Unusual Unusual attitudes

jimhorner

jimhorner

Line Up and Wait
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Jim Horner
Had my flight review this past Friday. The CFI threw in some under-the-hood unusual attitude recoveries. Now, in the past when I’ve done these, they’ve always followed a similar script — close eyes, chin to chest, hands off the controls, CFI puts the plane into an unusual attitude, then says to recover. Look up, check instruments and recover. No big deal.

For this review, however, the CFI changed that script, and it was kinda freaky. Instead of me releasing the controls to him for him to put the plane into an unusual attitude, he had me continue flying. Close eyes, chin to chest, told me to put the plane into a turn, and then, after a delay, asked me to open eyes, look at the instruments and recover. No biggie with the recovery part, but, wow, even with a well trimmed plane, a blind turn with eyes closed and looking down really put the plane into some wonky situations. I really felt I was doing a good job of entering and holding a level turn. Wrong! Spiral dives were the most common result, but there were some nose high almost stalls also. It was weird. Very uncomfortable feeling knowing that the plane was under my control but with no knowledge of what it was doing. Made me renew my resolve to always have several extra flashlights with fresh batteries if flying in IMC at night. Losing sight of the instruments in those conditions would end very badly.
 
That is a technique I often use, let the pilot put the airplane in the unusual attitude. Works even better at night or during an overcast day when you don't have the sunlight for reference.
 
A very good trick.

Letting the pilot put themselves into the unusual attitude always causes their brain more surprise, and something closer to what one feels when it happens truly inadvertently.

Taking the controls away takes something away from it.

It’s kinda fun to watch eyeballs bug out a little when the pilot who thinks they did a gentle bank level, comes up and sees a steep turn with the nose well down. :)

And so easy. All the instructor has to do is wait.
 
midwestpa24 said:
That is a technique I often use, let the pilot put the airplane in the unusual attitude. Works even better at night or during an overcast day when you don't have the sunlight for reference.
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It was certainly very effective. I can see how it would be even more so in the conditions you describe. I likely was subconsciously using the sunlight coming through my closed eyelids as a reference.
 
jimhorner said:
It was certainly very effective. I can see how it would be even more so in the conditions you describe. I likely was subconsciously using the sunlight coming through my closed eyelids as a reference.
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Sunlight and the resulting heat on a pants leg is also a pretty common way to cheat a little both for unusual attitudes and simulated instrument.

That one is hard to spot and notice if they’re doing it, other than knowing the unusual attitude is taking too long to develop.

But overcast or night... much more difficult to cheat.

“A peek is worth a thousand cross-checks...” as the old joke goes. But anybody doing it knows they’re only harming themselves... because they skipped the hard part where learning happens. :)
 
denverpilot said:
It’s kinda fun to watch eyeballs bug out a little when the pilot who thinks they did a gentle bank level, comes up and sees a steep turn with the nose well down. :)

And so easy. All the instructor has to do is wait.
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Yeah, the first time was a huge surprise. Okaaay, we’re in a nice level turn here, don’t see how this is unusual attitude recovery but okay I’ll humor the guy.... Recover, Lookup and WHAT THE HECK just happened? Nose low, 50+ degree bank, altimeter unwinding, airspeed rapidly increasing, 1500 fpm down and increasing. Yikes!

I was more ready for the next one, but that first one was sure an eye-opener.
 
I like taking private students out over Lake Michigan on a hazy day or hazy night. Don't even need them to close their eyes. It's a real....ahem....eye opener for them and they realize how much they cheat when they use view limiting devices. Usually about 10-15 seconds after we cross the beach before things go cattywampus.
 
Another trick of mine is to be very gentle during the entering of the unusual attitude, so they don't feel the movement of the aircraft as much. I also will return the airplane to straight and level and have them "recover" from that. They are so spring loaded to do something, many will start to maneuver before even looking at the instruments.

Unusual attitudes is one of the more fun parts of being an instructor. We get to use all kinds of tricks on the students and its all for learning.
 
We would do the close your eyes and fly, except we would do 2 or 3 turns before, ''open your eyes''. And sometimes add a slight climb while turning.

My usual recovery is to look at the A/S , then immediately to the attitude indicator. Except once when I opened my eyes the A/I was covered.!! (steam gauges) So I looked at the one on the right side.
 
Zeldman said:
Except once when I opened my eyes the A/I was covered.!! (steam gauges) So I looked at the one on the right side.
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Covering everything AND Ed’s lake trick combined could get a tad... interesting. LOL.

Might have to ask the student if they brought their cat and their duck. :)
 
The last time an instructor tried this with me about all that happened was banking. I was flying a C-172 so fixed pitch prop. I listened for the engine note to change and corrected accordingly.

Don't take this the wrong way! I'm not some magical pilot who can fly without instruments in IMC. I'm just sharing something that I did that worked to keep more or less level.
 
denverpilot said:
Covering everything AND Ed’s lake trick combined could get a tad... interesting. LOL.

Might have to ask the student if they brought their cat and their duck. :)
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Or a half full bottle of whiskey.
 
jsstevens said:
The last time an instructor tried this with me about all that happened was banking. I was flying a C-172 so fixed pitch prop. I listened for the engine note to change and corrected accordingly.

Don't take this the wrong way! I'm not some magical pilot who can fly without instruments in IMC. I'm just sharing something that I did that worked to keep more or less level.
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That’s common with people who have learned to be attuned (pun intended?) to sound for airspeed. Another decent skill to learn.

Of course if there’s a blue knob it’s just another way to mess with someone... LOL. Make sure they’re paying attention to it during recoveries.

(And be ready to slap a hand away if they reach for the throttle first, since you’re setting up a real problem they might actually do!) :)
 
All of my instructors have done the getting into the unuasual attitude but the DPE for my instrument checkride had me do it. The only twist was after chin-to-chest he had me turn my head to the right so it chin-to-shoulder. Man, I was nowhere near the attitude I thought I was.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk
 
My instructor did something like this during my recent FR/IPC. Under the hood, I was to basically fly myself into something resembling a departure stall. IT is different than the usual unusual attitude exercise. The weird part was what the AI looked like under the hood to get the plane to stall in a turn with some power. My brain kept saying, "this is not what it's supposed to look like!"
 
jimhorner said:
CFI puts the plane into an unusual attitude, then says to recover. Look up, check instruments and recover. No big deal.
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I always just listened to the engine RPM and automatically knew what I was getting ... the recent flight reviews have also had me "dig my own" unusual attitude ... it doesn't take too long;)
 
On my instrument checkride the examiner had me close my eyes and then he gave me a bunch instructions to fly blind. I found it was rather disconcerting because I was sure the airplane was out of control by the time I was allowed to go back on instruments.
 
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