood is one of the items on the old PTS and my DPE definitely tested me on it on my instrument checkride; not sure if it's on the ACS.
 
But the ability to do so is something that should be developed during instrument training. I believe that unusual attitude recovery under the hood is one of the items on the old PTS and my DPE definitely tested me on it on my instrument checkride; not sure if it's on the ACS.

It still is there.

"Use proper instrument cross-check and interpretation to identify an unusual attitude (including both nose-high and nose-low), and apply the appropriate pitch, bank, and power corrections, in the correct sequence, to return to a stabilized level flight attitude."
 
Help me understand. I have not flown in IMC. I have flown a lot at night and gotten the leaning sensation of feeling that I am flying cockeyed somehow.

The first time it happened, I right away moved my eyes to the AI and flew that thing until it went away.
For folks that spin it in (like this JFK fella), is the problem that the bodys' lies are so overwhelmingly strong that they don't believe the instruments?
I think there are two big issues at play.
1) Spatial disorientation is a ***** the first few times you get it. Every sense in your body that has kept you alive up to that point in your life is yelling at you that you are F'ed and going to die if you don't listen to it. Unfortunately, it is wrong and is going to kill you if you don't immediately get on the instruments, properly interpret them and fly through it.
2) This pertains primarily to traditional (especially vacuum) gyros. You have been taught that when they fail, it is usually slowly. So now people can and have trick F'ed their minds to think this tumbling left gyro is not real because your trusty senses are saying you are straight and level. In today's world, we have really good (relatively cheap) avionics that make this event almost completely unavailable. i.e. Garmin G500/600, EFD 1000, Garmin G5, Dynon, etc. Not to say those are fail-proof but their presentations and the way they fail make things safer in my opinion.
 
2) This pertains primarily to traditional (especially vacuum) gyros. You have been taught that when they fail, it is usually slowly. So now people can and have trick F'ed their minds to think this tumbling left gyro is not real because your trusty senses are saying you are straight and level. In today's world, we have really good (relatively cheap) avionics that make this event almost completely unavailable. i.e. Garmin G500/600, EFD 1000, Garmin G5, Dynon, etc. Not to say those are fail-proof but their presentations and the way they fail make things safer in my opinion.
How do you think they fail to make things safer?
 
This would probably be something to talk about on the ground, rather than after the fact.
Lol. Sure bubba. Ya might wanna think that one through before throwing out such moronic advise.
 
Yeah, I deleted the post, figuring you're as big an a-hole in real life as you are here.
If pointing out the fact that your advise is moronic makes me an a-hole in your eyes then so be it. HTH and HAND
 
How do you think they fail to make things safer?
Maybe the following sentence was written poorly. I did all my schooling in GA :)

"Not to say those are fail-proof but their presentations and the way they fail make things safer in my opinion."

I was trying to say that the way the new AI's fail compared to the old vacuum ones, makes things safer in my opinion.
 
Maybe the following sentence was written poorly. I did all my schooling in GA :)

"Not to say those are fail-proof but their presentations and the way they fail make things safer in my opinion."

I was trying to say that the way the new AI's fail compared to the old vacuum ones, makes things safer in my opinion.
And that's my question...what failure mode do you think they have that's safer?
 
I'm one of those instructors who used to use wild maneuvers to disorient a hooded student. No relation to any real-life situation, of course. When I got older and wiser I just let the student fly with the hood on while performing normal maneuvers such as climbs, descents, and turns, using his/her bodily senses for orientation. Result was the same...loss of control in a very short time...but the lesson was learned.

The most eye-opening demonstration I've ever had for disorientation came not from an instructor jerking the plane around wildly as most seem to do, but rather exactly what you describe.

1. Put your head down so you can't see the instruments.
2. Right turn
3. Level out
4. Left turn
5. Level out.
6. Look up

Sure enough, we were in a climbing left turn with our airspeed rapidly decreasing.

It took about 5 years after getting my PPL for an instructor to do this method and it definitely drove the point home in a manner no other instructor had managed. After that, spatial disorientation become something real and tangible, not just something you read about.

I still have friends that haven't experienced this and though they know the concept, the don't fully believe that you really can end up in a situation like that.

___________________________

Switching subjects now, a few years back I was flying over middle of nowhere Oklahoma at night with a broken-overcast layer at 10,000 feet. At one point where they sky was more overcast than broken I looked around and noticed that my only ground reference point was a single light from a farmhouse off my left wing-tip. My body kept telling me I was flying straight and level, but my instruments had me continually in a slight left bank.

Luckily it didn't take long before a few more lights appeared on the horizon, but it was nonetheless an interesting experience.
 
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For folks that spin it in (like this JFK fella), is the problem that the bodys' lies are so overwhelmingly strong that they don't believe the instruments?

It's strong. @jesse got me to a point (at night, no moon, no possible way to "cheat") during instrument training where I leaned hard into my door for 10-15 minutes while managing to keep the airplane upright and going wherever we wanted it to go, but the body thought we were banked... so I let the body lean into the door and forced the eyeballs and rational part of the brain handle the flying part.

For the first 30 seconds of it, you bank the airplane to remove the lean, then bank it back to make the AI level, and back and forth until you determinedly make a decision that the AI is correct and the lean is wrong.

Someone without any training or practice in that, at night, over water with no lights and no real horizon? Dead meat flying.

Get yer instrument ticket 6PC. You own an airplane so it is time.

This.

Does PTS still exist? Has ACS taken over all?

Anyway, teaching unusual attitude recovery wasn't something my instructors seemed to be good at. One very brief lesson from a DPE (not part of a checkride) fixed that little item.

ACS for Private and Commercial, PTS for all CFI stuff and ATP still... it'll be a while before ACS has taken over all.

That's sad that CFIs couldn't teach that. I was required to demo exactly how I would teach that on my initial CFI ride.
 
And that's my question...what failure mode do you think they have that's safer?

The original wording of his post was poor but I did interpret it to mean how he later clarified.

I happen to agree. An EFIS (electric AI) is either working or not. It's telling you the truth or it has a red x or something comparable. A vacuum AI will slowly tilt as the gyro spins down. If you haven't noticed the vacuum failure you may just follow that tilt all the way into a bad situation. As pilots we know vacuum pumps can and will eventually fail... I think his point was that in the event of spatial disorientation it would be much easier to convince ourselves that the vacuum and/or AI was wrong and we should follow our "feeling". With electronic AI's they go from good to failure in an instant and should be easy to tell when that happens. For example I have a garmin G5 AI and an IFD550 that has full glass panel SV. I also have my vacuum AI that is needed for the century AP. If I start experiencing SD I can look at the G5 and IFD 550 and if they agree on attitude then I should be pretty confident in which way it up or down.

Also, FWIW many of the EFIS instruments simply display the "landscape" much better than an old vacuum AI, especially those with SV. That added realism is very helpful. I love putting my IFD 550 on SV mode when shooting final approaches. The subtle changes and corrections are so much easier when able to "see" the airport.

Maybe I'm not reading it correctly though?
 
And that's my question...what failure mode do you think they have that's safer?

My reason is exactly what @arkvet posted.

The original wording of his post was poor but I did interpret it to mean how he later clarified.

I happen to agree. An EFIS (electric AI) is either working or not. It's telling you the truth or it has a red x or something comparable. A vacuum AI will slowly tilt as the gyro spins down. If you haven't noticed the vacuum failure you may just follow that tilt all the way into a bad situation. As pilots we know vacuum pumps can and will eventually fail... I think his point was that in the event of spatial disorientation it would be much easier to convince ourselves that the vacuum and/or AI was wrong and we should follow our "feeling". With electronic AI's they go from good to failure in an instant and should be easy to tell when that happens. For example I have a garmin G5 AI and an IFD550 that has full glass panel SV. I also have my vacuum AI that is needed for the century AP. If I start experiencing SD I can look at the G5 and IFD 550 and if they agree on attitude then I should be pretty confident in which way it up or down.

Also, FWIW many of the EFIS instruments simply display the "landscape" much better than an old vacuum AI, especially those with SV. That added realism is very helpful. I love putting my IFD 550 on SV mode when shooting final approaches. The subtle changes and corrections are so much easier when able to "see" the airport.

Maybe I'm not reading it correctly though?

You nailed it.
 
The original wording of his post was poor but I did interpret it to mean how he later clarified.

I happen to agree. An EFIS (electric AI) is either working or not. It's telling you the truth or it has a red x or something comparable.

I've seen "solid state" instrument show wacky things without giving the "X". Don't be so sure the failure mode will be one that will always give an indication that the instrument has failed.
 
I'm one of those instructors who used to use wild maneuvers to disorient a hooded student. No relation to any real-life situation, of course. When I got older and wiser I just let the student fly with the hood on while performing normal maneuvers such as climbs, descents, and turns, using his/her bodily senses for orientation. Result was the same...loss of control in a very short time...but the lesson was learned.

Bob
That's just cruel and down right mean...... :D
 
I've seen "solid state" instrument show wacky things without giving the "X". Don't be so sure the failure mode will be one that will always give an indication that the instrument has failed.

Point taken! which is why I would hate to be in a situation where I had to trust any one single AI or group of instruments that were all supported by a common link (vacuum for example). I mentioned I have an IFD550 and a G5. Being independent to each other makes the probability of them failing together nearly impossible. In the event of the slightest disorientation I am programmed to instantly hit the SV button on my IFD550. Of course having a G500 of Dynon Skytrax would be even better but that's not what I've got. Interestingly the AI that drives my AP is the one I trust the least (vacuum), but it is nice to have 3 independent AI's on the panel.
 
It's strong. @jesse got me to a point (at night, no moon, no possible way to "cheat") during instrument training where I leaned hard into my door for 10-15 minutes while managing to keep the airplane upright and going wherever we wanted it to go, but the body thought we were banked... so I let the body lean into the door and forced the eyeballs and rational part of the brain handle the flying part.
Not long after the JFK Jr accident, I was running a Young Eagles event at the local airport. One of the parents asked me about it, and I told him about vertigo and disorientation.

"But doesn't he have gauges that tell him the right way up?"

"Yes, but too often, a pilot's brain just won't let him believe them."

To this day, I remember how the guy just wouldn't believe me, that anyone would pay more attention to their own senses than the God-Gauges.

Ron Wanttaja
 
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My reason is exactly what @arkvet posted.
That's what I figured you were thinking, but I wanted to confirm...as @denverpilot indicated, the only things that result in a red X are things that the engineers/programmers think of and are within the development budget.

There are any number of failure modes that can result in erroneous information on the EFIS without it flagging itself. That's one of the reasons when you get into two-pilot airplane's with dual "everything", they include comparators that flag if the two sides are different by some predetermined value.

Granted, the Garmin stuff is at least 20 years newer than what I'm working with, but a friend of mine is flying the "latest and greatest" Garmin and has told me that Garmin isn't aware of the capabilities of their system. If they're not aware of what it will do, I can't imagine them being aware of all the ways it can fail.
 
Point taken! which is why I would hate to be in a situation where I had to trust any one single AI or group of instruments that were all supported by a common link (vacuum for example). I mentioned I have an IFD550 and a G5. Being independent to each other makes the probability of them failing together nearly impossible. In the event of the slightest disorientation I am programmed to instantly hit the SV button on my IFD550. Of course having a G500 of Dynon Skytrax would be even better but that's not what I've got. Interestingly the AI that drives my AP is the one I trust the least (vacuum), but it is nice to have 3 independent AI's on the panel.
Just make sure you follow the right one...here's an accident where they followed the wrong one of three into the ground. :(

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20160108-0
 
That's what I figured you were thinking, but I wanted to confirm...as @denverpilot indicated, the only things that result in a red X are things that the engineers/programmers think of and are within the development budget.

There are any number of failure modes that can result in erroneous information on the EFIS without it flagging itself. That's one of the reasons when you get into two-pilot airplane's with dual "everything", they include comparators that flag if the two sides are different by some predetermined value.

Granted, the Garmin stuff is at least 20 years newer than what I'm working with, but a friend of mine is flying the "latest and greatest" Garmin and has told me that Garmin isn't aware of the capabilities of their system. If they're not aware of what it will do, I can't imagine them being aware of all the ways it can fail.
Good points with the failures of EFIS. I agree that they, as all things, are subject to failure. I have spent good money to try to give me as much opportunity as possible to have redundant systems. I have a Garmin G5, a Vacuum AI, electric T&B, and a GTX345 with built in AHRS that bluetooths to my foreflight to give an emergency EFIS with synthetic vision.

As you mention, you have to have a good understanding of your system and a good scan/interpretation to ensure you don't let any failures bring you to the ground or cause an in-flight break up.

Thanks for the accident link. That is a good learning reminder to not put all your eggs in one basket.
 
I've never been close to SD so I have no idea how I'd react. I'd like to think that I'd never take my eyes off the instruments. I can't imagine the horror I'd feel in a situation with conflicting instruments.
 
I've never been close to SD so I have no idea how I'd react. I'd like to think that I'd never take my eyes off the instruments. I can't imagine the horror I'd feel in a situation with conflicting instruments.
Unfortunately most airplane's/instructors don't have the capability to make an instrument incorrect...all we can do is cover it up or fail it*. That's why it's important to regularly review some instrument malfunction scenarios, along with Primary/Supporting instrument combinations**, so you have the best chance of dealing with the malfunction.

*Some creative instructors might be able to cover the AI with a nice picture of an AI in some wonky attitude, or things like that.

**I disagree with the FAA...Primary/Supporting and Control/Performance are not two different methods for flying instruments. Control/Performance is how you normally fly. Primary/Supporting is how you interpret and troubleshoot instrument indications.
 
I wonder if it would be accurate to say it's the maritime version of whiteout?

Even without the rating, anyone signed off to fly solo ought to at least know how to use an artificial horizon wouldn't you think? And not having the sense to turn on the autopilot . . . or maybe he didn't have the sense to even know he was disoriented? Looks to me like another very common instance of someone thinking they ought to own an airplane just because they have enough money to buy one. If that's all true, the mystery is why he didn't own a Cirrus. I guess they weren't on the market yet.
 
Even without the rating, anyone signed off to fly solo ought to at least know how to use an artificial horizon wouldn't you think? And not having the sense to turn on the autopilot . . . or maybe he didn't have the sense to even know he was disoriented? Looks to me like another very common instance of someone thinking they ought to own an airplane just because they have enough money to buy one. If that's all true, the mystery is why he didn't own a Cirrus. I guess they weren't on the market yet.

Simulated instrument flight is not required prior to solo, though many instructors and syllabi do at least one flight of it before solo anyway. It is required before solo cross-country.

The Cirrus did not come out until at least a year after JFK Jr.'s death.
 
Just make sure you follow the right one...here's an accident where they followed the wrong one of three into the ground. :(

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20160108-0

I had a very similar situation happen this past winter, although not to the degree they had. Climbing out of 280, the FOs (which was me at the time) PFD had some sort of issue and showed us in a 15 degree climb, where the CA and standby showed us in the normal 2-3 degree climb. Even that slight amount really messed with your head.
 
I wonder if it would be accurate to say it's the maritime version of whiteout?

Even without the rating, anyone signed off to fly solo ought to at least know how to use an artificial horizon wouldn't you think? And not having the sense to turn on the autopilot . . . or maybe he didn't have the sense to even know he was disoriented? Looks to me like another very common instance of someone thinking they ought to own an airplane just because they have enough money to buy one. If that's all true, the mystery is why he didn't own a Cirrus. I guess they weren't on the market yet.

Seems a bit of a harsh indictment.

He seems to have worked pretty diligently at advancing his skills. He had his PPL for barely one year but had logged more than 300 hours total time, a fair bit of that dual instruction and had passed the instrument written shortly before the accident. Got himself into a situation the forecasts for VFR didn't really reveal. Lots of pilots with more experience than him have ripped apart airplanes after becoming spatially disoriented. But the fact he had replaced a 182 with the retract Saratoga not long before probably didn't help matters, as I'm sure it accelerated much faster as things started to go wrong.
 
I had a very similar situation happen this past winter, although not to the degree they had. Climbing out of 280, the FOs (which was me at the time) PFD had some sort of issue and showed us in a 15 degree climb, where the CA and standby showed us in the normal 2-3 degree climb. Even that slight amount really messed with your head.

That can be pretty insidious. There's a belief among some that these glass screens either work perfectly or go black. But that wouldn't appear to be true based on what you have told us here?

I have a recollection of reading about a high performance Lancair accident a couple of years ago where it was concluded that the AHRS was showing the plane wings level when it was actually in a modest bank. The pilot entered IMC shortly after lift-off and then flew it in a long wide arc into the terrain, all the while the instrument apparently indicating he was climbing straight.
 
Unfortunately most airplane's/instructors don't have the capability to make an instrument incorrect...all we can do is cover it up or fail it*. That's why it's important to regularly review some instrument malfunction scenarios, along with Primary/Supporting instrument combinations**, so you have the best chance of dealing with the malfunction.

*Some creative instructors might be able to cover the AI with a nice picture of an AI in some wonky attitude, or things like that.

**I disagree with the FAA...Primary/Supporting and Control/Performance are not two different methods for flying instruments. Control/Performance is how you normally fly. Primary/Supporting is how you interpret and troubleshoot instrument indications.

This is one area where a GOOD simulator can be a benefit. Many can simulate an instrument misbehaving.

That can be pretty insidious. There's a belief among some that these glass screens either work perfectly or go black. But that wouldn't appear to be true based on what you have told us here?

A friend shared that he's had ALL of the displays drop offline in the 777 more times than he can count.

The AHRS type LCD panel instruments tend to drop out or go into "red X" mode MORE often than showing bad data, but I can't think of a CFI or Commercial pilot I've talked to who has NOT seen a "modern" LCD panel show something completely wrong that makes no sense at all and doesn't match reality.

An old tech spinning gyro will fail. The new tech motion sensor chip was the cheapest part that met spec for the FAA direct from China and a mass assembly line in a building with safety nets around it catch suicidal workers jumping from the roof after the western press caught wind of the first few going splat.

Maybe you got a good one. Maybe you got one that the QC was done by the guy or gal who was thinking about jumping off the roof all day.

(The well known story of the suicidal workers is from an Apple iPhone assembler, but I seriously doubt the low production avionics assembly lines are a whole lot better when it comes to quality of life. I dunno. Ask Garmin if the plant they use has suicide nets hanging from the outside of the building.)

I do know this. That motion sensor driving that computer generated (read: Everything has bugs in software that aren't caught by the manufacturer OR the FAA certification process or your avionics guy wouldn't be calling saying you need to come in and reflash the units every couple of years...) was built by the lowest bidder when Garmin sent out the RFQ.

Do not ever blindly trust ANY instrument. They're all machines, whether physically rotating gyroscopes or acceleration sensors in chip packages sending voltages to a microprocessor running buggy code.

I'd say anecdotally yes. They go black or show a failure more often than they show bad data, but they do show bad data once in a while. When it happens VMC, no harm. When it happens IMC or worse, IMC on an approach -- things can get confusing and bad real quick.

Cross checking occasionally with the redundancy backups is likely to save your butt someday if you've ingrained the habit. If you haven't built that habit, you might follow bad information until your erroneous aircraft control inputs have put you into a situation where the airplane is going into the ground before you can figure out the problem and ignore the bad data displayed.

Instruments are guilty until proven innocent by their friends.
 
Help me understand. I have not flown in IMC. I have flown a lot at night and gotten the leaning sensation of feeling that I am flying cockeyed somehow.

The first time it happened, I right away moved my eyes to the AI and flew that thing until it went away.
For folks that spin it in (like this JFK fella), is the problem that the bodys' lies are so overwhelmingly strong that they don't believe the instruments?

I am not trying to trivialize something that kills pilots but it seems to me if something seems off, there is a ton if information on your panel.

@BrianNC you said no way you would have survived w/o CFI there. Is it not as simple as just flying the AI / TC to do a 180 the other direction?

I totally get the lack of horizon messing up my equilibrium and causing confusion. Barring inst. failure in IMC, what is it that keeps people from keeping the plane in a level attitude with instruments?

I'll try to help.


The sky is overcast and the visibility poor. That reported 5-mile visibility looks more like two, and you can’t judge the height of the overcast. Your altimeter says you’re at 1500 but your map tells you there’s local terrain as high as 1200 feet. There might even be a tower nearby because you’re not sure just how far off course you are. But you’ve flown into worse weather than this, so you press on.

You find yourself unconsciously easing back just a bit on the controls to clear those non-too-imaginary towers. With no warning, you’re in the soup. You peer so hard into the milky white mist that your eyes hurt. You fight the feeling in your stomach. You swallow, only to find your mouth dry. Now you realize you should have waited for better weather. The appointment was important—but not that important. Somewhere, a voice is saying “You’ve had it—it’s all over!”.

Your aircraft feels in an even keel but your compass turns slowly. You push a little rudder and add a little pressure on the controls to stop the turn but this feels unnatural and you return the controls to their original position. This feels better but your compass in now turning a little faster and your airspeed is increasing slightly. You scan your instrument panel for help but what you see looks somewhat unfamiliar. You’re sure this is just a bad spot. You’ll break out in a few minutes. (But you don’t have several minutes left...) You glance at your altimeter and are shocked to see it unwinding. You’re already down to 1200 feet. Instinctively, you pull back on the controls but the altimeter still unwinds. The engine is into the red—and the airspeed, nearly so.

Now you’re sweating and shaking. There must be something wrong with the controls; pulling back only moves that airspeed indicator further into the red. You can hear the wind tearing at the aircraft.

Suddenly, you see the ground. The trees rush up at you. You can see the horizon if you turn your head far enough but it’s at an unusual angle—you’re almost inverted. You open your mouth to scream but...
 
That can be pretty insidious. There's a belief among some that these glass screens either work perfectly or go black. But that wouldn't appear to be true based on what you have told us here?

I have a recollection of reading about a high performance Lancair accident a couple of years ago where it was concluded that the AHRS was showing the plane wings level when it was actually in a modest bank. The pilot entered IMC shortly after lift-off and then flew it in a long wide arc into the terrain, all the while the instrument apparently indicating he was climbing straight.

It momentarily went blank, but then when it came back, it was that far off.
 
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